For all the pictures that go with this report, please click here.

Knowing the meal window times for airlines is pretty important to me. When flying business class, this determines what flight time I select. For example, on British Airways you get afternoon tea on flights departing between 14:00 and 17:59. I used to always choose these flights until they removed the scones, so now I am more flexible.

Within the United States, most of the airlines cut off their domestic First Class dinner time at around 8pm. Flights departing after this time get some other kind of service. For example, on United a flight that is over 2 hours and 20 minutes and less than 3 hours gets "Refreshments, which include a selection of premium snacks and fresh fruit" after 8pm.

What do they do at American Airlines on a flight of similar length? Let's have a look.

AA1432 – Chicago to Denver (ORD-DEN)
27 May 2018
Boeing 737-823 – N839NN
Seat: First Class 3A
Departure: 20:20 Arrival: 21:58

After spending some time in the Flagship Lounge at O’Hare, it was time to board. Unusually enough, I was on exactly the same aircraft as the previous flight, just in a different seat.

Being a petite sort of guy, when I stretch my legs out fully in the bulkhead seat my toes just hit the divider. Therefore if you’re over about 5’7″ tall, you will have less room to stretch your legs than if you had sat in other seats further back.



Missing in this row is the little table that flips down from between the seats in front. Still, if you want no-one reclining into you and you’re not tall, the front row is very comfortable. Before departure the cabin crew serve pre-departure drinks. They will make you whatever you like it appears. I already have a note to in future not have the sparkling wine on American as it really is awful.



Video announcements periodically play during boarding too, about carry-on luggage and what not. I’m used to these announcements being made by the crew in Europe as opposed to a video so it was nice to see something different.



Our sector between Chicago and Denver was timed at two and a half hours. Imagine sitting there that long and not having a nice meal served like I'm used to on BA? Trepidation all round. Drinks are served first and I took a wine – again, terrible – and a water. It’s a thing on American Airlines domestic first class to have warmed mixed nuts served in a ramekin, so nothing unusual there as they’re always nice. After this is the main event which I’ll detail below and after eating you get a mint. But what is served as your Lite Bites snack on a flight with no meal?



Forking out hard earned cash for a seat in first class on a flight with no meal gets you a cookie! Being a premium cabin, you get to choose between something called Snickerdoodle and Chocolate Chip. When the flight attendant offered me the choice, my look of bewilderment at the word Snickerdoodle and frozen expression caused her to offer both cookie types to me if I wanted. I wanted – anything to recoup my investment on the ticket!



Served lovingly on individual paper napkins, the cookies are warm from the oven and tasty. I really like sweet things, so I found them to be really nice. Turns out Snickerdoodle tastes like cinnamon, but why use a boring name like cinnamon when you can Snickerdoodle? Really though, this is the food served on a two and a half hour flight in first class? Are we all 10 years old here?



By comparison, above is the food offered on a British Airways flight in Club Europe – the equivalent to American’s first class – departing at 10:25pm. That’s more like it!

There is nothing at all wrong with warmed nuts and there is nothing wrong with warm cookies. However, when you’re paying for a seat up the front of the aircraft it would be nice to get something more to eat than a cookie. If it was a one hour flight, fine but not for two and a half hours. Perhaps the best thing about this flight is the fact I learned all about Snickerdoodle cookies and how they taste. I guess it was worth the price of the flight after all.

What do you think of the cookies served after 8:00pm on American in domestic first class? Remember, for all the pictures click here.Thank you for reading and if you have any comments or questions, please leave them below.

Great approach to a trip report. What could have been incredibly boring turned out to be refreshing and funny! More like this please!

Have you thought of NOT flying first class and having a great meal in a restaurant before or after the flight. Or, simply buying a year's supply of cookies and a couple of bottles of good wine with the saving?

Good report. "Going for great" indeed by DUI Dougie cutting costs to fund his alcohol fund. Sadly, every airline in Europe basically has our air carriers beat with services provided in premium cabins. While the seats might be better on US air carriers the soft service is not.

