Brett
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Registered: 16th Dec 02
Location: Manchester
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Hopefully not a repost. I hadn't seen it before today...
Dear Mr Branson
REF: Mumbai to Heathrow 7th December 2008
I love the Virgin brand, I really do which is why I continue to use it despite a series of unfortunate incidents over the last few years. This latest incident takes the biscuit.
Ironically, by the end of the flight I would have gladly paid over a thousand rupees for a single biscuit following the culinary journey of hell I was subjected to at thehands of your corporation.
Look at this Richard. Just look at it:
I imagine the same questions are racing through your brilliant mind as were racing through mine on that fateful day. What is this? Why have I been given it? What have I done to deserve this? And, which one is the starter, which one is the desert?
You don’t get to a position like yours Richard with anything less than a generous sprinkling of observational power so I KNOW you will have spotted the tomato next to the two yellow shafts of sponge on the left. Yes, it’s next to the sponge shaft without the green paste. That’s got to be the clue hasn’t it. No sane person would serve a desert with a tomato would they. Well answer me this Richard, what sort of animal would serve a desert with peas in:
I know it looks like a baaji but it’s in custard Richard, custard. It must be the pudding. Well you’ll be fascinated to hear that it wasn't custard. It was a sour gel with a clear oil on top. It’s only redeeming feature was that it managed to be so alien to my palette that it took away the taste of the curry emanating from our miscellaneous central cuboid of beige matter. Perhaps the meal on the left might be the desert after all.
Anyway, this is all irrelevant at the moment. I was raised strictly but neatly by my parents and if they knew I had started desert before the main course, a sponge shaft would be the least of my worries. So lets peel back the tin-foil on the main dish and see what’s on offer.
I’ll try and explain how this felt. Imagine being a twelve year old boy Richard. Now imagine it’s Christmas morning and you’re sat their with your final present to open. It’s a big one, and you know what it is. It’s that Goodmans stereo you picked out the catalogue and wrote to Santa about.
Only you open the present and it’s not in there. It’s your hamster Richard. It’s your hamster in the box and it’s not breathing. That’s how I felt when I peeled back the foil and saw this:
Now I know what you’re thinking. You’re thinking it’s more of that Baaji custard. I admit I thought the same too, but no. It’s mustard Richard. MUSTARD. More mustard than any man could consume in a month. On the left we have a piece of broccoli and some peppers in a brown glue-like oil and on the right the chef had prepared some mashed potato. The potato masher had obviously broken and so it was decided the next best thing would be to pass the potatoes through the digestive tract of a bird.
Once it was regurgitated it was clearly then blended and mixed with a bit of mustard. Everybody likes a bit of mustard Richard.
By now I was actually starting to feel a little hypoglycaemic. I needed a sugar hit. Luckily there was a small cookie provided. It had caught my eye earlier due to it’s baffling presentation:
It appears to be in an evidence bag from the scene of a crime. A CRIME AGAINST BLOODY COOKING. Either that or some sort of back-street underground cookie, purchased off a gun-toting maniac high on his own supply of yeast. You certainly wouldn’t want to be caught carrying one of these through customs. Imagine biting into a piece of brass Richard. That would be softer on the teeth than the specimen above.
I was exhausted. All I wanted to do was relax but obviously I had to sit with that mess in front of me for half an hour. I swear the sponge shafts moved at one point.
Once cleared, I decided to relax with a bit of your world-famous onboard entertainment. I switched it on:
I apologise for the quality of the photo, it’s just it was incredibly hard to capture Boris Johnson’s face through the flickering white lines running up and down the screen. Perhaps it would be better on another channel:
Is that Ray Liotta? A question I found myself asking over and over again throughout the gruelling half-hour I attempted to watch the film like this. After that I switched off. I’d had enough. I was the hungriest I’d been in my adult life and I had a splitting headache from squinting at a crackling screen.
My only option was to simply stare at the seat in front and wait for either food, or sleep. Neither came for an incredibly long time. But when it did it surpassed my wildest expectations:
Yes! It’s another crime-scene cookie. Only this time you dunk it in the white stuff.
Richard…. What is that white stuff? It looked like it was going to be yoghurt. It finally dawned on me what it was after staring at it. It was a mixture between the Baaji custard and the Mustard sauce. It reminded me of my first week at university. I had overheard that you could make a drink by mixing vodka and refreshers. I lied to my new friends and told them I’d done it loads of times. When I attempted to make the drink in a big bowl it formed a cheese Richard, a cheese. That cheese looked a lot like your baaji-mustard.
So that was that Richard. I didn’t eat a bloody thing. My only question is: How can you live like this? I can’t imagine what dinner round your house is like, it must be like something out of a nature documentary.
