Eating on Air Asia

Something seems missing from this trip ... after some thought it was the realisation that I haven’t had a cold glass of white wine with my airline meals. That’s a drawback of flying a budget airline ... but the food on Air Asia isn’t bad at all.

The meals available for sale vary ... depending on which of the four airlines (two Malaysian, one Thai, one Indonesian) in the Air Asia brand family you’re flying with.

The following meals on the Malaysian shorthaul airline were sampled and the verdict was as follows:

Roti Jala: You get a whiff of the heavenly curry as soon as you rip the plastic top of the meal box. But the curry is only sauce ... no nothing like chicken (as described) or even potatoes. The lacey-bread roti jala (4 pieces) themselves were yummy and filled with chicken mince as described.

Asian Fried Rice: The fried rice was OK but not as pungent as I would have liked. The three sticks of satay were miniscule but they certainly packed in a lot of flavour. The anchovies weren’t crunchy but that’s hard to achieve unless they’re packaged separately as on Malaysia Airlines for their nasi lemak breakfast.

Nasi Lemak: Disappointment compared to the picture in the menu but still tasty ... but I’ve had tastier Nasi Lemak on flights before. As with their Fried Rice, it is hard to achieve crunchy anchovies with an all-in-one pack. If you’re flying out of KL Low Cost Carrier Terminal (LCCT) in the morning, have the Nasi Lemak Special at the Asian Kitchen beforehand ... far far superior for just MYR1 more than the Air Asia version.

As a summary, nothing looks like the pictures in the menu ... but still pretty tasty.