What is the mandatory hotel quarantine food like in Australia?

One thing I was curious about before I arrived in Australia was the hotel quarantine food. Since you are unable to leave your room, three meals per day are provided for you.

In the Pullman Adelaide where I am staying, breakfast arrives between 7am and 8:30am, lunch from 12:30pm to 2pm and dinner from 6pm to 7:30pm. They do cater to people with vegan, vegetarian, halal, lactose intolerance and gluten intolerance, which is good.

Hotel Quarantine Food – Day 0

Arrival day does not count as one of your 14 days of quarantine. My flight arrived at 5pm and I was in my room around 7:45pm, so on this day I received dinner.

Completely full from my flight, I tasted it all but really only ate the cookie and dessert. Very unlike me, but I made up for it on all the other days.

Day One and Two

Three meals per day, every day, like clockwork. The room service team deliver all the brown paper bags from a trolley. Once they have completed a corridor, they then go and knock on everyone’s door and get the hell out of there before we start retrieving our bags.

The food is hearty and filling which is nice. Sometimes it arrives quite cool, sometimes it’s quite warm. It can’t be easy having to do meals for everyone in the hotel at the same time every day.

Day Three, Four and Five

It’s funny what excites me when it comes to the meals. When they deliver a drink of any kind, that makes me happy. I’m drinking water mainly, so a surprise chocolate milk or juice is really welcome to break things up. Also, different kinds of bread like garlic bread or banana bread are great too.

The only thing really missing is salt and pepper and condiments. Since I have time on my hands, I’m trying to work out if there are different chefs on different days. Some days I like all the food and other days I find the food average. Could also be reflective of my mood, who knows! (For those wondering, the picture for dinner on day 5 is at the top of the post.)

Overall Thoughts

The hotel quarantine food is perfectly fine. Someone is making sure that it covers all the bases, such as a piece of fruit each day, vegetables, protein and what not. Quality is uniformly good, even if the temperature does vary from time to time.

Plates are provided (I used one once, for the image at the top, which does make the food look a lot better, I must say!), but I find it just as easy to eat from the containers and it saves washing up. I do believe you can ask the hotel, with notice, to switch your meal to something else on the menu, but I don’t see the need.

Those that might want something else are welcome to order delivery to the hotel. The staff will happily bring it up to you, so you don’t necessarily have to eat the provided fare. However, since you’re paying for it, you may as well!

What is your experience with hotel quarantine food in Australia? Is it similar to this? Thank you for reading and if you have any comments or questions, please leave them below.

Like planes? See my “Does anyone remember” series.
Flight reviews your thing? Mine are all indexed here.
Follow me on Facebook, Twitter and Instagram.