Food and drink at 35,000 ft
If you’ve flown with Icelandair recently, you will probably have eaten one of the 3,500-4,800 fresh meals prepared daily in the Icelandair flight kitchen.
Preparing food for Icelandair passengers is quite an operation, employing some 150 people during the summing months. The IGS (Icelandair Ground Service) flight kitchen is one of the biggest professional kitchens in Iceland and is open 24/7.
Food no longer free in economy
On-board food is no longer free in Economy Class on Icelandair flights. According to Director of On-board Sales and Services, Þórdís Anna Oddsdóttir, this decision was taken in order to improve food quality and increase passenger choice.
Passengers in Economy Comfort may order any food items from the Economy Class free of charge, while Saga Class passengers enjoy a selection of exclusive dishes served on china crockery.
Throughout the meal range, efforts are made to highlight the Icelandic origins of the company and the choice of food items reflects that. An authentic ‘taste of Iceland’, such as the dairy product skyr, is particular popular with passengers flying between Europe and USA and changing planes in Iceland.
Various factors affect planning
Making sure there is the right amount of food and drink for some 10,000 passengers a day is something of a jigsaw puzzle, with various factors at play.
According to Oddsdóttir, passengers eat more in the winter months than in the summer, but with more passengers in the summer, overall quantities even out. Some routes are ‘hungrier’ than others, with more food needed, for instance, on a flight to Copenhagen than to Munich.
The airline endeavours to assess how much food is likely to be needed on each flight in order to keep waste to a minimum.
When it comes to drink, things are slightly less complicated than for fresh food as any drink left over can be kept for the next flight, although storage space on aircraft can be an issue.
That said, account is taken of exactly who is taking a given flight. If a group of football fans is booked on, for instance, it is a good idea to have the bar well stocked!
Saga Class service. Photo: Icelandair
Salads being prepared for an Icelandic flight. Photo: Gló facebook page
