Virgin Australia Business Class - Meals, Menus & Service

[bcworld]

I read your post, then looked at your avatar (profile picture). I couldn't help but chuckle.


Surely your sausage roll at least came also with a side salad and/or a roll, and a cake? Actually, I'm surprised there was only one choice. I thought the other choice would be a more substantial salad (e.g. pumpkin and feta), or a cheese plate.

No side salad. My experience on OOL-MEL anyway. And to call the dessert a cake would be a bit of an insult to cakes.

The cabin was 8/8 and everyone in row 1 opted for the antipasto platter...that the FA on the MEL-OOL sector referred to as 'a meat snack'! That left row 2 with sausage rolls or Y sandwiches.

 

[maninblack]

The food on VA J 737 services has probably deteriorated rather than improved, almost to the point of "why do they bother". They really are as bad as the North American legacy carriers in fact they are possibly worse in this regard. Add to this a pretty lousy seat and what are you actually getting? Good access to a toilet.

 

[Jousams]

I read your post, then looked at your avatar (profile picture). I couldn't help but chuckle.


Surely your sausage roll at least came also with a side salad and/or a roll, and a cake? Actually, I'm surprised there was only one choice. I thought the other choice would be a more substantial salad (e.g. pumpkin and feta), or a cheese plate.

No alternative by the time it got to me (only 3 others on board though...) I was 2F.

It had a desert which was (I think) the orange cake that they normally serve and that was it. Oh and then FA bought bread round afterwards.


No pic as I only had it for about 5 seconds haha.

Ironically, I'm currently dieting and god it makes life miserable.

 

[Princess Fiona]

Chicken pie with mashed potatoes, peas and carrots on today's lunch flight MEL-NTL

4/8 J Pax, acceptable service but lacking a little polish ? new CSM.
Atrocious luggage service on arrival into NTL. Waited > 20 minutes for my suitcase. It arrived behind 30 or so non-priority cases

 

[QF WP]

Nice pic PF, making me hungry.

Just when all you wanted to do was go home

That's because your bag(s) were probably first on as you checked in earlier than most (given your Intl connection).

 

[dk4]

VA choice, vegetarian or meat. Lunch version: (Pictures from different flights, hence the different desserts).

 

[docjames]

Breakfast this morning - Polenta, bacon, beans and two different sausages. Fresh fruit (strawberry, pineapple and grapes). Needed some yoghurt with it! Fruit roll (warmed).

Disappointing no newspapers offered either - I purposely hadn't read in lounge as I expected one on board (in line with previous J flights).

 

[JessicaTam]

snip

Disappointing no newspapers offered either - I purposely hadn't read in lounge as I expected one on board (in line with previous J flights).

Perhaps they are following QF's lead.

 

[dk4]

Perhaps they are following QF's lead.

Both of my recent J flights had newspapers offered, in fact even on a short Y flight this week, in row 3, the CS continued down the aisle offering papers until he had run out. (As an aside, this was a precious metal heavy flight, more people in the priority boarding queue than the general boarding one. :shock

I think that it's always best to ask, when the CS doesn't do something that they should, like newspapers, because 9 times out of 10 they have simply forgotten. Although, I did ask for a mocktail on a recent afternoon flight (after being offered a juice) and was told they are phasing them out...only for one to magically appear on a flight a few days later . And conversely, on a recent Qantas flight I was offered a pre-take-off cranberry juice instead of the normal strawberry concoction. (Afternoon B737 Juice on Virgin, and Cranberry on Qantas, my mouth was confused as to which airline I had just boarded )

 

[bcworld]

For anyone that needs to see a pic of a sausage roll, here it is. I might be considered a bit 'unaustralian' but I don't normally have sauce with sausage rolls or pies...so having it served with the relish touching the sausage roll was quite confronting!

On my other recent sector I got this which was good. I would call it a vegetarian quesadilla but I don't know what Virgin call it because the FA didn't seem to know either - this is the one who called the antipasto platter a 'meat snack'. She described it like this: "...it's cheese, and tomato, and avocado, and beans...spicy!" Very strange lady!

 

[i_hate_the_tulla_freeway]

Had reasonably decent beef cheeks in VA J the other day for lunch. Kinda surprised. The FA was excellent too

 

[notzac]

On my other recent sector I got this which was good. I would call it a vegetarian quesadilla but I don't know what Virgin call it because the FA didn't seem to know either - this is the one who called the antipasto platter a 'meat snack'. She described it like this: "...it's cheese, and tomato, and avocado, and beans...spicy!" Very strange lady!