Unfortunately, most folks do not actually fork out money for first class, so passengers sort of let most domestic airlines getting away from meals after 8pm.
I am surprised that they do not offer at least a snack basket service.

Thanks for the nice comparison!

Carfield

Hmmmm flying for the purpose of eating dinner ... I’ll have to try that once

Interesting report! And I wonder if this is different by route? I recently flew AA MIA-JFK in F, after 8PM (my flight departed around 9), and dinner was served, with choice of lasagna or beef. We also got the cookies you showed (which were warm and very tasty). Actual flight time was around two and a half hours as well.

haha and there is the difference. Most Americans will tell you that euro C class sucks because the seat is similar to Y. True. But most don’t understand that you still get much better service and a full meal. I guess it depends on what you want...a big seat and no service or a Y seat with a blocked seat next to you and a decent meal. I’ll always take Euro C. My butt fits just fine in a smaller seat

Carfield wrote:

Unfortunately, most folks do not actually fork out money for first class, so passengers sort of let most domestic airlines getting away from meals after 8pm.
I am surprised that they do not offer at least a snack basket service.

Thanks for the nice comparison!

Carfield

Looking at UA’s ORD to DEN flights so far today only 22 out of 176 first class seats were upgrades. That is only 12.5%. The rest of the first class seats were paid for. First class is far cheaper than it used to be and upgrades are less and less common on business routes. Now a weekend to Florida or the E175s with 12F seats to the Midwest is a bit different.

Great report, thank you!

I lived in California for two years until last summer. I enjoyed it but one thing that frustrated me and that I could never reconcile is how early Americans took their evening meal. It was not unusual to be asked for dinner at 18:00, or even 17:30. With the phenomenally quick service at restaurants there, it meant the meal was often over and we were out of the restaurant by 19:00 or 19:30.

I have not regularly taken meals at that early time since I was in the nursery with Nanny. In comparison, now back in England we rarely take our evening meal before 20:00 - as it has always been, since I was old enough to dine with my parents.

Perhaps this explains why US airlines do not offer a meal after 20:00 - they found the majority of passengers had eaten already, and so it was wasteful? Or, are they simply being stingy and cutting costs?

What food was available in the lounge? For a flight barely over an hour I'd rather eat real food in the lounge anyway.

Real food in a lounge? Don’t see that very often.

GTTIC wrote:

What food was available in the lounge? For a flight barely over an hour I'd rather eat real food in the lounge anyway.

You don't get lounge access on US carriers if flying domestic F.

I don’t happen to fly on Business too often but it’s kind of ridiculous that LH has a pretty decent selection of food even in 40 minutes flights. Plus they always serve warm rolls of different kinds. KLM does the same on a one hour flight between CPH and AMS. I mean you know you get the food and when you are used to Economy you take it. I see a lot of regular Business flyers decline the food and going for a beer or a wine only instead.
I’m okay with the middle seat being blocked but when you fly from MUC to HEL or OSL it’d be great to have another seat instead of these Recaro Slim Line, especially when they are worn out and you sit on the blank seat.

To make it short: Business means food and drinks for me

I flew LA-Boston in First with AA a couple of months back. A flight of some 5 hours and I didn’t even get the cookie or nuts, just a drink. Pretty crappy if you ask me. Thankfully my BA status got me lounge access at LAX so I binged on champagne and food

outbackair wrote:

Great approach to a trip report. What could have been incredibly boring turned out to be refreshing and funny! More like this please!

Have you thought of NOT flying first class and having a great meal in a restaurant before or after the flight. Or, simply buying a year's supply of cookies and a couple of bottles of good wine with the saving?

Hey, thanks for the kind words - really glad you enjoyed the report!

Well, flying first class is a bit of a treat, just as much as a really nice meal is really. Since I was travelling alone, I think I'd rather treat myself there than eat alone in a nice restaurant. I get your point though, they money can certainly be better spent if all that is on offer is a snickerdoodle cookie.

Super80Fan wrote:

Good report. "Going for great" indeed by DUI Dougie cutting costs to fund his alcohol fund. Sadly, every airline in Europe basically has our air carriers beat with services provided in premium cabins. While the seats might be better on US air carriers the soft service is not.

