Fantasy airline food

Not long ago, food served at ballparks was limited to boiled hot dogs, stale popcorn, and watery beer served in little waxy paper cups. Inside the sealed-off environment of the stadium, there were no culinary alternatives. No barbecue, no roast chicken, no garlic fries, and not even the little ice cream sundaes in the pygmy plastic helmets.

But sports fans didn't seem to mind, because they hadn’t driven out to the ballpark for the slimey hot dogs-- the game itself was obviously the draw, and they'd be there notwithstanding the Cracker Jacks. The vendors hawking their nachos and corn dogs were simply opportunists, taking advantage of a pre-assembled crowd of customers to sell them some basic, mostly mediocre food while they enjoyed some baseball.

Suffering the same plight as other hostage eaters in cinemas, theatres, and prisons, these early sports fans weren't accustomed to better choices, and never had their expectations of grotty food challenged. And so the squeeze cheese flowed on.

Looking up into the skies above those stadiums those many years ago, there were other people, as there are now, in a state of genuine captivity, who were locked into pressurized cabins, strapped into their chairs, and forced to breathe hours of recycled air while being hurtled over oceans. But strangely, these airborne cousins of the baseball fan did not eat hot dogs. They ate roast beef, shrimp cocktails, and lobster tails. They ate from real china with silverware and knives and with fresh flowers in vases on their tables. They drank coffee and cocktails, and had cloth napkins. Air travel was a classy affair, and food was designed to reflect the brass-button blazer occasion upon which so few passengers were lucky enough to embark. It was a rare and treasured privilege, and the food served onboard was prepared appropriately.

And somehow, it seemed appropriate, this dichotomy between the mass class and the airborne elite; it made sense that everyday events deserved less gastronomic attention than 30,000-foot flights of technological wonder.

Something changed.

Air travel hasn’t been glamorous for ages -- the days of dressing up for the stroll down the jetway are probably gone forever. This has increasingly been the case, and airline quality continues to ooze into a miserable cattle-class torment as airlines eliminate in-flight meals and start charging fifteen bucks for luxuries like being able to take luggage. Food has long since been a casualty.

It's driving me to desperation; I'm an inch away from pulling an Alice Waters and packing my own gourmet food whenever I travel, to prevent myself the indignity of succumbing to another fourteen-dollar musty sandwich crammed with overcooked battery chicken and wilted shreds of dry iceberg lettuce that haunted my recent trip through San Diego.

Meanwhile, though, ballpark food has undergone a renaissance - the sporting pauper has swapped places with the flying prince, and now stadiums are good places to find decent barbecue, legit bratwurst with good brown mustard, New England clam chowder, Cuban roast pork sandwiches, Texas chili, Quebecois poutine, Philly cheesesteaks and countless other real, properly-made, albeit deliciously unhealthy, ballpark foods.

Why can't airlines find a way to serve real food again? Fuel costs are strangling carriers large and small and competition is tighter than ever, of course, but there are some airlines managing to squeeze quality service into their business model. If your experience has been limited to US-based carriers and budget European ones, you might find that claim hard to believe.

But a quick browse through airlinemeals.net shows that glamor isn't dead. British Midland, Air France, Singapore Airlines - they all perform an ancient and long-forgotten practice.

They still serve food.

In coach.

On short-haul domestic flights.

Even more amazingly, these airlines are also paying through the nose for fuel like everyone else. But they've managed not to allow themselves to forget that passengers are living, breathing adults who require food, not the option to buy bags of juvenile snack food. What's to credit this? Some Eurocentric cultural superiority pitch? Governments willing to bail out their national airlines for the sake of their culinary reputation? I don't buy it.

British Midland served me real ice cream last year, and after growing accustomed to the tortuous heartless feed that American Airlines had served me on my eastward flight, I thought I was hallucinating.

I would gladly pay for basic, real, hot food if it were available, but even the option of genuine food has been budgeted away by American carriers. Am I alone?