Why Gordon Ramsay Can't Stand Airplane Food

When someone mentions airplane food, you likely picture pre-packaged plastic trays with congealed lasagna, cold steak, and soggy veggies – i.e., the meals you get on airplanes hardly qualify as gourmet dinners. It makes sense given that there's no top chef preparing your food fresh for you. Rather, the airline has to prepare all of the food for thousands of passengers every single day before taking off, leaving them little opportunity to provide you with something you'd find at a five-star restaurant.

That being said, while we wouldn't rate it as our best meal ever, many of us have no problem eating the food served to us in flight (travel makes you hungry, after all!). Gordon Ramsay, however, refuses. The famous celebrity chef wouldn't touch airplane food with a 10-foot pole, according to a 2017 interview. Why? It's not because it doesn't taste good but because he knows a little too much about how it was made.

Fun fact: Gordon Ramsay used to work in the airline industry as a consultant for Singapore Airlines, per Travel + Leisure. So the real reason that he doesn't eat airplane food now is the same reason why some restaurant employees won't eat at the place where they used to work — they know all too well where the food came from (or how it was prepared). In an interview with Refinery29, the British chef said, "There's no f***ing way I eat on planes. I worked for airlines for ten years, so I know where this food's been and where it goes, and how long it took before it got on board."

So what does he eat when travels? If he's flying out of London's Heathrow airport, Gordon can get a meal at his own restaurant, Plane Food. Otherwise, he told Refinery29 that he prefers something light and Italian before he boards, like "a nice selection of Italian meats, a little glass of red wine, some sliced apples or pears with some parmesan cheese."