Talk about a step down. After my Garuda First Class flight my next flight was a 10hr flight to Houston in United Economy on UA21. I decided not to upgrade because economy was only about ¼ full and if I can have a row to myself I really don’t mind flying behind the curtain. What surprised me was the meal, the subject of this week’s Meal of the Week.
I have flown Untied Polaris twice recently and really enjoyed the food. In almost all aspects it is a step up over the previous BusinessFirst and Global First offerings. But this flight was in economy class. I figured the food would not be great so enjoyed a large breakfast prior to the 10am flight.
Shortly after levelling off the meal service began with the choices of spinach manicotti or chicken breast with risotto. I had planned on ordering pasta but the spinach…oh well, chicken it was.
Wow! The chicken was tender, flavorful, and did not have that microwave dinner taste (you know what I mean). The mushroom sauce was perfect – unlike the sauce on my short rib in Polaris earlier in the month. Even better, the risotto was absolutely outstanding. I love risotto and would like to think that I can discern good and bad. This was some really tasty mushroom risotto.
The grain salad and bread were not great, but it did not matter – I was satisfied. Oh, props to United for even offering real Kerrygold Irish butter.
Then came ice cream and the Belgian ice cream in economy is far better than the processed ice cream in Polaris. This was delicious.
Fast-forward to an hour before landing. Hot sandwiches were served: turkey and gouda on a pretzel roll. That makes a better meal in my book than the chicken breast served in Polaris. Delicious.
So perhaps it was just for this particular flight or a testament to my unrefined tastes, but I appreciated the meal so much on my AMS-IAH United this week I’d honestly say it beat my first class meal from just a few weeks earlier.
Agreed — I’ve been impressed with the quality of the meals I’ve gotten in UA economy over the past year. As it was with you, low starting expectations may have played a role. But still, a good surprise! My only complaint would be that the portion sizes can be really really small.
Hrmm, if UA keeps stepping up their long haul economy product, maybe it will be time to start considering them again.
Just so you know, your willingness to fly coach earns you SO many points in my book. Yep, my wife and I opt for J or even F when it makes sense. But points and miles bloggers who are virtually unwilling (cough cough) to fly in Y lose a lot of my respect and appear unrelatable.
And a whole article devoted to praising decent/good food, that was most certainly NOT fancy shmancy? Kudos, Matthew. Keep up the fantastic work!
Totally agree! I like other blogs but they lose me on their excitement of flying J for “only” $2K worth of points as a great value because the cash price was $8K, when those same points could get like 4 separate flights in coach! For people who literally accumulate more points than they know what to do with, sure, but not me.
Jake, Steve – I couldn’t agree with you more. I get that often the goal is to fly in premium cabins, but frankly, I just want to travel. So, if I can get to fantastic destinations where I’ll spend the majority of my time outside of a plane, I’m totally fine with flying in economy. Plus, when I travel for work, I don’t have a choice but to “Fly America” and in economy class. I think Matthew’s blog does a good job of presenting the good and bad of all classes of service and would like to see other blogs provide information in the same manner.
Jake+Steve+Daniel: thank you for the kind words. If my upgrade does not clear, I’ll be in coach again to FRA in a couple weeks…!
Hi there! so my boyfriend actually loved the turkey and gouda pretzel roll sandwhich and weve been trying to find out if we can purchase them in stores or online. Do you by chance remember if there was a brand name?
Can’t find brand name. Maybe someone else can chime in.
The only info I saw on the package was the name DF The Solutions Company and their website http://www.dfmarketing.de.
Enjoying your blog.
Best Wishes!
Thanks! Good find.
United’s economy class food is crap. Don’t what you’re talking about. The Pretzel Roll Turkey with Gouda was nice, that’s about it. Plus they won’t let your meal digest before they come rushing with their trash bags. Completely sucks. They need to fly BA across the Atlantic and see what economy food service ought to be like.