TUI is a UK based holiday airline (previously known as Thomson) flying to predominantly holiday destinations. It has been a while since I last flew them on a short-haul route, and thought it was about time to check out the latest buy onboard menu offering.
You can red the previous review here.
WHAT TO EXPECT
If you’re flying with TUI you won’t receive any free meals on short-haul flights, however on their long haul flights (7 hrs plus) meals are always included.
On long haul flights expect the service to run as follows:
1- After takeoff drinks are provided (No Prosecco or Champagne though)
2- Expect a hot meal service and the offer of red, white or rose wine.
3- A second meal service will be provided a few hours before landing, usually a breakfast offering, or afternoon tea.
4- The airline offers a range of sweet and savoury snacks such as Pringles, Cadbury products, Kit Kat and others to purchase inflight.
TUI SHORT HAUL
My flight from London to Malaga on TOM flight 4760 would take about 2.5 hours. Onboard I found the “Cafe & Shop Guide” in my seat pocket and it details the food and drinks available.
Items on the menu include water that sells for 1.90GBP, Orange Juice for 2.50GB, Chunky Chips for 3.50GBP, BBQ Bourbon Beef pies 4.50GBP, Tortellini for 6.50GBP, Bacon Roll for 4.50GBP and a Ham/Cheese Toastie for 4.50GBP.
THE MEALS
Ten mins after takeoff, the cabin crew, moved thru the cabin to take hot food pre-orders from passengers. Using iPads crew members started at row 1 and row 15 to take orders. I observed that there weren’t many takers on this flight. Twenty-five minutes after takeoff the cabin crew commenced the inflight service, two crew members worked on each cart, with one cart starting at row 1 and the other starting from the back. It took the crew 35 minutes to complete the service and meet in the middle of the aircraft.
I received my order of chips and pies about 45 minutes after I placed the order, and it was served to me from the cart when the crew made it to my seat row. I ended up ordering an orange juice and paid with a credit card for the total.
For a short-haul flight, I thought the food offering was quite good, and there was plenty of choice between hot and cold dishes. The crew offered tomato sauce and mayo (for free, some airlines charge for it) to accompany the pie and chips. I thought the chips were great, I’m usually quite sceptical of deep-fried products being reheated at 35,000ft, but they were crunchy and delicious. The portion wasn’t huge, but the chips were on the larger size. The packaging of the chips was a little challenging to open.
The pie pastry was flakey, and the BBQ Bourbon Beef was an excellent flavour combination. I’m not a huge fan of pies and was surprised at how good these tasted.
Rubbish was collected immediately once the food carts were stowed away in the galleys. A second service was not completed on this flight. However, the crew did offer the Tax-Free Inflight Shopping.
I spent a total of 9GBP inflight with TUI, and I felt as though I received great value for money, considering it’s an inflight meal purchase. The TUI UK menu offers plenty of meal deals, and the prices are quite reasonable. They regularly change their onboard offer, usually at the start of the Winter season and the beginning of the Summer season.