The taste of the sky: a new inflight menu on Uzbekistan Airways flights

**A taste of the sky: new inflight menu on Uzbekistan Airways flights**

On October 31, Uzbekistan Airways held a presentation of an updated inflight menu created by the team of "Ketring" LLC, which will soon appear on the airline's flights.

The history of the catering service began back in 1958 with a restaurant opened at the Tashkent airport. Today, "Ketring" LLC combines years of experience, modern production infrastructure, and a team of qualified specialists, providing a full cycle of preparation and supply of inflight meals for the aviation industry of Uzbekistan.

People's tastes vary greatly and often change. And while catering enterprises on the ground can fulfill customer requests relatively easily, airline catering services find it more difficult. Nevertheless, they strive to adapt as much as possible and design the inflight menu taking into account the requests and preferences of air passengers.

Zera Emirvelieva, Chief Technologist of "Ketring" LLC, spoke about how this happens in practice: "The menu change is due to the fact that it has a cyclical nature. We collect feedback from passengers that they leave in questionnaires, meaning we study consumer demand, and only after that do we compile the menu. Everything here is passenger-oriented. And we start developing with our chefs what they want to see on board. We develop a range of dishes and then offer to include them in the menu."

In reality, menu development is quite an extensive process. In parallel, a Skytrax audit takes place according to international standards, where they offer their own options regarding the assortment, presentation of dishes, and even the food heating temperature.

Menu development is considered complete when it becomes a document — a recipe card, and then a costing card, on which the price of the dish depends.

The menu being prepared concerns not only international, but also domestic flights, including even all check flights.

Naturally, the approach to the menu, service class, and crew members differs. For business class, completely different standards of presentation, tableware, portion norms, and, naturally, prices are provided. The same applies to CIP and VIP lounges.

The updated menu at this presentation was introduced by chefs Ahadov Abduvali, Kim Gennady, and Somodov Abdusattar, who directly participated in its development, offering a wide range of salads and hot dishes.

Premium restaurants might envy the new menu on board Uzbekistan Airways. Depending on the class of service, passengers will be offered drinks, including freshly squeezed juices (fresh), meat platters consisting of boiled kazy, smoked/cooked poultry fillet (duck).

Cold appetizers will include smoked/cooked poultry fillet (chicken), duck fillet, meat roll with prunes, as well as a large selection of cheeses.

The fish appetizer will consist of butterfish, house-cured salmon, fried-smoked eel.

Naturally, the menu will also feature various vegetables, dried fruits, as well as a large selection of salads with arugula, mozzarella, sun-dried tomatoes with chicken, with stracciatella cheese, smoked duck, and other products.

For breakfast, passengers will be offered potato zrazy with mushrooms and broccoli, pancakes with meat and sour cream, pancakes with chicken, classic omelet with sausage, spinach with caramelized onions and sun-dried tomatoes.

The list of hot dishes includes "Minestrone" soup, beef "Shurpa" soup, "Garbure" soup (with duck "Confit").

Among the meat dishes, the chefs offer delicacy meat, rustic potatoes, beef medallions, festive beef plov, braised lamb in demi-glace sauce, and much more.

The chefs have not forgotten about fish lovers either. For them, they will cook grilled salmon, fried pike-perch, Bukhara-style pike-perch, parchment-baked salmon.

And, of course, a large selection of poultry dishes is provided — grilled chicken, chicken tabaka, chicken roll with a side dish, duck breast "Confit", chicken cordon bleu.

For dessert, passengers will be offered an assortment of mini-cakes, "Nafis" cake, and a large selection of Oriental sweets.

However, service at such a high level is impossible without an appropriate material and technical base and qualified personnel.

Murod Trobov, Director of "Ketring" LLC, drew attention to this: "Our enterprise is equipped with modern equipment that allows us to produce more than 5 million inflight rations per year. "Ketring" LLC involves 22 services that provide uninterrupted meals for flights not only of Uzbekistan Airways, but also of other domestic and foreign companies flying to Russia, Europe, and Southeast Asia."

According to him, more than 600 employees are involved in the production process, which allows preparing more than 15 thousand portions per day, fulfilling orders in a timely manner, and maintaining high quality standards for all airlines.

We may add that the inflight menu is updated twice a year, and for Uzbekistan Airways each update is another step in the consistent work on the quality of passenger service.

Every dish is not just a meal on board. It is part of the passenger's overall travel experience. Quality products, thoughtful flavor combinations, and aesthetic presentation help make time in flight more comfortable and pleasant — and this very approach remains one of the key guidelines in the enterprise's work.