I agree with you there - I'm really spoiled on BA in Club Europe when you compare it to AA F after 8pm. It'll be interesting to see if anything ever changes in the US, but I am not holding my breath.

Carfield wrote:

Unfortunately, most folks do not actually fork out money for first class, so passengers sort of let most domestic airlines getting away from meals after 8pm.
I am surprised that they do not offer at least a snack basket service.

Thanks for the nice comparison!

I think it's just a case of "no-one else does it, so why should we?" - the airlines often have a mentality to do exactly the same thing as everyone else, rather than doing something different. It would be good if there were more differentiation like JetBlue's Mint for example.

Thanks for the kind words!

jetero wrote:

Hmmmm flying for the purpose of eating dinner ... I’ll have to try that once

My point was more, "I am forking out money for first class and you're only giving me a damned cookie to eat?!".

I'm not fat or tall, so the extra space is just nice to have, not vital. The food however - I'm all about the food.

reffado wrote:

Interesting report! And I wonder if this is different by route? I recently flew AA MIA-JFK in F, after 8PM (my flight departed around 9), and dinner was served, with choice of lasagna or beef. We also got the cookies you showed (which were warm and very tasty). Actual flight time was around two and a half hours as well.

According to the AA web site, dinner is not served on all departures in F from 8:01pm. I do know that Miami to JFK is definitely a flight that should get a meal, exactly as you described. Though you don't get a meal after 8pm. Perhaps your flight was delayed? 8pm is the hard and fast rule.

toobz wrote:

haha and there is the difference. Most Americans will tell you that euro C class sucks because the seat is similar to Y. True. But most don’t understand that you still get much better service and a full meal. I guess it depends on what you want...a big seat and no service or a Y seat with a blocked seat next to you and a decent meal. I’ll always take Euro C. My butt fits just fine in a smaller seat

I'll take the proper meal and the decent quality drinks in European business class over what they do in the USA.

I guess it's all what you're used to at the end of the day. My butt fits in that smaller seat too

Newbiepilot wrote:

Looking at UA’s ORD to DEN flights so far today only 22 out of 176 first class seats were upgrades. That is only 12.5%. The rest of the first class seats were paid for. First class is far cheaper than it used to be and upgrades are less and less common on business routes. Now a weekend to Florida or the E175s with 12F seats to the Midwest is a bit different.

Thanks for that data point, really good to know. With a world economy not in the doldrums, it makes sense more people are paying for first class, rather than being upgrades. In that case, spending the $10 to provide a meal in first class really should happen.

vhtje wrote:

Great report, thank you!

I lived in California for two years until last summer. I enjoyed it but one thing that frustrated me and that I could never reconcile is how early Americans took their evening meal. It was not unusual to be asked for dinner at 18:00, or even 17:30. With the phenomenally quick service at restaurants there, it meant the meal was often over and we were out of the restaurant by 19:00 or 19:30.

I have not regularly taken meals at that early time since I was in the nursery with Nanny. In comparison, now back in England we rarely take our evening meal before 20:00 - as it has always been, since I was old enough to dine with my parents.

Perhaps this explains why US airlines do not offer a meal after 20:00 - they found the majority of passengers had eaten already, and so it was wasteful? Or, are they simply being stingy and cutting costs?

Being asked to dinner at 17:30 or 18:00 is really early. When I am at home, I will eat around 18:30, but if I am going out for dinner the earliest is 19:30 and usually 20:00 is more usual. My parents in Sydney have always eaten that early at home so I am used to that time.

You are right, it's entirely possible they have no meal service as people will have eaten. I think there should be some option at the time of booking to opt in if you want a meal, and opt out if you don't - on flights after 8pm. That way it's win win - you get food if you want it and there should be no waste.

We'll see what happens as time passes, I guess! Thanks for the comment

GTTIC wrote:

What food was available in the lounge? For a flight barely over an hour I'd rather eat real food in the lounge anyway.

