Trip Report: AMS-FRA-ORD-SAN part II
After living it up in the Senator Lounge it was back to plebe life; funny to think, this was the first intercontinental trip in economy class in a year and a half (as readers of this blog will know). Also the first time in transcontinental LH economy class. I have to say, Lufthansa Design (there is such a thing) communicates to me brand attributes of well-engineered, man-made, and efficient. Not really anything about comfort of wellbeing. But kudos for being consistent across the lounges, plates and cups, seat design, even arm rests in economy are sculpted and branded.
Lunch was chicken in porcini mushroom sauce with spatzle, salad with carrot shreds and feta cheese, apple cake (sort of bread pudding-ish in texture), and bread with camembert.
Pre-arrival snack was a choice of pizza or bratwurst. I chose the bratwurst, which came in a bread shell. There were three tubes of bratwurst, and each one was filled with an inner tube of mustard! Quite tasty.
Connecting in ORD was smooth. My luggage was already on the carousel before I got through immigration, and I was waved through customs. In the domestic terminal, I won a pack of United playing cards by spinning a wheel (promotion for new Travel Options from United). I went to the Red Carpet Club by B18, and was pleasantly surprised by how light and airy it looked. A lot of Red Carpet Clubs seem to be going through renovation which is a nice sign from the airline for being serious about investing in their product. The food seems to be given an upgrade too with more choices.
I had some celery and carrots, cheese and crackers (yay to real cheddar for the first time in 4 months!), Kit Kat, Ghiradelli chocolate, oatmeal squares, and green tea.
On my flight (upgraded) from ORD to SAN, I found it intriguing that the flight attendant offered us steak salad, chicken sandwich, or anything from the Choice menu from Economy class (she called it "Fresh Express" and "Bob" as in buy-on-board but she pronounced it like Bob Dole). I took the steak salad, substantial and well-seasoned, with pecans carefully arranged around the plate. There was also a roll with real butter (for a while I feel like I've been getting butter-flavored vegetable oil product on UA), and a warm chocolate chip cookie. A nice end to a very long journey.
