Airbooze: Alcohol Selection on Airplanes
August 23, 2010
Because I am a geek who feels the need to categorize everything, I try to track which airlines carry which spirits.
I started a page to share this, located at this link: Airline Drink Menus.
I'll keep filling it out over the coming months, but should you feel like enabling my geekery you can help: snap a picture of the spirits and cocktail selection of your next flight (usually in the airline magazine) and email it to me. Make sure to let me know which airline, domestic or international, and what month you flew so I can categorize it correctly.
Looking at the menus I have there already there are some interesting choices. As usual, Virgin is doing cool things. On Virgin America, they have craft beer: Black Star Beer, Gordon Biersch Mãrzen, 21st Amendment Brew Free or Die! IPA. On Virgin Atlantic, they have a guest spirit as a promotion: Akvinta vodka.
I wish more airlines were more adventurous with their spirits selection- Virgin Upperclass has an actual bar with barstools where you can sit, but then the spirit selection is mostly well liquor. They should have rows of single-malt scotch and other high-end brands to try. They've got a captive audience of high income-earners (except when I'm on the plane) who can spend the money on bottle of the spirit when they land.
In the meantime, let's keep watching to see where things stand.
ah, i love this kind of 'geekery' & 'catagorizing' :) thanks for doing it. just wish it had started earlier in the year when I was traveling a lot more. Also, someone should really bring up (or take pics of) those funny/crappy little "bags" of spirits you get on Ryanair! They kind of crack me up.
Posted by: forest | August 23, 2010 at 02:35 PM
Bags of spirits? Have not seen.
Posted by: Camper English | August 23, 2010 at 03:04 PM
I flew Porter Airlines recently, and they give you complimentary beer or wine (or other drinks). The beer, since it's a Canadian airline, is Steamwhistle Pilsner. It's a traditionally-brewed Czech-style pilsner and comes in cans. They also offer a chard and a cab which are also both quite serviceable. In Toronto, they were offering a whiskey tasting for certain stopover flights this summer, though I don't know which distillery was featured.
Cheers!
Posted by: Newtype2001 | August 23, 2010 at 04:31 PM
USair has crap cocktails made with Stirrings mixers (whose "Mai Tai" has cranberry juice in it -- blecch!) ... I wish Virgin flew out of my hub!
Posted by: Beachbum Berry | August 23, 2010 at 07:09 PM
Would it be wrong to book future travels based on such information . . . I think it would be very sensible indeed!
Posted by: Michelle | August 24, 2010 at 11:43 AM
Yo, I just sent you a photo of the United Airlines spirits list page I took a couple months ago. It listed Courvoisier VSOP under "Liqueurs". That's a very special cognac indeed.
Posted by: Greg Lindgren | August 24, 2010 at 01:11 PM
Yeah Ryanair sell pouches of Gin/Vodka etc
Never tried them myself.
Posted by: Neil | August 26, 2010 at 01:21 PM