QANTAS: New menu after catering smashed by vegatarians

After a complete rubbishing in the media about its lack of vegetarian alternatives, and a promise to do better, here is what you can expect on a Qantas domestic flight in economy these days:

• Breakfast packs with yoghurt, banana, honey and macadamia bread and sliced apples
• Bolognese calzone
• Chicken and potato Mediterranean croquettes
• Zucchini and caramelised onion frittata
• Ham and egg hollandaise ciabatta
• Spinach and ricotta wrap
• Roast chicken and chive on a light rye sandwich
• Zucchini and corn fritters
• Gluten-free and plant-based chocolate caramel slice
• Pear and ginger cake

Yes, I’m finding it hard to contain my excitement too.

“Qantas is continuing to invest in product and service as we work to get back to our best. We have been progressively returning normal service levels and last month we fast tracked the return of vegetarian options on all flights.

Executive Manager of Product and Service Phil Capps

It’s free!

The release also crows that:

‘Qantas is the only domestic airline to offer complimentary food and beverages, baggage, and onboard WiFi on its domestic Boeing 737s and Airbus A330s in Economy.’

Well that is true, but on the food front, on Virgin, you can actually make a selection from their menu, even though you buy it – its probably less than the margin you pay on Qantas fares over and above the price of a Virgin airfare, so I’d be careful with that comparison Qantas PR.

Plant-Based

And if you are really eager to find out what is on offer, you can step into the Qantas Club lounge and taste such delicacies as plant-based ‘cocktail pies with tomato sauce’. If you qualify for access to the business lounge, then you can enjoy the delights of plant-based penne pasta bolognese with parmesan. Given that they seem to have penne bolognese, of indeterminate plant or animal origin is standard fare at the Business lounge (yuk!), you won’t get me making a special trip to sample this ‘option’. Take this paragraph as my ‘feedback’.

2PAXfly Takeout

This is another timely reminder to wear your seatbelt when seated. Holding you close to your seat will protect you from the sort of injuries sustained on this flight, when unsecured passengers flew to the ceiling of the aircraft, and then came crashing down once the ‘drop’ ceased.

The hope will be that this is an anomaly – a ‘freak accident’ in casual parlance. If it is a systemic error either mechanical or electronic, then this is a larger concern for the airlines that fly Boeing Dreamliner 787 aircraft. Let’s hope it isn’t. If it is, it will pile on the woes to Boeing’s existing stack.

Qantas domestic catering whether it be on the ground or in economy in the sky leaves a lot to be desired. I was subjected to the blandness of beef and black bean and oyster sauce in Business Class last week. Not a dish I will be ordering again. I should have taken the chicken salad option. On a breakfast flight, the red pepper frittata was actually tasty, but the sausage was not.

Catering did seem to take a bit of a dive after the pandemic. There were the halcyon days of actually not-bad food delivered to your seat when initial pandemic restrictions were introduced – but that is long gone.

At the moment, Virgin in the lounge beats Qantas food hands down. However, you can’t get a gin and tonic in the Virgin Lounge, now wifi in the air. Six of one – a half dozen of the other.