How to avoid a bad in-flight meal
(CNN) -- My stomach still churns at the thought of the ham-and-cheese sandwich I ate on a recent flight between Atlanta and Baltimore.
The meat was embalmed in a generous layer of mayonnaise. The
too-salty potato crisps soaked in a puddle of oil. The soggy lettuce was limp and flavorless. A man named Willie served it with all the enthusiasm of a baggage handler loading a heavy trunk onto a conveyor belt.
And that was before I boarded the flight.
I ordered this second-rate dinner at Hartsfield International Airport a few minutes prior to takeoff. The price of such unprincely fare? A princely $7.48.
Perhaps I should have considered the airline's alternative, a turkey sandwich with bottled water doled out to passengers in a deli bag as they boarded, but I was dubious. Like most other air travelers, I swallowed all of those stories about the awful state of in-flight grub, hook, line and sinker.
I should have taken the plane fare. Airline food industry executives
insist their offerings are tasty, nutritious and better than the stuff
inside the airport.
"There's a great deal of effort being made to improve airline
meals on several fronts," says Bill Slay, a spokesman for LSG Sky Chefs, the nation's largest airline caterer.
Carry-on meals
Two years ago I gleefully reported that passengers in the know were shunning air fare for takeout that they brought on board. When I boarded the recent Atlanta-Baltimore flight, I assumed that I could find better food before I entered the plane.
I'm in good company. "Airline food has become so inconsistent that I
have seen people bring their own lunch on board," says Stephen Frickx,
an Oak Park, Illinois, financial manager. "Some are bought at the airport
and some even made a sandwich at home and brought it along. If I could
save some money by bringing my own meal on board, I would."