Plenty of lovely stuff was in the Flagship Lounge in Chicago! Definitely food paradise in there... as opposed to the Admirals Club which doesn't really do free meals.

toobz wrote:

Real food in a lounge? Don’t see that very often.

Some lounges are really good for food, perhaps not in the United States though. In Europe, all the lounges have decent free food, with a far bigger range than I've ever seen in an Admirals Club.

anstar wrote:

You don't get lounge access on US carriers if flying domestic F.

You are correct, but as a oneworld Sapphire frequent flyer (who is a member of a programme other than AA), I have access. Happily that meant the Flagship Lounge in Chicago rather than an Admirals Club. Thanks for the comment!

mchei wrote:

I don’t happen to fly on Business too often but it’s kind of ridiculous that LH has a pretty decent selection of food even in 40 minutes flights. Plus they always serve warm rolls of different kinds. KLM does the same on a one hour flight between CPH and AMS. I mean you know you get the food and when you are used to Economy you take it. I see a lot of regular Business flyers decline the food and going for a beer or a wine only instead.
I’m okay with the middle seat being blocked but when you fly from MUC to HEL or OSL it’d be great to have another seat instead of these Recaro Slim Line, especially when they are worn out and you sit on the blank seat.

To make it short: Business means food and drinks for me

I have taken the 1 hour flight on KLM between Dublin and Amsterdam in Europe Business Class and I had a nice box of food - plenty to eat actually - and tasty too! It is the same with British Airways as well, they always have decent food.

I've not had the "pleasure" of worn out Recaro Slim Line seats, however I probably will soon. All the airlines are changing over to them, which makes sense from their standpoint, but maybe not so much from a passenger comfort standpoint. A worn out one sounds painful!

I'm with you - busiiness means food and drinks for me too! Thanks for the comment

Eirules wrote:

I flew LA-Boston in First with AA a couple of months back. A flight of some 5 hours and I didn’t even get the cookie or nuts, just a drink. Pretty crappy if you ask me. Thankfully my BA status got me lounge access at LAX so I binged on champagne and food

Was that a red eye flight? God that sounds hideous, 5 hours with nothing but a drink! That BA status is very useful when in the USA, considering it basically unlocks all the AA lounges if you're Sapphire or above, which is totally the opposite of what AA flyers get themselves. I'm not complaining! Hope you enjoyed your lounge Champagne haha!

We eat dinner at 17:00, in bed by 22:00. This is exactly why dinner isn't served after 8pm on domestic US flights. In fact, for an 8pm flight I would have already eaten dinner before I even set foot in the airport haha. I always found the european style (well at least in France, pardon me for blanketing the whole EU if this is a wrong assumption) of eating their evening meal so late as odd. I want to be able to digest my food before I turn in for the night.

Another great report!

Awesome report - thanks a lot!

trpmb6 wrote:

I always found the european style (well at least in France, pardon me for blanketing the whole EU if this is a wrong assumption) of eating their evening meal so late as odd. I want to be able to digest my food before I turn in for the night.
Another great report!

Ok, let me tell you something. As a German who studied French in France I am quite familiar with the habits of eating late. But still I’m a German. And I very well remember how my wife and me tried to find a spot for dinner in France at 6 pm. They laughed at us and said they wouldn’t open before 8 pm. And that happened in the south and in the north. But when I went to Norway and I saw that they eat l lunch at around 11.30 am I was quite with being German. That was early.

mchei wrote:

Awesome report - thanks a lot!

trpmb6 wrote:

I always found the european style (well at least in France, pardon me for blanketing the whole EU if this is a wrong assumption) of eating their evening meal so late as odd. I want to be able to digest my food before I turn in for the night.
Another great report!

Ok, let me tell you something. As a German who studied French in France I am quite familiar with the habits of eating late. But still I’m a German. And I very well remember how my wife and me tried to find a spot for dinner in France at 6 pm. They laughed at us and said they wouldn’t open before 8 pm. And that happened in the south and in the north. But when I went to Norway and I saw that they eat l lunch at around 11.30 am I was quite with being German. That was early.

