Qantas international Economy Class meals

[hutch]

QF1 Syd to Sin - 13 May

Similar to Matt's earlier post - which I've copied appropriately.

Water, then pretzel/soy cracker mixes and offered drinks after takeoff.

Then lunch with 3 choices available - twice cooked beef and rice (not sure why cooking beef twice is a selling point), Roast chicken and veg, plus the vegetable pasta - with I think included AFF's favourite orange vegetable.

Served with a focaccia and cheese & crackers.

Went the beef.



Was an acceptable international economy meal.

Bulla ice creams then handed out after lunch.

The flight crew came around offering snacks later in the flight, which were also available in the galley.

A snack served before landing - a pie or a mozzarella and cauliflower arancini ball (I think).


Sauce was provided.

Apart from perhaps having a small side salad with lunch, can't ask for much more.

Good service from crew. Feedback provided.

 

[FlyingKangaroo]

twice cooked beef and rice (not sure why cooking beef twice is a selling point),

In theory, it would suggest a more tender end result (though a long slow cook once should yield the same result). In practice... well.

If I saw it on a menu, I personally would specifically interpret it favourably in terms of increasing my chances of getting a tender rather than tough and chewy beef, just as I do the term "slow-cooked".

Unless they just mean reheating it in an airplane oven... or is it now thrice-cooked?

 

[anat0l]

twice cooked beef and rice (not sure why cooking beef twice is a selling point), ..

Looks like an Asian preparation.

So my guess is that "twice cooked beef" here is an approximate translation of the Chinese Sichuan (Szechuan) dish hui guo rou. Literally translated, it means "return to the pot meat" and it's usually prepared with pork, but beef is not unusual if less common.

Here I'm going to guess that QF has made (or rather, ordered) a rendition of the dish (or rather, a rendition of the sauce), because after cooking, chilling then reheating, a lot of the point of making a good hui guo rou is sort of lost (particularly as well that this is a Y meal).

 

[Nessa1977]

16.5.26 QF178 ZQN to MEL

Herbed chicken salad with farro and potato salad. Snack: Cheese and crackers.

How one is supposed to cut the chicken with flimsy wooden cutlery is beyond me.

Hot meal was beef meatballs with polenta and caponata.

 

[Wing Nut]

QF153 MEL - AKL this morning, braised beef mash and veg for lunch with houmous and crackers for later watching a movie. Quite tasty, couple of reds may have helped

 

[anat0l]

QF25 SYD-HND dep 2030 a/c 333

Meal service announced as supper followed by breakfast. No paper menus and no menus on the IFE (except drinks selection), so the cabin manager announced the dishes each time.

Supper service had three options: roast chicken with potatoes and vegetables; beef with ginger and bamboo shoots with rice; and vegetarian Shanghai fried noodles.

As a Platinum, the CSM approached me before meal service started to ask for my preference, which was served alongside anyone who had a SPML.





The main was served with a piece of warm focaccia bread and a creme caramel for dessert.

The main was branded on the container as "simmered beef in ginger and bamboo shoots". Surprisingly, the beef was very good. Decent slices of beef, not tough, good ginger taste through, and the bamboo shoots worked with it. Rice is rice - I didn't eat any.

The focaccia was soft and nice herbs through it. Very tasty.

The creme caramel is better than most packaged ones in that the dessert actually has some body to it - this isn't a cream coloured jelly with lots of sugar loaded in; it is actually creamy. With a hint of burn in the caramel sauce, this dessert is pretty good. It's just very sweet, so I didn't finish it. I could have saved it and a spoon for when the trays were cleared for tea/coffee service later, but I couldn't be bothered.


Approximately 2 hours before landing, breakfast was served. Choices were again announced, which included a frittata with has browns and chicken sausage, or a fruit platter. I went for the platter on the latter, having had a lot to eat the previous day and knowing a good lounge in transit lay ahead.

Either dish was served with a raisin and oat muffin.

The fruit platter ("seasonal") consisted of rockmelon, pineapple, watermelon and a bunch of grapes - I say bunch because there were so many of them, had they not been picked off the stems, you'd likely be holding onto a bunch.



Great crew working the Y section on this flight. Had some really great talks about working at QF, QF inflight catering and QF strategy (armchair talk, but still).

The first meal service was quite slow due to something off about the chicken meals. Might have had to do with how the chicken meals were stored then loaded on board - apparently they weren't hot enough even though crew had followed prep instructions. Also not helping was about a dozen passengers in the forward cabin wanting to use the bathroom, forcing the aisle dance of the trolley by the crew.

 

[MEL_Traveller]

The crème caramel is yummy, but there are two little tabs on the bottom of the pot which you’re supposed to break, releasing the pudding and letting the sauce flow over it!

Odd choice given you can’t do that on board!!

 

[blackcat20]

QF103 Syd to Honolulu June

Dinner was the beef with Mac n cheese. Beef was melt in your melt, pulled apart perfectly. From memory there was a veg dish and a chicken salad.


Breakfast options were pumpkin frittata or the fruit plate shown above. Tasty enough and hit the spot. We lost our kids meals with all our flight dramas so they had the fruit plate, but weren't impressed with what was on it aside from the grapes.

 

[anat0l]

QF128 HKG-SYD dep 1930 a/c 333

Meal service was dinner then breakfast. One of the FAs who worked our section said it was a light dinner; didn't seem so light to me (as I don't know what a full dinner would entail). I'm surprised the breakfast was a full breakfast (as opposed to say a "cafe breakfast").

Once again, no paper menus and the IFE didn't mention the options. They didn't preannounce the options over the PA and only mentioned them as they met each passenger.

Options were:

• Beef bolognaise with penne pasta
• Mala tofu with rice (I believe one of the FAs mispronounced the initial one as "Malay"; I didn't order this, so I'm guessing what was intended)
• Chicken with stir fried noodles

Before meals were offered, FAs came around with bottles of water and a packet of nibbles; or, as David from Simply Aviation would call this, a "salty snack".


While you can't eat or drink these, they then came around offering eye shades and earplugs to anyone who wanted them:


My fellow exit row passenger and I opted for the chicken. Just as well, as we had grabbed some of the last chicken loaded - about 1-2 rows behind us there was only beef and tofu available. I was told by one of the FAs that one time the beef was the most popular option on the route, then it switches back to chicken, back and forth it goes.




The main was served with a small salad of potato, red cabbage and corn, as well as a bread roll infused with garlic butter.

Tasty enough, but it's stir fried noodles with green vegetables. It still sounded less pedestrian than the beef (and although I like mapo tofu, not sure I wanted to chance the tofu).

Following the main meal, frozen desserts were handed out, in the form of this blueberry yoghurt bar. Think a Weiss bar except made of blueberry frozen yoghurt.



In the morning, the choices consisted of the usual fruit platter, or eggs with bacon, sausage and vegetables. One of the FAs asked me quickly while he was still working the cabin in front of me whether I would like to set aside an option, and I asked for a hot option to be set aside. It might not have been material difference in the end as many people behind my row seemed to be able to get eggs.

The eggs were served with a couple of rashers of bacon, a sausage, a tomato and a bunch of sugar snap peas. Alongside was served a banana and chocolate chip muffin.





Great crew working my side of the Economy cabin. One of them has about 25 years experience in the industry and used to work in more senior roles as well as a number of ground roles in other airlines as well as Qantas. His current ambition is to transfer to a different crew base, so he's accepted working in Economy in order to increase his chances of success and position in the queue.

 

[MEL_Traveller]

HKG services are now double meal IIRC? So two main meals instead of a main and smaller refreshment as you might get to say Jakarta or Manila.