AS 307, First Class, SFO-SEA

Flight Details:

• Departure: 1:25pm (scheduled), 1:55 (actual)
• Seat: 1C
• Meal: Snack

My first time flying Alaska Airlines First Class, but it was just a short 2 hour flight from San Francisco to Seattle.

It was ... fine?  Flight attendants were friendly and efficient.  The "meal" was better than I expected.

Red Wine & Warm Nuts.

Once underway, hot towels were offered and our drink orders were delivered (pre-ordered while on the ground).

I opted for the red wine, I'm not sure what it was, there was a choice only of red or white, no details given.  It was ... drinkable.  A table wine, not offensive, not too tannic at least.

I appreciated that the nuts were served slightly warm, and that the mix was well distributed between cashews, almonds, and pecans, nicely salted.  Fine nuts.

Turkey Sandwich.

The meal served was "snack", I was expecting just a snack basket, so I ate in advance.  This wasn't really a "snack" ...

I had a choice ... protein plate or turkey sandwich.  Neither actually sounded good.  The protein plate was sliced chicken, hard boiled egg, hummus, pita, apple slices, and grapes.  No cheese.  The turkey sandwich came with no sides, usually the only thing I like about the sandwich option on a flight.  Hmm.  Neither of these appealed, but the FA said the turkey sandwich was good, so, hey, I went for it.

It was a generous sandwich, two halves, both quite large.  And, shockingly, served warm.  I wasn't expecting that at all.  It actually warmed up really well, the bread slightly crispy and toasty, the fillings pleasantly warm, the cheese melted.  Huh.

The bread was fine, not stale, and the toasting worked wonders on it.  The inside of both the top and bottom was soggy, but in a way that I sometimes like, uh, yes, I like scraping out mushy bread.

On the side was a delicious herbed mayo that made me want things to dip into it, and some mediocre grapes.

Turkey Sandwich: Warmed.

The inside also was better than expected.

Decent amount of roast turkey slices.  I tried a bite of turkey, and yes, it was turkey.  Not my thing, but nice and warm.  The tomatoes weren't that bad, not mealy.  The dill was a nice surprise and added a ton of flavor.

And then, cheese ... sorta.  It was melted, not very generous, and mostly soaked into the bread.

So, overall, this was actually a decent quality item.  Not really my thing at all, but I found that I enjoyed the mushy bread I scraped out, with melty cheese, tomatoes, dill, tasty tasty herb mayo, and my own salad and snacks I brought.

If you actually like sandwiches, or turkey, this really might be a good one.

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Takeout from Din Tai Fung, Bellevue

When I travel for work, I often get exhausted with dining out, and I'm usually crazy busy actually doing my job.  By the time dinner rolls around, I just want to do something easy, solo, ideally back at my hotel, and then get back to work.  Did you think all my business travel was ... glamorous?

If I have a hotel with any sort of facilities for preparing food, I'll just go to the grocery store, particularly when I find a high quality one nearby.  Or I opt for a lot of takeout, poke being a recent highlight for me, as you've read about frequently.  But another fun one for me is takeout from Din Tai Fung, when there happens to be a location near me, like in Costa Mesa or Sydney.

I've still never visited a Din Tai Fung to dine in (seriously, 2 hours waits all the time!), and I don't live near one, so I've never been able to go with a group, which is how it makes the most sense, since everything is served family style, in large portions.  But the takeout experience is done well, and I continue to work my way, slowly, through the menu that way.

This particular visit was in Bellevue, WA, in a mall location adjacent to the hotel I was staying at.

Takeout Sesame Noodles.

I decided to try something that sounded almost similar to the spicy wontons I enjoyed so much before, this time, noodles with a sesame sauce.

It was a mixed success.

Full House!

As is normal at any Din Tai Fung, the place was packed, there were massive queues of people waiting out front, and the wait time was quoted in hours.

I was glad I had just ordered online, and planned to jet out of there as quickly as possible.

Signature Takeout Bag.

I got my takeout intending to eat it basically immediately, and didn't really need the signature Din Tai Fung bag, but, I did feel like I had a bit of a prize as I walked past all the crowds of waiting people, watching their eyes track my bag.

Nicely Packaged:  N9. Noodle with Sesame Sauce. $8.50.

As with my previous takeout experience from Din Tai Fung (in Costa Mesa), I was impressed with the packaging.  They do a really good job of delivering the highest quality takeout imaginable, with each component in its own container, and the potentially leaky element in sealed plastic bag as well.

My bag contained one bowl with the noodles, one with the sauce, and a little one with the crushed sticky nuts topping.  What it didn't have?  A bowl to mix them in, I think I was supposed to just pour the sauce onto the noodles, but, what if I didn't like it? What if I wanted less sauce?

Luckily, I tried every component individually first.

Sesame Sauce.

The sauce looked great, although I'd admit, it wasn't what I was expecting from "sesame sauce".  It certainly looked spicy, and loaded with green onion.  Where was the sesame?  I was expecting something thicker, more paste like, perhaps like tahini ... I'm not sure what I was expecting, really, but it wasn't this.

But still, it looked spicy and good, particularly since I had liked the spicy sauce so much last time on the wontons.  But this ... I did not like.  I tried it alone, I tried a portion with noodles that I mixed in a paper cup I had.  It didn't matter how I had it, I didn't like it.

It was spicy, just nothing like the spicy sauce I had previously enjoyed.  The flavor, whatever it was, just wasn't one I liked.  Kinda like sriracha.  I don't like sriracha generally :(  I never tasted, nor really saw, sesame.

It really was a let down, not what I was expecting, and I'm very, very glad that it was packaged separate, and that I didn't just dump it all on the noodles first.  

Noodles.

The noodles were ... noodles?  Shockingly hot actually, I couldn't believe how hot they were, and how hot they stayed for a while.  Very, very fresh noodles.  Plain, but that is intentional, as they are only used in dishes with sauces.

Since they were packaged separately, they did clump together pretty immediately though, which made eating them a bit hard.  That said, I'm glad they were packaged separately, because ... I did not like the sauce.

I salvaged the noodles, bringing them back to my hotel, and mixed them with a different mayo based sauce I had leftover back at the hotel, along with the crushed peanut topping that came with this, and some veggies I had on hand.  My creamy pasta salad was actually quite tasty, fresh noodles worked remarkably well in it.

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