How they REALLY make your airline food: Why spicy menus are best to eat at 30,000 feet, what the cabin crew do with the leftovers and why the pilots NEVER eat the same meal revealed

Beige, bland, unidentifiable—airplane food doesn’t usually have the highest culinary reputation.

But I’m one of those people who, on a long-haul flight, can’t wait to peel off the silver foil and find out what’s in store for breakfast, lunch or dinner.

What I’ve always been interested in is how aircraft products are actually made. And what it takes to produce thousands of meals ready to be heated and served 38,000 feet in the sky.

To find out, I spend a day with British Airways in its massive 55,000 sq ft catering facility. feet two miles from Gatwick Airport. It is run by Newrest Catering, whose 350 staff produce 4,500 meals a day.

The scale of the 24/7 operation is staggering and cleanliness is key. I start by changing into a white chef’s uniform, black boots with steel caps, a striped apron, a hair net, a face mask, and head to the industrial-sized metal hand-washing sinks.

To find out how airline food is prepared, Harriet Syme (pictured with the Christmas food she helped prepare) spent a day with British Airways at its huge 55,000 sq m catering centre. feet two miles from Gatwick Airport.

I’m helping the team put together the British Airways Christmas menu (pictured), which includes a traditional roast turkey with all the trimmings.

I’m helping the team put together the British Airways Christmas menu, which includes a traditional roast turkey with all the trimmings. Even behind my mask, the holiday aromas are unmistakable as cooks chop, peel, stir and roll out giant quantities of food.

First up are the roasted parsnips, which I drizzle with honey with a spade-sized slotted spoon before moving on to make the cranberry compote. More than 50kg of Brussels sprouts bubble next to me in a huge silver vat as I mix the bright red berries with sugar, cinnamon sticks and nutmeg.

Every few minutes, a huge oven rings a Christmas chime to signal the food is ready before it is transported on tall trolleys to huge refrigerated rooms to avoid overcooking.

British Airways plans to serve 380,000 Christmas dinners (including 600,000 sprouts) in the skies over the festive period.

My last stop is the “dining room,” where dozens of workers in thermal underwear and wool hats under blue hair nets (the room is kept at a cool 8 degrees) and wearing long blue plastic gloves prepare food with impressive precision for business class passengers.

Everything is done by hand, with employees working along conveyors, carefully adding vegetables one by one.

At the end of each gleaming silver stand in an oval porcelain bowl is a “golden sample” showing how each dish should look. I keep a close eye on this by placing three tiny but perfectly roasted carrots on top of the parsnips, followed by a dollop of the cranberry sauce I made just a few hours ago.

“We spend a lot of time developing our menus and testing them over and over until they are up to standard,” Newrest head chef Andy Bailey, 53, tells me.

The catering business (pictured) is run by Newrest Catering, whose 350 staff produce 4,500 meals a day.

Harriet carefully wrapped the sausages in bacon while she wrapped the pigs in blankets for Christmas dinner.

So how long are these dishes stored before they reach passengers? For British Airways, the food we prepare will be served on board the next day.

About 90 percent of the food at the facility is produced for British Airways (the rest for Air Mauritius, Air Transat, Delta and Vueling). Every week Newrest supplies BA with 52,000 buns, 47,000 desserts, as well as 20,000 bottles of sparkling wine, 45,000 red wines and 20,000 cans of beer.

“The perception of airplane food is changing,” Mark Brega, BA’s chef, tells me later as we sample the Christmas roast as if we were on board. With celebrity chefs involved, passengers now have much higher expectations.”

Indeed, as the aviation industry becomes increasingly crowded and fiercely competitive, airlines are now investing huge amounts of money into their catering services to differentiate themselves from others.

Earlier this year, Cathay Pacific introduced Michelin-starred food to first and business class passengers flying out of Hong Kong, while Etihad is offering a seven-course tasting menu for those turning left. But this higher standard of dining isn’t just for those in the posh seats.

Harriet made cranberry sauce (pictured above) for the British Airways Christmas dinner.

Harriet Syme (pictured) helped the team create the British Airways Christmas menu, which includes a traditional roast turkey with all the trimmings.

Qatar Airways offers its popular mezze of hummus, muhammara, tabbouleh and Arabic bread to passengers in all classes (including economy).

Interestingly, I learned that our taste buds don’t function as well in the sky because the air on a plane is drier, which dehydrates our nasal passages and makes our taste buds less sensitive and able to detect flavors.

“You lose about 30 percent of your taste buds, so we have to take that into account when cooking,” Mark says. “British food in general is very good, but it’s light on flavour, so spicier and flavoursome dishes tend to work better. Butter chicken or chicken tikka masala are some of the most popular dishes.

“The same goes for wine; some of them taste great on the ground but can taste terrible in the air, so they need to be tested.”

When preparing dishes, the smell of the food is also carefully taken into account. “Fish similar to the smell of red mullet can fill the cabin and should be avoided. But the aroma of the bread is extremely attractive and signals to passengers that a delicious meal awaits them.”

Typically, 70 percent of the meals on board will consist of meat or fish, with the rest being vegetarian, vegan or special diet meals (the crew has to serve 11 different “diet meals”). But this may change depending on the route. For example, on flights to India, most meals will be vegetarian.

What about the crew? The flight attendants eat what’s left after service, and the captain and co-pilot dine on different foods in case one of them gets sick.

After an eight-hour shift, I’ll be very glad if I don’t see another Brussels sprout before the big day. But, more importantly, the next time someone asks me “chicken or fish?”, “beef or vegetarian?”, I will think about Andy and his colleagues – and eat with special pleasure.