American Airlines’ London business class is now serving wine from a box, a detail that would be unthinkable in a premium cabin when everything is running normally. It’s the latest visible symptom of the Heathrow catering breakdown that has forced this airline into bare-minimum service levels.
The carrier abruptly halted its catering out of London Heathrow airport. Instead, they’re “double catering” flights out of the U.S., flying the food across the Atlantic, and serving half of it on the return flight to the United States.
Since that means food is onboard their planes for far longer, they have to restrict options. There’s no ice cream, and no seafood. And because there’s not enough room in the galleys to load provisions for full service for two flights, they’ve cut back significantly on what they’re giving to customers.
Here’s a Flagship First Class, single tray service meal from London Heathrow to Los Angeles right now. Passengers have also reported being served only one meal instead of two, and not receiving the expected business class amenities.
Flagship First Dinner LHR to LAX
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u/SpecialistOne9509 in
americanairlines
Aviation watchdog JonNYC shares this front line report of catering on board an American Airlines flight from New York JFK to London. The passenger received their pre-order meal, so there’s a chance it happens (althogh crew have been told not to expect pre-order meals to be fulfilled) and business class passengers are being served box wine. The advertised Bollinger champagne has been replaced with Cava, though it’s not clear why this would be necessary because of catering or galley constraints.
a single data point on current catering:
“Currently on AA142 to LHR in J. Pre ordered meals honored but wine is boxed wine and bollinger is Cava. I couldn’t believe it when I saw boxes wine on the cart.”— JonNYC (@xJonNYC) March 5, 2026
JonNYC tweets the receipts:
Honestly box wine isn’t worse than what American Airlines usually serves. While Bollinger is an excellent business class champagne choice, the rest of their wine program is arguably among the worst in the airline industry, on par with SriLankan Airlines.
There are wines you can drink at the $6 price point, but somehow American not to select even those.
All of this is reportedly because of hygiene issues with their caterer in London, dnata. A photo is circulating of mice in a bag of bread that flight attendants discovered when they placed it in a basket in the galley, as shared by JonNYC.
The belief is that a mice infestation at Dnata’s London Heathrow catering kitchen prompted American to immediately halt local catering and fly in minimal meals from the US for their London departures.
Update: dnata responds,
dnata firmly rejects recent claims regarding alleged hygiene issues within our catering operations at London Heathrow. These allegations are entirely false.
Independent audits confirm that our facility meets all food hygiene and safety requirements, with robust processes in place to ensure full compliance at all times.
One of our airline customers has temporarily adjusted its catering arrangements as part of its own internal review, and dnata is fully supporting them throughout this period.
dnata continues to operate normally for all other airline customers, with no changes to service delivery, safety protocols, or quality standards.
Our teams remain committed to delivering safe, high‑quality catering services and supporting our partners with transparency, reliability, and operational excellence.
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