- Who
- Handley Page Transport
- What
- first first
- Where
- United Kingdom (London)
- When
The first meal served on a regular passenger aircraft was a pre-packed lunchbox consisting of sandwiches and fruit, served by "cabin boys" for three shillings (equivalent to £6.33 in 2017) to customers on board the Handley Page Transport (UK) service from London to Paris on 11 October 1919.
Eighteenth-century balloon flights were often accompanied by Champagne lunches, but it wasn't until 1919 that a regular meal service was offered mid-flight, on the modified Handley Page World War I bombers. According to culinary historian Richard Foss, the first hot meals served on an aircraft were those on board Lufthansa in 1928. On some flights in the 1930s, US airlines offered free cigarettes with their meals.
