Welcome to Souvenir Sunday, the day we take a look at some of the fun, locally-themed and inexpensive items you can buy when you’re stuck at the airport.
This week: Kit Kats picked up on a very short layover at Tokyo’s Narita International Airport.
Wildly popular in Japan (where Nestle has a Kit Kat boutique), Kit Kats are available in dozens of unusual flavors in addition to the three – wasabi, hot Japanese chile and rum raisin – that we picked up at the airport.
Those hearts your barista makes with the foam on your latte may be charming, but the 3D foam Hello Kitty and other cute characters that top the drinks at Chock Full of Beans in Singapore’s Changi Village neighborhood bring latte art to a new level.
Starbucks, take note…
If you’re traveling through Chicago’s O’Hare Airport on Tuesday, March 31, head over to Terminal 2 (across from Wicker Park Seafood & Sushi) at 11 a.m. for the live, Iron Chef-style cooking competition.
Organized by HMSHost, which operates food and beverage outlets at many airports (and along highways), the cook-off will feature the winners of a contest held earlier this year. (See the winning videos here.)
During the “Channel Your Inner Chef” cook-off at O’Hare contestants will have 30 minutes to prepare a dish using three “surprise” ingredients – a protein, a starch and vegetable –plus one additional ingredient plucked from the herbs and vegetables growing in the airport’s aeroponic garden.
The winner of the cook-off will have their specialty dish added to the menu at one of the airport’s HMSHost-operated restaurants and they’ll get a trip back to Chicago on May 4 to attend the 25th anniversary of the James Beard Foundation awards, being held outside of New York City for the first time.
To show off its new “Alaska Beyond” package of in-flight amenities and services, Alaska Airlines parked a 737 out in front of Seattle’s Museum of Flight on Thursday and welcomed aboard a planeload of frequent fliers, reporters and bloggers for a two-hour flight over Oregon and Washington.
I got to tag along.
During the flight passengers could test out the new on-board entertainment options, which include both free and for-purchase TV shows and films that can be streamed on personal devices and new inflight entertainment tablets (rented in the Main Cabin for $8-$10 and free in First Class) offering access to new movie releases, selections from the Seattle International Film Festival, TV shows, music, digital magazines and games.
The Alaska Beyond program extends to the buy-on-board menu, which now includes Canoe Ridge Wines blended especially for drinking at 30,000 feet and dishes created by Seattle’s three-time James Beard award-winning chef Tom Douglas, who was on board serving his BBQ chicken sandwiches and coleslaw and, afterwards, helping to gather up the empty wrappers.
Alaska says that by mid-April, 70 percent of its planes will feature all the Alaska Beyond amenities (which also include power at each seat and leather seats by Recaro with adjustable headrests) and all the airline’s 737s will offer direct-to-your personal-device-entertainment.
Why is Alaska doing all this upgrading now? Some say it has to do with Delta Air Lines’ aggressive push into the market. No doubt. But who’s going to argue against welcome improvements in services and in-flight amenities, especially those that remind Pacific Northwest passengers of home?
Germany’s Dusseldorf Airport has a fun, creative side: an outdoor airport terrace that has hosted an outdoor film night, a robot that parks cars and a monthly event in the pre-security shopping area that has featured everything from a circus to dance performances.
Following up on last year’s “Dîner en bleu” – which featured guests wearing blue clothing, blue decorations and blue-themed food, earlier this month the airport hosted “Dîner en rouge, with everything red: the clothing of the diners, the decorations and the 7-course menu, which included guinea fowl on beetroot-risotto with blood orange and champagne foam.
To be considered as one of the 100 invited guests, potential diners had to share a story about a special shopping experience a Dusseldorf Airport.
What’s better than really fresh and really tasty sushi at the airport?
Sushi that comes to you on a conveyor belt.
YO! Sushi, the ‘running’ sushi restaurant that started in London and now has 74 restaurants worldwide, just opened a branch at Copenhagen Airport. There, the sushi moves along a 230-foot-long conveyor belt at just over 3 inches per minute – giving diners time to peruse the offerings, make a decision and pick up a dish – or wait a few seconds for something tastier-looking to come along.
