V-Flyer

If I pre order a special vegetarian meal in upper class, will I be given the standard veggie meal served in economy, plated up, or reserved the veggie option available from the UC menu? There are 3 of us travelling that are veggie so worried about them running out if we don't pre order but don't want an economy meal.

I'm led to believe the special meals are the same in all cabins. If you order one you won't get the veggie option on the UC menu but you're at least guaranteed a veggie meal.

If you decide to chance it remember they serve from front to back so try and request seats near the front of UC. But they don't overstock meals so you do run the risk of them running out.

Whilst they don't overstock meals much (if indeed at all nowadays) - I have seen the orders taken in differing ways. Sometimes it's front to back, sometimes it's start at 12A, work up to 6A, then do 6K to 12K. (This is on the LGW/MAN fleet by the way). Depends on the crew - then you can get couples from opposite sides of the cabin using the other halves ottoman, so they mess the ordering order up as the crew will take both orders from a couple at the same time. I've also seen meal orders taken in FC status order.

In the event of certain meal choices running out, FC status should come into play as the crew reallocate meals / decide who to approach with the "sorry we've run out" message. I have certainly had my meal choice of the beef when it had run out & I was FC Silver at the time.

I am sure at one time there was a rule in place stating that FC Gold members should always get their first choice of meal if possible. I've never been Gold, but I vaguely recall a trip report of a Tokyo flight from a v-flyer who was Gold at the time - they were refused their first meal choice & they clocked the passenger manifest list at the UC bar... there were only a few Golds onboard & they could count the number of passengers who'd got the meal choice they wanted - there were more of them than Gold passengers.

It may be worth the OP contacting the Upper Class team & asking if it's possible to get the veggie Upper Class meal reserved as a special meal. Explain to them that you don't want an Economy meal when paying an Upper Class fare. Of course, depending on the route you could be on an A346 / 787 with a decent size UC cabin, so there may well be 3 UC veggie meals loaded - nothing to say there are not other vegetarians onboard though. Certainly if I had selected a veggie meal as my preferred choice, I would always swap to a meal containing meat (as I an not a veggie) if asked by the crew in order to accommodate a non-meat eater.

If you are in Upper and order a vegetarian special meal you will receive an Upper vegetarian meal. Most of the time this will be the same as the main menu vegetarian option but not guaranteed 100%.

As it is a special meal, it will have your name and seat number on it.

As a fellow vegetarian, I can confirm that I've never received an economy meal, always options from the UC menu after pre-selecting. However, on my first flight, it was unclear if I could choose between the various V options (usually more than one V starter) and I was given a pre-determined choice of a mushroom starter. Luckily that's what I wanted, but I have since tweeted VS about this and they confirmed that if you pre-select your meal, you should still be able to choose between UC V options on the menu provided they are available.

I will hold them to this on my next flight in a few weeks and report back!

I can confirm what Kraken says. Even sat in 6a on the Gatwick flight Mrs D was told her choice had run out.
She was a lowly flying club Red. It didn't stop her nominating me, a Silver FC, to give up my meal. I didn't mind as I got 4000 miles for the trouble.
I would definitely pre-book special meal.
Dick D

If you pre-order a special meal and then decide for whatever reason that you don't want it but rather want something from the normal menu, you'll go to the bottom of the list and your choice may not be available.

Interesting topic.
I spoke to customer services recently to inform them of my intolerance to poultry and could a note be put on my booking for my upcoming flight in upper.
The agents reply "I'll put you down for a vegetarian meal" I made the point that I didn't want a vegetarian meal ordered as there should be other choices available, the agent I spoke to seemed determined that my only choice was to accept a meal that I certainly didn't want so I asked him to forget the conversation and I'll take my chance once on board.
The fact that I have silver status didn't seem to matter I'm afraid.

Bombardier wrote:Interesting topic.
I spoke to customer services recently to inform them of my intolerance to poultry and could a note be put on my booking for my upcoming flight in upper.
The agents reply "I'll put you down for a vegetarian meal" I made the point that I didn't want a vegetarian meal ordered as there should be other choices available, the agent I spoke to seemed determined that my only choice was to accept a meal that I certainly didn't want so I asked him to forget the conversation and I'll take my chance once on board.
The fact that I have silver status didn't seem to matter I'm afraid.

Meat based meals are generally prepared in the same kitchen which is why they can't guarantee a meal won't have been exposed to chicken. Just as they can't guarantee a meal isn't exposed to nuts or other allergens.

Vegetarian meals are generally prepared in a separate kitchen where they are not exposed to meat.

Yes you could have say the beef on board or lamb stew or whatever but who's to say it wasn't prepared with chicken broth?