Haha thanks. It's a healthy reminder that there is still a lot of culture out there! My wife prefers to eat at 5PM on the nose. That means starting to cook dinner as soon as we get home from work. We do go to work quite early in the US (well for the most part) so it's not that big of an issue. It works well for the kids, they get home, eat dinner and then go out and play. Harder on the weekends though as it breaks up the afternoon a little awkwardly.

The more I see of USA domestic, the more I appreciate the food back home. Be me, on a 2am departure out of BOM and a 4.40am arrival in to CCU - absolutely astonished to get a full snack service with kebabs & a patty, along with ice cream. And this was back in Y. Thank you for sharing this witty one!

Wow, I did wonder what they served on the later flights, that’s a bit shocking.

Surely a small salad and a slice of pizza would be ok, it’s not as if the ticket prices are that much cheaper on the later flights!

I don’t mind just a drinks service on an hour or so flight.

Not impressive.

jetero wrote:

Hmmmm flying for the purpose of eating dinner ... I’ll have to try that once

Why do so many of you airline staff people miss the point? Why should someone pay such a hefty price differential between coach and "F" to only get a cookie?
Do you people go to a dealership to pay for a Merc and walk out with a Hyundai?

Nice report, thanks for sharing. Your experience is fairly typical, but rather unacceptable all the same. A couple of years ago, I wound up taking a Delta flight in First from ATL to BOS which departed around 21:00 instead of my preferred earlier departure. I chose that flight because it was operated by a Boeing 757 and the preceding flight by something far less exciting - I forget what exactly, but since Delta didn't have any A321s back then and I'd have taken a Douglas T-Tail over a 757, I guess it must have been an A320 or B739. The flight usually takes a little over two hours, but the distance covered, rather than time spent in the air qualifies it for meals during set times. To be fair, the service offered onboard was far better than this and at least consisted of a snack basket being passed around the cabin three or four times during the flight with a selection of snacks available. I don't know how AA can justify serving a couple of cookies to First Class passengers. Heck, you get more than that on a KLM intra-Europe flight in Economy!

Suffice to say, I didn't make that mistake again and have enjoyed dinner on my ATL-BOS flights since then. In general though, apart from the bigger seats, US Domestic First is not a patch on European Business. When the entire experience is taken into account, European J has to come out on top - for one thing, you're guaranteed a decent meal no matter what time you travel, even if the flight is under one hour in scheduled duration. On top of that, the services offered at the airport in Europe are far, far superior to those offered in the US, where Domestic First passengers must pay for lounge access if they don't have status with the airline - prices range from $50-65 for a one-time visit if I recall correctly, and frankly the lounges themselves are sub-par once you get in them.

Once again, thanks for the report.

trpmb6 wrote:

We eat dinner at 17:00, in bed by 22:00. This is exactly why dinner isn't served after 8pm on domestic US flights. In fact, for an 8pm flight I would have already eaten dinner before I even set foot in the airport haha. I always found the european style (well at least in France, pardon me for blanketing the whole EU if this is a wrong assumption) of eating their evening meal so late as odd. I want to be able to digest my food before I turn in for the night.

Another great report!

Glad you liked the report!

I understand what you're saying, however, what about the 8:30pm flight that gets in at 10pm? You then have at least half an hour and up to an hour of waiting for baggage claim, then you need to get transport to where you're going which could be at least another hour. By midnight you're gonna want something else to eat as you've been on the go for so long.

It's not like you get off the aircraft and walk straight into a bed - unless you're staying at an airport hotel on hand baggage only of course

mchei wrote:

Awesome report - thanks a lot!

Ok, let me tell you something. As a German who studied French in France I am quite familiar with the habits of eating late. But still I’m a German. And I very well remember how my wife and me tried to find a spot for dinner in France at 6 pm. They laughed at us and said they wouldn’t open before 8 pm. And that happened in the south and in the north. But when I went to Norway and I saw that they eat l lunch at around 11.30 am I was quite with being German. That was early.

Thanks for the nice words on the report!