As I said at the start I love your brand, I really do. It’s just a shame such a simple thing could bring it crashing to it’s knees and begging for sustenance.
Yours Sincererly
XXXX
Paul Charles, Virgin’s Director of Corporate Communications, confirmed that Sir Richard Branson had telephoned the author of the letter and had thanked him for his “constructive if tongue-in-cheek” email. Mr Charles said that Virgin was sorry the passenger had not liked the in-flight meals which he said was “award-winning food which is very popular on our Indian routes.”
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willay
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Organiser: South East, National Events
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Registered: 10th Nov 02
Location: Roydon, Essex
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quote:
It appears to be in an evidence bag from the scene of a crime. A CRIME AGAINST BLOODY COOKING
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C2RL R
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Registered: 28th Mar 02
Location: Redcliffe, QLD
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used Bransons name far too much in that letter but funny all the same.
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stubbsy05
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Registered: 23rd Oct 02
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Aeroplane food is bad at the best of times.
The BA food I had on the flight from Bangalore to London was terrible! Resulted in me spending most of the 11.5 hours on the shitter on the plane! 
[Edited on 28-01-2009 by Alex.S]
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C2RL R
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Registered: 28th Mar 02
Location: Redcliffe, QLD
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i have never once had bad food on a plane.
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Cosmo
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Registered: 29th Mar 01
Location: Im the real one!
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quote:
Originally posted by C2RL R
i have never once had bad food on a plane.
Same here - but then again first class has always been great service.
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DC90
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Registered: 14th Nov 07
Location: Bedfordshire
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Quite funny. I've also never had a bad experience with plane food..Bet I will now lol..
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Mobby
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Registered: 31st Dec 07
Location: Leicestershire
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mint. i like the fact that richard actually phoned him up (if its true)
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C2RL R
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Registered: 28th Mar 02
Location: Redcliffe, QLD
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if it was snakes on a plane then i'd have something to say about it........
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CorsAsh
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Registered: 19th Apr 02
Location: Munich
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Lufthansa has never let me down, and they give me free beer. It's the sensible option as it's the biggest driink available, or so I told the gobsmacked god-botherer type sat next to me when I cracked a cold one at 9am. 
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DannyB
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Registered: 6th Feb 08
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That cookie had me in stitches
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Russ
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Registered: 14th Mar 04
Location: Armchair
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that really made me chuckle
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Carl
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Registered: 9th May 04
Location: Jimmy Bennett's la la land.
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Class! I always take sandwiches with me.
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Graham88
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Registered: 16th Apr 07
Location: South East Kent Drives: E46 M3
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Superbly written
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mattk
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Registered: 27th Feb 06
Location: St. Helens
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I take shit loads of monster munch, space raiders and mega transormers on flights I go on
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_Allan_
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Registered: 24th Mar 04
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quality email.
[Edited on 28-01-2009 by _Allan_]
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Shell
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Registered: 14th Oct 08
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Can you take food on with you now? I know you couldn't take anything through security checks? But it's been almost a year since i've been on an aeroplane, might have all changed!
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Carl
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Registered: 9th May 04
Location: Jimmy Bennett's la la land.
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quote:
Originally posted by Shelley
Can you take food on with you now? I know you couldn't take anything through security checks? But it's been almost a year since i've been on an aeroplane, might have all changed!
Yeah, never had a problem.
Off thomson website; Can I take my own food for the flight?
Yes, you can take and eat your own food on your flight. However, please be aware that we cannot provide heating facilities whilst on board (although for infants, we are able to warm bottles of milk in hot water).
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sand-eel
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Registered: 15th Mar 07
Location: carluke/braidwood--IRNBRULAND
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Shell
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Registered: 14th Oct 08
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Oooh, around the height of the "terrorism scare", I used to fly to East Midlands every few months and you couldn't take any food or juice through the wee security part. Although I think they had lightened up a bit and you just couldn't take liquids after a while. Good to know though!
[Edited on 28-01-2009 by Shelley]
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stubbsy05
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Registered: 23rd Oct 02
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Boots meal deals at the airport beat aeroplane fod hands down
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Demo
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Registered: 27th Sep 01
Location: south wales Drives: astra sri ecoflex
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fucking quality
"its mustard richard. more mustard than any man can consume in a month"
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Corsa_Quadz
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Registered: 24th Feb 08
Location:
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I was in complete agony with laughter reading that! Made my day cheers 
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Jambo
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Registered: 8th Sep 01
Location: Maidenhead, Drives: VXR Arctic
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the birds digestive tract got me Rotfl tbh
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VegasPhil
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Registered: 16th Jan 05
Location: Fareham, Hants Drives: Octavia VRS
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I laughed at the Cheese paragraph
Funny one though well done
Corsa 2.0 16v Vegas - Sold
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