Looks pretty quesadilla-ish to me as well. Yum!

Did the FA really call an antipasto platter a meat snack..?

 

[Plutonus]

It's quesadillas, I think VA need some staff training on menus. Everytime I've had the quesadilla offered or the 'meat snack' they haven't known the word and usually followed up with "I don't eat Mexican". It's fine, we can't all know every word, but when it's being offered I'd hope the party offering knew what it was in case I didn't :/

 

[anat0l]

Looks definitely like a quesadilla.

With the proliferation of Mexican fast food around the place and given that a good deal of the VA crew are quite young, I'm surprised they have no idea how to describe that. Aren't the descriptions on the labels / foils of the food when they have to prepare them?

Even if you had no idea, given the thing looks like a wrap bread, why not just call it a toasted wrap? A better guess than a meat stack!

Thank goodness the last time I was served by VA crew in J they knew that the fish I was given was salmon. I would dread to think what they would try to say it was if they had to think on their feet.

 

[lovestotravel]

It's quesadillas, I think VA need some staff training on menus. Everytime I've had the quesadilla offered or the 'meat snack' they haven't known the word and usually followed up with "I don't eat Mexican". It's fine, we can't all know every word, but when it's being offered I'd hope the party offering knew what it was in case I didn't :/

This is exactly where VA falls down.. In dealing with customers who may (well the few that actually do) pay $500-$2000 for a flight and come from a wealthy background this childish humour and lack of professionalism is not acceptable.

Would you get that sort of comment in a high-end restaurant when you enquire about an item on the menu ? No

 

[drewbles]

This is exactly where VA falls down.. In dealing with customers who may (well the few that actually do) pay $500-$2000 for a flight and come from a wealthy background this childish humour and lack of professionalism is not acceptable.

Would you get that sort of comment in a high-end restaurant when you enquire about an item on the menu ? No

Ask them to serve you a Tempranillo and see how they pronounce it.

The proper pronunciation is tem-prah-nee-oh, but they just about all say tem-pra-nill-oh.

I've even had a few of them correct me and say 'oh you mean the tem-pra-nill-oh'.

(mind you, I had a staff member at Dan Murphys say the same, and they're meant to know about wine when they're working in the 'nice' wine section)

 

[quokka77]

Pronunciation of exotic food names is no big deal. With the amount they get paid (and no tips like a high end restaurant) I don't think you can really expect amazing gourmet service. Personal opinion - the whole foodie thing is a bit overdone.

 

[notzac]

Pronunciation of exotic food names is no big deal. With the amount they get paid (and no tips like a high end restaurant) I don't think you can really expect amazing gourmet service. Personal opinion - the whole foodie thing is a bit overdone.

If it's overdone, then VA should drop their prices accordingly.

Really, how hard is it to find out what the food and wine that's being served is called?

 

[anat0l]

Ask them to serve you a Tempranillo and see how they pronounce it.

The proper pronunciation is tem-prah-nee-oh, but they just about all say tem-pra-nill-oh.

I've even had a few of them correct me and say 'oh you mean the tem-pra-nill-oh'.

(mind you, I had a staff member at Dan Murphys say the same, and they're meant to know about wine when they're working in the 'nice' wine section)

Most on this forum wouldn't know how to pronounce it.

Same thing with Champagnes: Taittinger, Bollinger, Moet & Chandon. Not to mention that I'd like to see how many FAs - both from QF and VA - know that not every sparkling white wine is called "Champagne" - I'm not staking a high percentage.

I'm not too fussed on the pronunciation (even if I pick them up on it), but having no idea what it is called is damn well odd. Even restaurant waiters may not know how to exactly pronounce it, but the good ones should damn well know what the hell the dish is and how it is prepared! Even if the dish is Persian-style orange beignets with macerated blood orange and creme chantilly... someone waiting on you shouldn't just proffer, "No idea - let me ask the chef".

 

[Princess Fiona]

This is exactly where VA falls down.. In dealing with customers who may (well the few that actually do) pay $500-$2000 for a flight and come from a wealthy background this childish humour and lack of professionalism is not acceptable.

Would you get that sort of comment in a high-end restaurant when you enquire about an item on the menu ? No

I totally agree with you. I find on the whole the VA crews are getting it a bit better. They still by and large don't IMHO have the polish of a good QF Dom J crew (one or two male CSM's I have come across aside) and at times the J class experience leaves me a little underwhelmed. The catering is slowly but surely being refined. OT but I find asking someone if they want red or white and appearing from the galley with a glass of the "white" to be a tad underwhelming as a J experience ( this happened to me a couple of days ago).