You are right, it's all relative depending on the culture of the country you're in. Great examples you gave there. I still think it's stingy for First Class

trpmb6 wrote:

Haha thanks. It's a healthy reminder that there is still a lot of culture out there! My wife prefers to eat at 5PM on the nose. That means starting to cook dinner as soon as we get home from work. We do go to work quite early in the US (well for the most part) so it's not that big of an issue. It works well for the kids, they get home, eat dinner and then go out and play. Harder on the weekends though as it breaks up the afternoon a little awkwardly.

Wow, I thought my parents ate early in Australia, which is always around 6 or 6:15pm.

5pm is very early - to me!

CollegeAviator wrote:

The more I see of USA domestic, the more I appreciate the food back home. Be me, on a 2am departure out of BOM and a 4.40am arrival in to CCU - absolutely astonished to get a full snack service with kebabs & a patty, along with ice cream. And this was back in Y. Thank you for sharing this witty one!

Food all day suits me - you never know who is connecting from what and will be hungry.

Happy you enjoyed the report!!

ba319-131 wrote:

Wow, I did wonder what they served on the later flights, that’s a bit shocking.

Surely a small salad and a slice of pizza would be ok, it’s not as if the ticket prices are that much cheaper on the later flights!

I don’t mind just a drinks service on an hour or so flight.

Not impressive.

The ticket prices are quite similar no matter what time of day you are travelling. Of course, I usually always deliberately pick the flights that serve a meal as it's more bang for my buck. That being said, I had no choice this time due to the way I was connecting. I was on a mad itinerary of YVR-JFK-DCA-ORD-DEN thanks to something I had to change and not wanting to cancel anything.

Anything would be better than the cookies, I agree. Thank goodness the cookies aren't crap, but even so!

AEROFAN wrote:

jetero wrote:

Hmmmm flying for the purpose of eating dinner ... I’ll have to try that once

Why do so many of you airline staff people miss the point? Why should someone pay such a hefty price differential between coach and "F" to only get a cookie?
Do you people go to a dealership to pay for a Merc and walk out with a Hyundai?

Haha - this is the comment of the thread Exactly!!!!

KLDC10 wrote:

Nice report, thanks for sharing. Your experience is fairly typical, but rather unacceptable all the same. A couple of years ago, I wound up taking a Delta flight in First from ATL to BOS which departed around 21:00 instead of my preferred earlier departure. I chose that flight because it was operated by a Boeing 757 and the preceding flight by something far less exciting - I forget what exactly, but since Delta didn't have any A321s back then and I'd have taken a Douglas T-Tail over a 757, I guess it must have been an A320 or B739. The flight usually takes a little over two hours, but the distance covered, rather than time spent in the air qualifies it for meals during set times. To be fair, the service offered onboard was far better than this and at least consisted of a snack basket being passed around the cabin three or four times during the flight with a selection of snacks available. I don't know how AA can justify serving a couple of cookies to First Class passengers. Heck, you get more than that on a KLM intra-Europe flight in Economy!

Suffice to say, I didn't make that mistake again and have enjoyed dinner on my ATL-BOS flights since then. In general though, apart from the bigger seats, US Domestic First is not a patch on European Business. When the entire experience is taken into account, European J has to come out on top - for one thing, you're guaranteed a decent meal no matter what time you travel, even if the flight is under one hour in scheduled duration. On top of that, the services offered at the airport in Europe are far, far superior to those offered in the US, where Domestic First passengers must pay for lounge access if they don't have status with the airline - prices range from $50-65 for a one-time visit if I recall correctly, and frankly the lounges themselves are sub-par once you get in them.

Once again, thanks for the report.

I'm glad you enjoyed the report!

The snack basket is quite common, I think United do it and American do it on some flights too. I was reading an article today where someone was really complaining about the snack basket basically saying it was insulting to the passengers paying for First Class but most people in the US are upgrades which is why they give such bare service. I don't think the fact most are upgrades is true any longer, now we are post financial crisis, so I didn't agree with that part, but I did agree with the fact it wasn't enough.

I completely agree with you. European business class is ahead in every single respect over the USA apart from the seat. I do understand the lounge aspect though - if everyone with status was allowed in they would probably be overrun. But I have no figures to back that up!

Thanks for the comment!