Virgin Australia serve new business class meals – at times that would make US airlines blush!

Virgin Australia recently exited business administration and now have new owners. They have just released information on their new business class meals, which look rather good.

What excites me more are their new meal times. Breakfast is served on flights departing from 3am to 9:59am, lunch from 10am to 4pm, and dinner from 4:01pm to 2:59am. Around the clock business class meal service is the same as what British Airways and others do, which I like.

Virgin Australia’s New Business Class Meals

Introduced from 25 March 2021, the new meals certainly look the part. Gone are the celebrity chef meals from before and these are replaced by decent on trend dining that Australians will enjoy. I’m happy the meals times have been simplified into breakfast, lunch and dinner, so I won’t have to actively pick and choose flights with full meals.

Their competitor in Australia, Qantas, continues to have flights outside the traditional meal times designated as “refreshment”, which is usually a full meal anyway. No real need for that with the extortionate prices they charge for it. Full meals or nothing, that is my motto!

Why Would US Airlines Blush?

Quite frankly, I find it mad that US airlines elect not to serve meals to domestic first class passengers after 8pm. With flight pricing being the same, it’s a bit rude to hand over a cookie and drink, whereas people travelling earlier would have received a full meal.

I’m someone who will actively choose a flight based on a meal served. For example, on Aer Lingus, I like to fly before 11am to get their delicious breakfast, while on British Airways I’ll fly Club Europe between 2pm and 5pm to get their excellent afternoon tea. Buying a premium ticket and receiving virtually no meal is anathema to me.

Overall Thoughts

It’s great to see Virgin Australia doing something different and not aping the competition so closely. Has anyone ever booked an airline ticket based on which celebrity chef designed the menu? I love my food when flying and I know I certainly don’t.

Offering tasty food that is well presented and filling is all that is needed. It looks like the Aussie carrier is going to deliver on this, and it’s certainly whet my appetite.

US airlines would do well to take a leaf out of the foreign carriers playbooks and start offering proper meals on board around the clock in their premium classes. I just find it so on the nose to pay extra for a ticket and get a cookie. Ugh!

What do you think of the new Virgin Australia meals? How about those US airline meal cut off times? Thank you for reading and if you have any comments or questions, please leave them below.

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All images apart from the cookies by Paul Harris for Virgin Australia.