AA Domestic F - My Expectations Were Low.

[serfty]

And, do they still do the 'freshly' baked cookies LAX to the east, the aroma of which goes all around the cabin, and presumedly the whole plane?

No! They stopped on September 1st as USair's internal absorption of AA becomes apparent.

It seems the meal standards in Domestic First/Business have diminished since then as well!

There's a couple of expansive threads on FT over this:

Late 2014 AA/US Combined Domestic Meals - menu / pictures / etc. (Consolidated) - FlyerTalk Forums

Meals changes US & AA announced - international and domestic [Discussion] - Page 90 - FlyerTalk Forums

 

[Flying mermaid]

And, do they still do the 'freshly' baked cookies LAX to the east, the aroma of which goes all around the cabin, and presumedly the whole plane?

yes - not generally a cookie fan, but it was hard to resist the aroma.....

 

[Flying mermaid]

No! They stopped on September 1st as USair's internal absorption of AA becomes apparent.

It seems the meal standards in Domestic First/Business have diminished since then as well!

There's a couple of expansive threads on FT over this:

Late 2014 AA/US Combined Domestic Meals - menu / pictures / etc. (Consolidated) - FlyerTalk Forums

Meals changes US & AA announced - international and domestic [Discussion] - Page 90 - FlyerTalk Forums

oh - that's not good. - have a few sectors coming up in May

 

[JessicaTam]

oh - that's not good. - have a few sectors coming up in May

Same here. A few 2 and 3 class F flights, both long and short haul.

 

[Fifa]

Ah. Yes. The warm nuts. Then I know I'm back on AA.

Edit: I have 12xAA flights on a USA trip next year, (along with 2xUS and 1xDL at this stage, where AA doesn't fly), so there should be plenty of warm nuts along the way.

AA now offers snacks on a lot of the flights outside the traditional meal hours and the famous hot nuts are only served with those meals.

A basket full of snacks is offered and you choose what you would like - filled rolls/croissants, packs of nuts, pretzels, chips, biscuits, apples and bananas.
It certainly cut backs on food intake when on a SC run as you now don't get 3 breakfasts and/or 2 lunches in a row .

 

[Flying mermaid]

AA now offers snacks on a lot of the flights outside the traditional meal hours and the famous hot nuts are only served with those meals.

A basket full of snacks is offered and you choose what you would like - filled rolls/croissants, packs of nuts, pretzels, chips, biscuits, apples and bananas.
It certainly cut backs on food intake when on a SC run as you now don't get 3 breakfasts and/or 2 lunches in a row .

Is the basket of snacks as bad as it sounds on the other forum? And the meals for that matter? We are not doing status runs - just a bit of travel within the USA as part of a round the world and while AA domestic first is not as good as QF domestic J, I have found meals fine. It now sounds as though We should bring a packed lunch!

 

[serfty]

AA now offers snacks on a lot of the flights outside the traditional meal hours ... filled rolls/croissants,....

Not sure "filled" is the appropriate term:

Originally Posted by denCSA

The latest Dougie Deluxe sandwich from this weekend on ANC-DFW, a SIX HOUR flight...unbelievable. ... When the FA offered the basket I looked at her and said it's pretty sad AA is serving vending machine sandwiches on a six hour flight. She agreed and had an embarrassed look on her face. The 'sandwich' was 95% soggy bread (I assume they catered these in DFW on the outbound) and tasted as bad as it looks. Keepin' it Klassy AA, real Klassy...

And yes, I've complained to cust relations and Twitter, both had generic responses.

Originally Posted by Stripe
... They then passed around the short-haul snack basket supplemented with two pre-packaged sandwiches. The turkey pictured below, and something with cream cheese and jalapeno and some other stuff, which I did not try. The "sandwich" measured 2 inches x 2 inches. When I asked for another one and mentioned the tiny size, the FA said "welcome to the new American".

...

Originally Posted by AA-Flyer-SAN
... It was DISGUSTING. I've gotten better alternatives on AMTRAK in business class. The person next to me actually BOUGHT his FC ticket and doesn't know what he paid extra for. Here are some pics:

My savory option


The filling "sandwich".


Thanks Doug Parker.

