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
