Gourmet dining at 30,000 feet
Airline food — even if passengers can get it in scraps — has never been generally known for its gourmet quality, but an emerging trend is for airlines to upgrade their premium offerings and even add celebrity chefs.
Delta Air Lines in recent years began offering food created by Todd English and Michelle Bernstein. Two other US carriers, Continental Airlines and American Airlines, have also been busy overhauling their offerings with the help of celebrity chefs.
“Airlines have a long history of using celebrity chefs to help them create meals for first- and business-class passengers. But most US carriers trimmed or eliminated such programs during the economic turbulence that followed the 2001 terrorist attacks. American, for example, pared its 16-member chef conclave to six, and then three,” wrote Courant.com.
Another world-renowned chef, Charlie Trotter, recently joined forces with United Airlines, a carrier that has been under bankruptcy protection and is known more for cost cutting than cuisine.
“The recent moves are a sign of the airline industry’s economic revival and increasing focus on overseas expansion,” suggests Courant.com.
Most of the food the celebrity chefs create is being served on long-haul or international flights. The trend has little or no application for coach passengers more accustomed to bags of pretzels.
“If you have the chutzpah to charge a customer $8,000 to sit in business class or $10,000 or more than that to sit in first, you better serve a good product,” said Henry Harteveldt, vice president of travel industry research at Forrester Research in San Francisco. “The food can’t be lousy.”
Report by David Wilkening
David
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