 

[serfty]

However, changes have been announced (this after 1 month of the service); they are changing the "Flight Length" criteria to "about" 2:30 (it was 1000 miles [~2:45]) and improving the "Snack Sandwiches (pictured above):

Originally Posted by JonNYC
Meal window will be reduced to 2 hrs 30 min. More exception markets- DCA/IAD-MIA, DFW-MEX, ORD-AUS.

Return of ice cream to flights that dropped it. Snack baskets will see improved sandwiches. Breakfast flights with the baskets will now include pastries. Warm nuts return to flights over 2 hrs and under 2.5 hrs. Chicken catering quality to be improved.

Exception markets added Oct. 16. Everything else is Nov. 1.

70% of feedback received in September were meal complaints.

Improving "Snack Sanwiches"? - there's a broad swath ...

 

[Fifa]

Is the basket of snacks as bad as it sounds on the other forum? And the meals for that matter? We are not doing status runs - just a bit of travel within the USA as part of a round the world and while AA domestic first is not as good as QF domestic J, I have found meals fine. It now sounds as though We should bring a packed lunch!

Over the last 3 days we have had 7 flights from SEA to BGI.
The snacks were only ok and the rolls were pretty gross with not much filling.
Breakfast is fine - I had the steel cut oats which comes with brown sugar and dried fruit mix, plus fresh fruit and a 'biscuit' or roll. +1 had the quiche which he enjoyed.
For lunch we both had the same - salad, beef enchilada (quite tasty), roll (I chose a pretzel roll that was really sweet) and a cookie for dessert.

Our flight from DFW-MIA was over two hours late due to a late incoming aircraft and we missed our connection to Barbados. As a result our flight the next morning was in Y . We were #1 & #2 on the upgrade list but were warned the afternoon before that business was full. The aircraft was one of the refurbed international 757s and we were given seats in the 'main cabin extra' section which had a lot more leg room. When the trolley came round I asked if Oneworld Emerald received a free snack, the FA said she didn't know but told us to choose something anyway! We both had the chicken, avocado, egg and salad sandwich which my +1 said looked like a kid had thrown it together for their lunch. However it wasn't too bad and had lots of fresh chicken and salad in it as opposed to the slim pickings in the F snack roll.

 

[dajop]

Is it also true that there is no food on flights served after 8pm? I know someone who will shortly be taking a flight leaving ORD at 20:10, a four hour flight to SFO, in F, and he observed that no meals were to be served. He was wondering whether he could ask for something to buy from the economy food for sale , I laughed as that also cuts out at 8pm.

Bit of a paradigm shift when you come from a part of the world where meal availability is highly likely on any 4 hr flight - irrespective of class of travel or whether full service or LCC (with $ obviously for the latter).

 

[Fifa]

Not sure "filled" is the appropriate term:

I was being generous!
The FA called it a filled roll but it was actually quite empty, just like the picture.

 

[RooFlyer]

Is it also true that there is no food on flights served after 8pm? I know someone who will shortly be taking a flight leaving ORD at 20:10, a four hour flight to SFO, in F, and he observed that no meals were to be served. He was wondering whether he could ask for something to buy from the economy food for sale , I laughed as that also cuts out at 8pm.

Bit of a paradigm shift when you come from a part of the world where meal availability is highly likely on any 4 hr flight - irrespective of class of travel or whether full service or LCC (with $ obviously for the latter).

Yes; recently had a Domestic F DFW-MIA departed 8:25pm and only the snack tray offered (I had one of those packaged sandwiches, or rather two). Then 'international' J DFW-YYC also dep 8:25pm with same service.

On other dom F and 'int' J in the meal service window, the meals were OK, maybe on par with QF dom J meals when the latter are reasonable. Pretty heavy handed with the drinks in all cases .

Some comments in TR (but I've deleted the pics, sorry. Senior moment. http://www.australianfrequentflyer....ahamas-atlantis-nassau-62992.html#post1114871

 

[JohnK]

I can't complain about any of the AA flights I have had in the 2 trips via the USA a few years ago.

But then again my expectations are very low on these flights.

 

[JessicaTam]

I can't complain about any of the AA flights I have had in the 2 trips via the USA a few years ago.

But then again my expectations are very low on these flights.

