Well BA certainly do in First and Club World. Believe it or not they had them on 747 'classics' back in the 1970's.

Well I guess some people have low standards. :E

By and large, airline meals are revolting. They are mass-produced, heavily-processed pap.

CX J class meals in the mid to late 80's were magnificent! QF J class a few years ago I had a superb steak LAX-BNE.....but not in the class of CX stuff in an earlier time...

I still fondly remember Y class CX flights between HKG & Europe, and every Y class pax being offered little glasses of cognac after the meal service, so very refined and ever so enjoyable....

I think the reason for no large scale installation of Microwaves is weight. Also, the existing system of cokk/chill/reheat has been around for a long time and is used around the globe. For a carrier to introduce a new way of doing meals? Problems and cost from the ordering of the machine, till selling it on.

It will be much cheaper to stay with the status quo and fiddle at the edges for Y. Simpler to alter for C + F. Which is why we've seen the lounge menu leap forward to solve the problem.

Well the last time I flew long-haul it was CX LHR-HKG then a 1hr connection to HKG-CEB.

Had CX not been serving airline meals (and bl00dy excellent Cantonese meals they were) then where the hell would I have eaten during my 17 or so hours of travelling?

Hi vctenderness,

There is only 1 onboard, which is in the Club World galley. The galley operator from First will come and use it occasionally, usually only for making scrambled egg for breakfast.

I am wondering how much would cost to have a decent meal in a intra European flight. I am willing to pay something in the region of 10 € for the sake of a decent meal like the ones in the 90's.

I expect given economies of scale, you're probably not far off in terms additional cost to improve quality.

I certainly suspect the current target price point given to the caterers by the airlines is far below 10EUR.... at least certainly for Economy and Business, they might stretch a little more for First, but not much. Catering is another expense for the airlines, but unlike stuff like fuel its easier to beat down your suppliers for cost savings on food. :E

As vctenderness stated they certainly on the 747 100s. They were always used in 1st class and would annoy the passengers when crew used to slam the door shut especially after manually whipping a tray of eggs and scrambeling them. The black cherry ice cream which used to be stowed in a dry ice box always got defrosted before service, unless the galley girl forgot about it and when the door opened it poured out like a purple river :D

Travelling First Class with BA back in the early 90s was great for food and wine.
Some of the Cabin Crew turned the service of food and wine in to a First Class show.
Both watching the Performance, and eating the food was brilliant entertainment.

Starter with a decent Montrachet, Beef with Lynch-Bages, and puds with Drambuie, all served just like they do at Le Manoir.
Brilliant.

The seats, though, those great big light grey things, were awful.
The pyjamas were great.

On the leg down to OZ, I particularly liked the way the CSD would scoop the yogurt out of the pot and into a white bowl for breakfast and then add some strawberries and chocolate flake on top. One in particular seemed quite shocked when I refused Bucks Fizz at 5am prior to landing in Sydney...

I recall reading that one US carrier saved a fortune by removing one Olive from each salad. Across a year? Imagine how much they can save by removing 2g of this a stick of that?

Unfortuantely, in this second great depression, the greatest majority of folks only look at the bottom line ticket price and many others have no say as the company has negotiated a bulk deal - which is much lower than the rack rate.

That's why the lounges turned into restaurants, much cheaper to do better food there, than on board for C+F.

When I was talking about 10 € I should have made clear of willing to pay 10 € more in my regular airline in exchange for better food.

Indeed Rwy in Sight, your meaning did come across. But those that think the same as you (and me) as a percentage of the pax??? :(

Reportedly attributed to Bob Crandall, one-time Chairman/President of American Airlines. He was the ultimate bean-counter and I've heard various estimates of the predicted saving, ranging from US$40K to US$0.5m per year (the latter is a bit hard to believe).

I had the pleasure of hearing him talk at a RAeS branch meeting many years ago when he walked into the lion's den at BA's Heathrow HQ (there was an all-out war between the two airlines in those days). Very entertaining speaker.

He didn't mention olives, though, :O

There was a story circulating back in the 80's that the Britannia beancounters had figured out they could save X amount in fuel per annum by no longer serving a large orange with their meals.

DaveReidUK,

"BA's Heathrow HQ (there was an all-out war between the two airlines in those days)"

That should have been a very long time ago because I still remember the "No way BA/AA" of a red carrier.

Anyway is the olive story true or is it an urban legend?

Because people constantly walking around the cabin isn't going to hinder the FA's as well as annoy other passengers. Not to mention queues for the microwaves. Plus how many meals do you take? What if some greedy guts has 4 or 5? How would such a thing be policed so to speak.

Personally I've never had a problem asking FA's for a drink or snack if they don't happen to be doing a service at the time. Meals have come a long way recently and I can't think of one bad meal in recent years. That is 'good for a plane meal', which can't really be compared to restaurant cuisine so enough of the allegations that I clearly don't know good food.

There is good and bad.
 

On occasions, travelling out of London City, I have connected with an Edelweiss flight in Switzerland. The tray meals they serve have always been appetising - and far superior to those served by their parent company, Swiss.

The worst meal was on a charter out of Gatwick with a company I fortunately cannot remember. The odour of reheated roast lamb, dowsed in vinegary mint sauce was enough to push the whole tray away!

BA used to run a scheme for staff whereby if you suggested some thing to save money they would investigate and if plausible you would get a share of savings.

I had noticed that out of London they were bulk loading bread rolls and placing a bread roll on the tray. I suggested they remove the one on the tray.

I received quite a good cash payment and the choice of a sizeable gift from a catalogue for my idea.

They worked out the cost of the bread plus the cost of placing it on the tray as each item had a 'cost' to perform this.

So I'm sure the olive story is true.