Gabi Friedlander, an aide to New York City Councilman Brad Lander, is only one of many kosher airline travelers who have a beef with major international airlines.
Traveling on LOT Polish Airlines from New York’s JFK International Airport to Budapest, “I was served only OU frozen food (not only main dish).”
Friedlander noted that it was the same food on all classes including Business Class and that the food on the return flight “was really bad – “canned airplane food.
Travel agents and other travel experts agree that the poor quality of the food of late is the subject of many complaints by travelers.”
Stogel Kosher Catering in Antwerp, Belgium, provides frozen kosher meals to airlines flying out of Europe such as Delta, United, Brussels and Jet.
Perri Spiegel, Stogel’s General Manager, says these meals are “much better than the meals served out of the United States,” and notes that “We receive great letters and reviews about these meals. They are tasty and very presentable.”
But he reveals that there’s a second kind of airline meal.
“The other type of meal we offer is the long-life meal, or shelf-stable meal,” she says. “This is already going into a different category. Although the meals are really cooked the same way, the sterilizing process does change the taste and look of the meal.”
Spiegel explained that the reason an airline company or airline catering company would choose this meal over frozen is because there is less expense involved in the shipping and storage.
“They do not have to be shipped in a freezer truck or dry ice and once they arrive, they don’t have to be kept in a freezer, obviously, lowering the expenses,” she says.
“When I get an order for these meals from a new customer, I try to steer them to our frozen meals. They don’t always listen, to my dismay.”
Spiegel told Kosher Today that the company was taking many steps to upgrade the meals and the presentation despite the disadvantages the company faces from limitations imposed by airlines.
“I have also just invested in a very expensive packaging machine which we will be using a sort of plastic dish instead of the aluminum that we are currently using because I feel that plastic will not only present the meal better, but there will be no aluminum odor or after-taste.”
Travel agents are surprised that airlines like LOT do not receive more complaints even as they are increasingly carrying more kosher passengers.
food from stogel in business was so bad
what a shame to take advantage of jewish customers
To Paris and served a kosher meal by a Montreal company. The food was so good and fresh we actually kept the label to look them up later. I have no interest or benefit but was very impressed they are called “food with a conscience” canada.
If everyone in the USA feels the kosher airline meals are that bad then here’s an opportunity for a young person to open a business and provide a better product.
That’s a stupid comparison. Know why? Because they order in bulk. So they order the day’s treif meals in bulk, and it comes out relatively cheap.
If they only need 10 kosher meals, that’s not enough for a bulk order (and the system doesn’t do individual orders), so they estimate how many kosher meals they’ll need in a given month/ two months/ six months and order the entire supply at once. Obviously if they only go through one order (bulk order) every 4 months, they’re going to prefer the long-life stuff.
just take your own supply of long life gefilta fish and long life bread.
will work for your way out and back
Enjoy Langerhuize meals on board of Alitalia, Air France, KLM, Air Berlin and many other airlines. Fresh meals delivered on a daily basis and weekly or monthly deep frozen or long life meals.Very good, the mashgichim are Lubavitchers!!!
20 some years ago, we had a Montreal caterer, on Air Canada, to Israel; . the food was actually good!
In response to the explanation from Stogal Caterers, that would mean that all kosher suppliers to airlines world wide have the same predicament. How is it that the kosher meals coming out from US caterers are really total garbage. It’s interesting that the photo is of a Turkish Airlines meal, kosher meals out of Istanbul on Turkish are Parev or Milchig and are served fresh. A piece of fresh salmon and salad is much more welcomed than a frozen piece of meat that tastes like old leather, I understand that not many places can offer fresh food, you would think… Read more »
I bring my own food even though I travel business. I bring healthy cookies,salt free nuts and blintzes with low fat cheese.
Hermolis meals are the BEST plane meals,only thing is you need to start out from UK.
Whatever happened to a Jew never travels without food? I always have plenty of food with me and never rely on the airline meals when taking flights – no matter how long the flight. If the meal on the airline is good then it’s a bonus . Plus I never have to wait to be served or have my tray taken away. I eat when I want. And on more than one occasion I have shared my food with fellow Jews.
There is no better than Stogel kosher l have tasted all of them
I travel a lot, seeing a stogels meal for me is a nightmare. Those canned meals are not edible and they have a putrid smell.
Hermolis out of Heathrow are very good, there is no reason why stogels (or borenstein) have to be so bad
Don’t do it. Never do it. I got a kosher meal on my last flight and I became so sick I had to go to the emergency room half a day later. Never again. Just bring some veggies or chips or something. RANCID FOOD IS NEVER WORTH IT.
To 2
I was served a grand total of a Beigel’s rugelach and a Dole canned fruit cup. That’s it: no protein; all sugar. Even some simple corn flakes and (cholov yisrael) milk or soy milk would have been more balanced and a bit less junky than THAT! Meanwhile, the treif-eaters around me were dining on cheese omelettes, FRESH fruit, and small bagels or muffins with butter and jam. Don’t tell me that my kosher “meal” cost just as much to make, package, and serve as the treif one — that would be a BIG lie. I say, don’t serve anything but… Read more »
I’m always relieved when I see hummus. At least a protien to quiet my stomach for the next 18 hours of travel. The rest of the meal definitely doesn’t help in that department, unfortunately…
I’m not sure what you mean by cheaper than ever before. from my experience the price of flights to London 20-30 years ago was $200 round trip and now they are mostly $800+ unless you go in a budget airline, but according to inflation rates they should be $300+
I understand more of the complaints in first class for meals, but airline tickets are cheaper than ever before, and that is because they are cutting corners to beat the competition. If you want better meals, you will be paying for better meals in your ticket prices and then will subsequently complaining about that.