It sounds like that the meals have dropped in quality in the last year or so, so you may have to lower your expectations further.

 

[Flying mermaid]

Over the last 3 days we have had 7 flights from SEA to BGI.
The snacks were only ok and the rolls were pretty gross with not much filling.
Breakfast is fine - I had the steel cut oats which comes with brown sugar and dried fruit mix, plus fresh fruit and a 'biscuit' or roll. +1 had the quiche which he enjoyed.
For lunch we both had the same - salad, beef enchilada (quite tasty), roll (I chose a pretzel roll that was really sweet) and a cookie for dessert.

Our flight from DFW-MIA was over two hours late due to a late incoming aircraft and we missed our connection to Barbados. As a result our flight the next morning was in Y . We were #1 & #2 on the upgrade list but were warned the afternoon before that business was full. The aircraft was one of the refurbed international 757s and we were given seats in the 'main cabin extra' section which had a lot more leg room. When the trolley came round I asked if Oneworld Emerald received a free snack, the FA said she didn't know but told us to choose something anyway! We both had the chicken, avocado, egg and salad sandwich which my +1 said looked like a kid had thrown it together for their lunch. However it wasn't too bad and had lots of fresh chicken and salad in it as opposed to the slim pickings in the F snack roll.

thanks - we have one 6 hour flight (JFK-SFO) so that shouldn't be too bad and anyway it won't do us any harm to starve a bit at the end of a holiday where no doubt we will have eaten more than we should! The others are short and we weren't expecting much.

 

[DC3]

I have to admit that I have polished-off multiple breakfasts/lunches/dinners on some days of flying with AA in the past. So definitely not all bad news.

 

[JohnK]

It sounds like that the meals have dropped in quality in the last year or so, so you may have to lower your expectations further.

My expectations were low and I was pleasantly surprised.

Sandwich and can of coke on LAX-DCA flight in economy. And had some sort of snack and cup of soft drink on other short flights in economy.

If that has gone that so be it.

 

[dajop]

My expectations were low and I was pleasantly surprised.

Sandwich and can of coke on LAX-DCA flight in economy. And had some sort of snack and cup of soft drink on other short flights in economy.

If that has gone that so be it.

That's good to hear. As a WP 3 or 4 years ago doing ORD to LAX all I got in economy was a single plastic cup of coke from a bottle and maybe a very small packet of nuts for the 4 hour flight. Mind you last year traveling MCI-ORD on AA eagle I was given 2 very strong scotch and cokes on a much much shorter flight in economy.

 

[Mal]

My observations from 11 AA F sectors over the last couple of weeks.

- Catering is very bad at the moment. Some of this is being rectified, but here are some examples:
. Breakfast flights being catered with chips, pretzels, energy bars etc as the food.
. Flights just over 2 hours not being catered with a meal, but just the above plus some horrid 'mini rolls' discussed elsewhere on the internet (the FAs warn you not to take them from the basket - seriously)
. Lunch meals using low quality ingredients.
. Small numbers of certain drinks carried onboard (eg entire plane, including Buy-on-board for economy has 4 heinekens loaded)

Food service was always Front to Back for my flights. No distinction between North/South/East/West and odd or even.
FA's know that catering is horrible. You should have seen the look on a few of the FA's faces when they come out of the galley with a small basket of rubbish junk.

One improvement I did see during my flights is that on one of my 'breakfast' flights, some fruit was added to the basket selections.

 

[docjames]

Had a discussion with the FAs today (an hour ago!).

The "short flight" reductions in food are highly unpopular but likely to stay - but with a refinement in what is offered so it's not so meagre. They were particularly unhappy serving "self open" "meals" to pax and not presenting it properly, plus not having a hot option to offer was causing consternation.

The "longer flight" meals had dropped in standard but have picked up already. I'm now 2/2 on US and AA flights that were perfectly acceptable (without being of "Neil perry" standard but decent "comfort" food).

So hello everyone from DFW, and let's hope its 3/3 decent meals!

Edit: orders taken front to rear on eastbound, rear to front westbound. Served in mixed order on both flights based on who was ready (ie. Who wasn't in the lav or seat mate climbing up getting stuff from lockers), but broadly served front to rear.