Hong Kong Airlines is rolling out a new business class menu series developed in collaboration with local chef, Gabriel Choy, that will be served on all flights departing Hong Kong.
Choy has worked at a number of notable restaurants alongside celebrity chefs, including Gordon Ramsay’s London restaurant Petrus, Heston Blumenthal’s three-Michelin-starred The Fat Duck, and Gaddi’s at The Peninsula Hong Kong hotel.
The menu will comprise 12 Western dishes with Asian twists that will be rolled out over the next 12 months, though an exact schedule for when each dish will be rotated in hasn’t been unveiled. The menus on regional flights will rotate every two weeks, however, and every month on long-haul services.
Dishes that will be served on flights include:
- Roasted ling fish fillet with mushroom ragu and Moroccan pearl cous cous.
- Grilled tenderloin with red dates demi-glace sauce, roasted potatoes and seasonal vegetables.
- Black bean tapenade gratin chicken supreme with bacon, pumpkin gnocchi in Genovese sauce and seasonal vegetables.
- Roasted pork shoulder with red wine prune sauce, baked Mediterranean potato and gratin broccoli with cheese.
- Seafood penne pasta in coconut bouillabaisse sauce.
- Braised beef chuck with red wine sauce, kale and sun-dried tomato orzo and seasonable vegetables.
- Roasted pork shoulder with lemon and thyme gravy, and sausage Garbanzo paella.
- Seed-crusted chicken breast with pumpkin cheese sauce, creamy white bean potato mash and oven-roasted vegetables.
- Mixed seafood cannelloni in white mornay sauce topped with jade sprouts.
- Grilled beef tenderloin with sun-dried tomato butter and green peppercorn sauce, pumpkin and potato soufflé, and vinegar-cured vegetables.
- Herb-gratin chicken breast stuffed with apricot and Parma ham, with saffron tomato sauce and mushroom wild rice.
- Sous-vide prawns with XO tomato sauce and mezzi rigatoni.
Business class passengers also will be able to pre-order their meals on select routes, enabling them to choose their dishes between 30 days and 24 hours prior to their scheduled departure. The facility is available for travellers flying from Hong Kong to Auckland, Cairns/Gold Coast, Los Angeles, Vancouver and the airline’s upcoming flights to San Francisco.
“We started business class pre-order for main meals in December, available on long-haul flights, and we’re working towards rolling that out onto regional flights soon,” Chris Birt, Hong Kong Airlines’ general manager for service delivery told Business Traveller Asia-Pacific. “At the moment, for long-haul business class yes; for regional, watch this space, it’s about to be launched.”
Birt also didn’t rule out the possibility of Hong Kong Airlines introducing a “dine-on-demand” system sometime in the future. “We’re definitely evaluating it [dine-on-demand], particularly as we grow our long-haul routes. The longer the flight, the more different are customers’ needs,” he added.
“On regional flights and the shorter routes, possibly not, but certainly we’re looking at a few concepts for long-haul travel, especially when we get the next fleet of Airbus A350 aircraft with the herringbone seats. That sort of service lends itself really well to dine-on-demand. We haven’t made a decision yet, but it’s certainly something we feel our customers want.”
Hong Kong Airlines’ new herringbone business class seat product was unveiled back in November, 2016, and was originally set to debut on its A350, the first of which the airline received last September.
However, the carrier’s initial aircraft, which it flies to Los Angeles and soon to San Francisco, launched with Hong Kong Airlines’ older, forward-facing seats.
“[The new seats] will be coming in late summer this year,” Birt added. “The first aircraft – which will be our fifth A350 – from that aircraft onwards will feature the Super Diamond seat.”
Business Traveller has reviewed Hong Kong Airlines’ current A350 business class product on its Los Angeles service.