Sound like fun? This entertaining dining option is also available at Edinburgh Airport and and Heathrow Airport T2 and T3.
The people who invented Yo! Sushi didn’t stop with restaurants. They’re also the folks behind the Yotel – the hotels located at Heathrow, Gatwick and Amerstardam airports that offer cabin-like rooms where you can relax and refresh before, after or between flights. The concept has been so popular that there’s now a Yotel in New York City and plans to open additional Yotels at Singapore Changi and Paris Charles DeGaulle Airport and addiitional off-airport Yotels on Orchard Street in Singapore, in Brooklyn, NY, San Francisco, and Miami within the next two or three years.
Courtesy SMU Central University Libraries, via Flickr Commons
Think you can do better than the people who cook the food served up at airport?
O’Hare International Airport is inviting you to strut your culinary stuff in a cooking contest called Channel Your Inner Chef.
Open to both travelers and employees of the airport (who eat on-site far more often than any of us do) the contest ask contestants to shoot and submit a five-minute video of themselves preparing a favorite original recipe.
Three to five finalists will be chosen to compete in a cook-off that will be performed in front of a live audience and a panel of judges at O’Hare. The contest winner will receive two round-trip airline tickets to Chicago and VIP admissions to the James Beard Foundation Awards Gala on May 4, 2015 at Lyric Opera of Chicago.
Even better: the winning dish will be featured on the menu of an HMSHost-operated restaurant at O’Hare.
You have until February 28, 2015 to enter. Find more details here.
I’m a big fan of free. Especially at the airport. So here are a few of the items I included in a slide show of great airport promotions that I put together for CNBC Road Warrior.
Volunteers at Indiana’s Fort Wayne International Airport welcome arriving passengers with a cheery greeting and a complimentary cookie baked and individually wrapped by nearby Ellison Bakery. They’ve been doing this since sometime in the late 1980s and, by December 2009, handed out their 1 millionth cookie. Don’t worry if you’re too late to get a cookie from one of the treat-toting Hospitality Hosts; there’s an after-hours self-service cookie stand.
On both Mother’s Day and Valentine’s Day, volunteers at Jacksonville International Airport hand out more than 1,000 colorful carnations to passengers.
The parking promotions at Oakland International Airport is a very nice, money-saving perk. Through April 15, travelers leaving from OAK on any airline heading to any destination in Hawaii or Europe can get up to five days’ free parking (worth up to $110) in the airport’s Daily Lot. Passengers flying to any destination in Texas can get free parking (up to $66) through April 15 as well.
Good coffee is important on the ground and in the air. So it’s good news that Delta Air Lines has decided to join with some other airlines, including Alaska Airlines, in serving Starbucks coffee on flights.
To celebrate the airline is having a coffee cup contest. To enter, write where you want to go on a cup and share a photo of it on line at Twitter or Instagram with the hashtag #DeltaCupContest.
Do that by midnight eastern time on February 8, 2015 to be eligible for a drawing for a free flight on Monday, January 9. The prize: an economy ticket for one anywhere Delta flies.
I wish I could fly to Australia and enjoy the #sun, #beach, #nature, and #food! #DeltaCupContest pic.twitter.com/EDNXj20GzQ
— ホソカワユリ (@eurihosokawa) February 5, 2015
Here’s hoping you have a good long layover at O’Hare or Midway International Airports coming up – and that you’re hungry when you land.
Both airports are participating in Chicago Restaurant Week with a special Airport Restaurant Week event running from January 30 – February 12, 2015.
50 restaurant at O’Hare and 20 at Midway will highlight their house specialties and feature dishes that are not regularly offered on the menu – such as Deep Dish CheeseCorn from Garrett Popcorn Shops (only at O’Hare!) and Chicken Kebobs at Midway’s Pegasus on the Fly.
In many spots there will also be discounts offered on certain menu items as well.
Want to plan ahead? Here’s a link to the pamphlet listing all the participating restaurants.