• United - offers variety and healthy choices in four different meal types, Smartpack, 895 cal; Minimeal, 560 cal; Quickpick, 655 cal; Ritebite, 625 cal. The Smartpack and Ritebite are your most balanced options.
• Continental Airlines - doesn't have all the options that United does, but the meals are definitely health-oriented with pretzels and sandwiches made with low-fat mayo. Turkey, 285 cal; Ham, 316 cal.
• JetBlue - has a number of individually packaged, portion-controlled snacks, including Nabisco 100 calorie packs, Doritos Munchies Mix, Mrs. GoodCookie Jungle Crackers, All Nuts Jumbo Cashew Halves.
• American Airlines - skip the breakfast muffin, but the meat, nuts, raisins and cheese in the 710-calorie snack pack are filling.
• US Airways - offers a fairly low calorie snack pack (470 cal), but lacks any real nutritional punch. Try the fruit/nut mix and skip the rest
• Delta Air Lines - again, the fruit and nuts are worth eating in Delta's snack pack, but the rest of the 766 cal meal can easily be skipped.

We have an in-flight food guide that we posted a couple of weeks ago to help Slashfood readers know what they're in for food-wise on several major airlines this summer. This week, the Wall Street Journal actually took to the skies to taste-test some of the meal options on various airlines. Dubbed the "unfree lunches," since you now almost always have to pay for meals and snacks when you fly.

Many of the "snack" boxes contained little food for the shocking amount of calories they contained, and the exact calorie count could not always be determined, since single-serving "cheeses" were often unlabeled. Overall, you'd do best to pass on the "insultingly skimpy" snack box from ATA ($3), which garnered the "worst snack box" award. United Airlines Right Bite Box ($5), by contrast, was voted the "best snack box" because their selections were "smart," reasonably healthy and stocked with popular brands - including organics. Air Canada was praised for their excellent muffin ($2) and offering of Subway veggie sandwiches ($5). As for the rest? Let's just say that packing your own snack is always a good idea.

Michelin-starred chef, Marcus Wareing of the Pétrus restaurant at the Berkeley hotel, in the UK, said that the standards in airline fare were higher than that of the average pub. While many pubs rely on canned soups and old sandwiches with little sign of improvement orver the years, the airlines are constantly trying to "up their game." Wareing takes a rather optimistic view of the recent discontinuation of food service on many airlines, however, seeming to imply that the reason they have done this is because they don't want to serve sub-standard food in an effort to cut costs.

Does anyone agree with this? Granted, some of the airlines do try to serve quality foods, but they know that people will eat just about anything on planes and readily take advantage of that fact. The quality of the food may be better from a freshness and food-safety standpoint, but that doesn't change the taste.

It sounds like Wareing needs to frequent some different pubs.

Flying is a tricky business these days, especially when it comes to the availability of food. I know that I don't need the extra calories when I'm essentially immobile for a large chunk of time, but I like having something to munch on when I'm on an airplane, especially if it's a long flight. At this point, I've basically given up hope of having a meal served (let alone an edible one), especially after my last United flight across the country teased me by asking my meal preferences when I booked the ticket. There are a few airlines that offer sustenance, but it looks like you might have to pay for that packet of peanuts/pretzels/snack mix with some of them.

I don't mean put tiny packets of honey roasted peanuts and a vacuum-packed bag of wilted celery cticks in a flimsy box and charge yourself $4.95.

Conde Nast Traveler magazine challenged chef Gene Kato of Chicago restaurant Japonais to create an in-flight meal that was spoil-proof for three hours, leakproof, and didn't stink strongly enough to disturb your neighboring traveler (Conde Nast used the word "odiferous"). It couldn't be too difficult for something Japanese-inspired, since the concept of mobile food in bento boxes comes from Japan. Chef Kato created Miso-glazed Fried Chicken with Japanese Truffled Soybean Salad. The recipe is on Conde Nast's website.

I challenge Chef Kato to make something to take on a Korean Airlines flight that's not "odiferous." Kimchee anyone?

[via: Gadling]