How to be vegan when travelling on a long haul flight

Travelling can be a daunting task when you're vegan, in regards to what you are going to eat. Even when I was vegetarian I would find myself panicking that there would not be an option for me - this wouldn't be a big deal if I were travelling on a short haul flight  but when it comes to long haul its a whole over story. I tried to take pictures when I remembered of what we had to eat, unfortunately i missed a few on the way back.

I flew with Etihad Airways.

I seem to have developed a tradition where every time i go to the airport on holiday, I will always make sure that I have enough time to sit down and have a meal before boarding without rushing. This time we went to a restaurant called 'Giraffe'. 'Giraffe' have some really good vegan options, I would recommend the 'Indo-Coco Curry' if you were eating here. On this occasion though I was having breakfast, I had a bagel with Avocado, Spinach, Mushrooms and Tomatoes. This isn't something that is on the menu but they did have a meat option for a bagel breakfast sandwich, so when ordering i asked if i could have that but without the meat and just have avocado - the server then recommended to add on the extra veggies. (I know that the 'Giraffe' local to me are able to do porridge with soy milk to make it vegan but I cant vouch for any other branches)
I also had a soy latte to drink.

In my previous experience, plane food has always been a hit or miss situation - to prepare for this we bought a  meal deal from boots each, I had the beetroot tandoori wrap, a TREK coconut protein bar and for a drink just a bottle of water. 

Out-bound flight

Flight One

Our first flight to Abu Dhabi, was delayed by two and a half hours but we only found this out when we were already on the plane. 

Our first flight was a morning flight, so we had breakfast at giraffe at around 7 am and got our first meal on the plane at around 11:30am. One perk of having a 'special' meal is that it comes out first to avoid any confusion with other meals. 

 We had a hot box of cooked potato slices, tomatoes and chickpeas, a small barm with a pot of dairy free butter and a pot strawberry jam, a box of chopped apples, carton of raisins and orange juice. There was also a 'Nutri-Grain' bar but unfortunately this contains milk so I was unable to have this and gave it to my boyfriend. They also came around with the drinks trolley shortly after offering a range of drinks, all of which were complimentary. 

The cabin crew brought around little packets of crackers a few hours later. during all the flights of this trip I noticed that all of the small snacks that were brought around or presented with the meal tend to be both vegan friendly and gluten free friendly. 

The next meal was brought out a little less than two hours before landing, it was a hot wrap and another bag of the crackers. Small but however I found it was enough. Apologies for the picture not being the best quality but I mainly took it to remember what flavour it was that we had. The wrap was a spinach & Lemon Dhal, I was quite surprised with how flavourful this was. 

Flight Two

We boarded the next flight at around 9pm, since this was an overnight flight we had dinner and breakfast.

Dinner was served fairly soon after take off. This time it was a pasta dish with a tomato sauce, unfortunately I do not have a picture of this. It came with a side bread roll and a portion of fruit.

Breakfast was not your average breakfast but it was a sweet&sour tofu curry, I was pleasantly surprised by this. It came with a bread roll and dairy free butter, a pot of beans which were cold but if you put them into the curry they heat up quickly and then a box of fruit.

Return Flight

Flight One

For this flight we were travelling over night the whole way, since we were going back against the time zones we were travelling in the night time over different parts of the world! 

For the first meal we had a curry, it had an assortment of vegetables and tofu. As per usual it came with a bread roll and fruit  box along with a box of raisins and then some cucumber and celery sticks with a guacamole dip. I was slightly disappointed with the guacamole dip as it just didn't really taste the best so i just ate around this. 

Flight Two

For the second flight I did not get around to getting any photographs of the food.
On the second flight, food was served in a paper bag this time - Lunch style. It came with a sandwich, a bag of crackers, a bag of apple slices and a little biscuit with a soft centre. The sandwich was a little disappointing, but it wasn't inedible. It was a nice soft bread but the filling was mediocre - Tomato sauce and two slithers of cucumber, too add a bit of flavour i opened it up and popped a few of the small crackers into sandwich.
A little while later, the cabin crew brought around drinks and snacks. This was a bag of caramel popcorn and whichever drink you wanted.
Around 2 hours before we were due to land the next round of food was brought around, we were served a breakfast fairly similar to the previous one, although instead of potato slices it was two hash browns, served with a little muffin and a pot of fruit. The muffin didn't have the ingredients listed on the back so just as a precaution I didn't have this.


Extra Tips

• Make sure that you request the meal as a special meal when you book the flight, you usually have to do this via the airlines online system. The code I used was 'VGML' this was a vegetarian meal with no dairy - this worked perfectly for me as nothing came with egg and does not tend to. 
• Take extra snacks just incase you need them, a bag or two of crisps, a muesli/raw bar and some nuts are always a good idea. 
• Be sure to double check ingredients where you can, on things such as the packeted crackers or cakes. 

I hope this comes in useful for somebody, I struggled to find any information online for vegan airplane food which gave me the idea to do this post. 

Thanks, 

Charlotte x

Instagram: @Chvrlottee

@CharlottesGalleryUK