Adding a note to a booking means nothing unless it's read and it would only be seen if someone needs to look at your booking for another reason. No one will look at every booking to check if there is a note in it.

Very insightful tontybear if not more than a little patronising.

In todays litigious society the meerest hint of "intolerance" or "allergy" will result in any service provider defaulting to the safest option, in the case of a chicken intolerance the vegetarian option. As Tonty rightly says, there are no guarantees unless the meal is prepared in a meat-free environment. For some people with allergies, the smallest exposure to the antigen can result in life-threatening responses, and the customer service operator will have protocol to follow.

I have a suspected allergy to scallops but whenever I mention it at any restaurant they will advise me not to eat any of their fish dishes. They will not take a risk advising anything else. So I have stopped telling them now and just choose a dish that does not have scallops as a main ingredient.

I found in Japan they are more flexible when I pass them a little slip of paper (in Japanese) stating I am allergic to scallops!

On VS chicken seems the more popular menu item so i suspect vegetarian and beef options are less likely to run out. There are always the extra bites options as well.

Bombardier wrote:Very insightful tontybear if not more than a little patronising.

I give you a factual answer so how is it patronising?

Thanks for your input everyone. I tweeted VS and they confirmed if I ordered a vegetarian meal I would get the same meal as served in economy :( . Interesing point Tonty, it makes sense if they prepare all foods in the same "kitchen" then requesting a veggie meal would get you a special one loaded to avoid coming into contact with meat products. Whilst I don't eat meat I'm not strict enough to flip out if it's prepared in the same place as meat so I'll take the risk. You would think though, it shouldn't be that difficult to be able to allow pre-order of the UC veggie dish.

tontybear wrote:

Bombardier wrote:Very insightful tontybear if not more than a little patronising.

I give you a factual answer so how is it patronising?

It wasn't. It was interesting and informative.
Dick D

Whilst meat based meals & vegetarian based meals are doubtless prepared in the same in-flight catering kitchen (as indeed they are in just about every restaurant) - they should be prepared on different lines to ensure there is no cross-contamination.

I do agree it is a shame that you cannot pre-order a veggie meal in Upper Class - you're paying the fare so don't really want an economy meal served to you. Of course, if Virgin allow pre-ordering of normal menu Upper Class meals, then catering flights becomes a bit of a logistical nightmare & when the caterers cock-up (which does happen, on any airline) complaints would be much higher then the odd person complaining that their choice of meal had run out.

It sounds like the only safe bet with airline food is on a Middle Eastern airline such as Emirates - you can guarantee that all of their meals, whatever variety, will contain no pork products or traces of alcohol.

polb74 wrote:Thanks for your input everyone. I tweeted VS and they confirmed if I ordered a vegetarian meal I would get the same meal as served in economy :(

Hmmm, I think they need to go and check their information.

If you are in Upper, you will get an Upper vegetarian meal. Not one from economy. Not one from PE. An Upper vegetarian meal. Been there, eaten it, it was delicious and most certainly not from economy.

Special meals, AFAIK, are the same in all cabins. The difference in UC is they'll take it out of its plastic container and plate it up with a sprig of parsley or something so it won't look like an economy meal.

The vegetarian option on the UC menu is, however, exclusive to UC.

I used to order vegetarian in Upper but 9 times out of ten I ended up with a not very nice vegan or asian vegetarian meal....no eggs, no cheese..all a bit too 'healthy' for me when heading out on holiday. In my experience, there is always a 'non meat' option on the standard upper menu which is to ovo lacto vegetarian standards - this suits me perfectly and is ALWAYS considerably better than a 'special' meal.

Hope that helps.

I've just found 4 UC Menus in a drawer - if it's any help, I've listed below the veggie offerings for starters & main courses off them to give you an idea of the sort of thing Virgin offer for vegetarians on the normal UC menu.

Starters
Waldorf salad
Tomato & basil soup
Celeriac & pear soup
Mixed salad
Pea & mint soup
Buffalo mozzarella and Roma tomatoes
Mesclun salad
Parsnip & parmesan soup

Main Courses
Vegetable Thai red curry
Keralan curry
Wild mushroom tortellini
Spinach & ricotta tortellini

So based on the above, it seems you get two vegetarian options for starters on an UC menu - one of which will be a soup. For the main course there is one veggie option.

This is interesting - maybe this is a recent change? I literally tweeted VS perhaps only 3 weeks ago and they confirmed the Veggie UC options were off the menu, and changeable if desired (if available). I've never had an economy veggie meal in UC, always the menu option, every time...

I preselected and was approached by CC on boarding, who confirmed that I was veggie. I very much doubt they would start serving off menu economy meals to UC passengers?