Travel Tale #5 – The stale bread versus the Chinese cracker-pot
The “Moslem” halal meal on British Airways was supposed to be today’s topic but I’m saving that for another day. This travel tale all started when a friend of mine shared his concept of airline food. I honestly feel that sometimes there is a vendetta against airline food, and in most cases I can understand why. The nostalgic aroma of economy tin foil over molten hot cauliflower is often one that doesn’t dissipate with time. I particularly enjoy the bits on the side though, and have a quiet liking to uncovering the desert which tends to be a no-no in normal life, but because you’re stuck 30’000ft in the air, its acceptable to indulge in double chocolate mousse otherwise you will die of starvation. The little bread roll that comes on the tray has somewhat petrified my friend, so much so that the mere taste may in fact put the whole meal in jeopardy. This made me think, in what kitchen in the world is that scarily perfectly round roll made to taste exactly the same on whatever flight you go on? I want to know, and I will find out the secret to the most consistent bread roll on the planet. Watch this space.
My favourite story though is one a colleague told me about on a China Air flight in business class. She loves the crackers and cheese, but for some reason the cheese outnumbered the crackers. You may think this is well…crackers, but she kindly asked for one more cracker to have the remaining twenty five pieces of brie left on her foldable tray. When she asked for this extra cracker she was met by the Chinese air steward’s frown saying – “only one packet per person”. My colleague was a little shaken by her abrupt defiance in extending one more 12p packet of crackers to her business class client. If she was asking for a kilo of camembert she would understand, but the 12p packet of crackers was the tipping point of this rather irate stewardess. After a bit of banter, the answer was still the same as the initial one – “grrr…only one packet per person…grrr”. So the lesson learned here is don’t annoy a Chinese air stewardess otherwise you will be frowned at for six remaining hours of flying, and that China Air has a one cracker policy – who would’ve known.
Halal Friendly Travel 