Los Angeles International Airport has been ranked first among airports nationwide for offering healthful food for stressed-out travelers. But the ranking might matter mostly to lovers of vegetables.
The nation’s second-busiest airport won the honor from the Physician Committee for Responsible Medicine, a Washington, D.C., group that advocates vegetarian or vegan diets. Its annual airport review noted that 90 percent of the eateries at LAX offer meatless munchies.
If you crave baby kale and quinoa salad, for example, you can find it at Wolfgang Puck Express in Terminal 7. Homeboy Cafe in Terminal 4 sells a salad featuring tofu, vegetables and pumpkin seeds. At Terminal 3, La Brea Bakery offers a baby kale salad with grapefruit, pistachios, avocados and citrus vinaigrette.
But if you don’t mind ingesting a few calories in exchange for some extra flavor, a separate study has found that the calorie counts for in-flight food at all airlines are rising.
Those findings come from an annual study by Charles Platkin, a health food advocate and professor at New York’s Hunter College who compares calorie counts of meals and snacks offered by airlines.
Platkin’s studies found that the overall calorie count for airline food is on the rise, from an average of 360 calories in 2012 to 400 calories this year.
He believes the calories are climbing because airlines are adding more fat and sugar to their food to improve the taste and increase sales.
Skymall returns to sky through United
Skymall is back. For now.
The Phoenix-based in-flight catalog that was known for selling quirky items such as hoodies for dogs and garden Yetis filed for bankruptcy this year, a victim of a Digital Age that made ordering from a catalog obsolete.
In April, New Jersey-based C&A Marketing purchased Skymall out of bankruptcy protection with plans to revive the business.
The first step began in October when Skymall paid to be included as an insert into United Airlines’ in-flight magazine, Hemispheres. It will continue to be in the magazine through the end of the year.
Representatives for C&A Marketing said United is the only airline to carry Skymall so far, but the catalog also appears in Amtrak’s Arrive magazine around Boston, New York and Washington.
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Hugo Martin, Los Angeles Times
