Air India Express passengers to be served Kerala food

MALAPPURAM: As a New Year gift to Malayali passengers, all Air India Express flights from three international airports in the state will serve Kerala delicacies on board, from January onwards.
 
The plan, aimed at wooing more passengers, is to serve sadya with sambar and three or four vegetarian dishes, idli and dosa with sambar, puttu with kadala curry, local varieties of appams such as vellayappam, kallappam, noolappam, idiyappam, different varieties of thattu dosas, different local varieties of biriyani etc. More items would be added to the menu in the coming days.

The local delicacies that are to be served in the flights were selected after a long procedure. A Delhi based catering firm, which decides menu in Air India flights, presented local varieties of Indian food in Kochi weeks ago and the representatives of Air India selected Kerala dishes from them.

"Food has an important role in creating strong bond between guest and host, so we decided to introduce more localized menu in flights," said a senior Air India source at Kochi. "At present, majority of airlines including Air India Express serve continental and western menu in flights and those who would like to have Malabar or Thiruvananthapuram varieties of food items have no option," he said.

The move to introduce the Kerala menu in international flights from state is the result of an informal suggestion by Union minister of civil aviation K C Venugopal. Now the move has gained momentum after the warm response to the Kerala menu which was introduced in domestic flights of the airlines recently.

"We have introduced the menu, which is almost similar to be introduced in our Express flights, in our domestic flights from December 2 onwards and the response from the passengers is very positive and also encouraging," said source.

Malappuram: As a New Year gift to Malayali passengers, all the Air India Express flights will serve Kerala's favourite local food items including Sadya, Puttu and Kadala curry(chick peas), Iddali and Sambar, Thattu Dosa etc to its passengers, January 2013 onwards.

The aim of the fresh initiative of Air India providing local delicacies in its international flights from three international airports at Thiruvananthapuram, Kochi and Kozhikode is nothing but to woo more passengers.

Air India planning to serve Sadya with Sambar curry and three or four vegetarian items with it, Iddali and Dosa with Sambar curry, Puttu which goes well with Kadala Curry, local varieties of Appams such as Vellayappam, Kallappam, Noolappam, Idiyappam, different varieties of Thattudosas, different local varieties of Biriyani etc to the passengers. More items would be added to the menu in the coming days.

The local delicacies that are to be served in the flights were selected after a long procedure. A Delhi based catering firm which already deciding menu in Air Indian flights presented their local varieties of Indian food in Kochi weeks ago and the representatives of Air India selected favourite food items of Malayalis among them.

Food has important role in creating strong bond in-between guest and host, so we decided to introduce more localized menu in flights, said a senior Air India source at Kochi. 'At present, majority of Air Lines including Air India Express serving continental and western food items in flights and those who would like to have Malabar or Thiruvananthapuram varieties of food items have no option ', he said adding that some of the Air India Express flights are currently offering menu with Ghee Rice, but it cannot be considered as a Kerala menu.

The move to introduce the Kerala menu in international flights from state was started with an informal suggestion of Union Minister of Civil Aviation K C Venugopal. Now the move has gained momentum after the warm response to the Kerala menu which was introduced in domestic flights of the airlines days ago. 'We have introduced the menu which is almost similar to be introduced in our Express flights, in our domestic flights from December 2 onwards and the response from the passengers is very positive and also surprising', said source.

Article:   http://timesofindia.indiatimes.com