Four airport restaurants to fly for
Roula Khalaf, Editor of the FT, selects her favourite stories in this weekly newsletter.
The Perfectionists’ Café, Heathrow, Terminal 2
The idea behind Heston Blumenthal’s café is “to serve fantastic food fast” – his take being that the quicker you cook it the better it tastes. There’s hamburgers, wood-fired oven pizzas (try the truffled salami and mushroom) and fish and chips (the batter aerated through a siphon) with Bollinger. Before lockdown there was a liquid nitrogen ice-cream parlour and swirling clouds of chemistry-lab style gas aplenty (the parlour’s currently not in action, but will reopen down the line). theperfectionistscafe.com
Crystal Jade, Singapore Changi Airport, Terminal 1
The airport outpost of the city’s Michelin-starred Crystal Jade Golden Palace serves Chinese food inspired by the Jiangnan region south of the Yangtze River. Crystal Jade launched its first restaurant in 1991 and its food is loved for its speciality dishes made with la mian (hand-pulled soft flour noodles) and xiao long bao steamed buns (soon to return post-Covid-19 reopening). changiairport.com
Globe@YVR, Fairmont Vancouver Airport
With views of the runway through a wall of windows, the lofty modernist-style dining room at the Fairmont Vancouver Airport offers a comforting yet forward-looking chomp through the flavours of the Pacific northwest. Start with beer bread and bee-pollen butter and move on to miso-marinated sablefish with quinoa, mushroom truffle- scented broth, pickled radish and edamame. Or go more casual for lunch with tuna poke or a turbocharged turkey club sandwich. Afternoon tea is hyper-civilised, with sandwiches, scones, macarons and cocktails. And for Thanksgiving, there’s scrumpy cider-brined turkey with all the trimmings. fairmont.com
One Flew South, Hartsfield-Jackson Atlanta, Terminal E
A mix of Southern food with international flair, this restaurant-bar opened in 2008 in a space that used to house ticket counters in the airport. There’s an exceptional sushi menu, or for something more homegrown try roasted NY beef strip with white beans, mushroom ragout and sage butter. The drinks menu offers eight sakes and cocktails range from a classic Aperol Spritz to the Auromatica: pineapple rum, turmeric cinnamon syrup, orange bitters and more. oneflewsouthatl.com
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