You’ve put away your hard-earned money for your vacation, and the day has come for you to head out to the airport. If you haven’t flown recently, you might be shocked at how expensive the food is in the airport and, increasingly, on the airplane itself. Fewer flights offer full meals on relatively short flights, and often what they do offer for free is not the tastiest fare. Traveling with your family and having transfers can add up to a long day and a lot of money spent on food. What can you do? You may want to pack your own food to bring onboard, but are you allowed to do this? What should you bring? Here are some tips to keep in mind on packing food for the airplane:
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Remember the rules about liquids and gels. The TSA will allow you to bring liquids, including liquid or pourable foods, but only in 3-oz containers, and only the number that will fit in a quart-sized ziplock bag. You do get one bag per person, so if there are several of you traveling, one person can carry on toiletries while the others carry on the small quantities of any type of liquid food that you need. These would include salad dressings, yogurt, applesauce, and so on. There are exceptions made for baby food and baby formula.
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Plan on not bringing ice. While there are anecdotes about some people successfully carrying ice and ice packs through security, security agents have asked others to discard of these items. Assume that you won’t be able to carry ice through the line. You can always pack the ice around your foods to keep them cool during your drive to the airport and as you check in your bags. Discard it if necessary as you go through security, then plan on eating your cold food within a couple of hours. You can also use foods like bags of frozen vegetables and frozen yogurt tubes as ice packs.
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Pack the right kinds of foods. You’re going to want to avoid packing foods that will go bad before you can eat them. Fresh, whole fruit is a good choice, but cut fruit will only be good for a few hours, so eat that first if you bring it. The same goes for sandwiches, salads and other items that should be kept cool. Dry foods like granola bars and crackers make good snacks. Avoid foods that have strong smells to avoid bothering your seatmates, and also try to avoid foods containing nuts. With the prevalence of nut allergies, it’s possible that you could cause someone else to have an allergic reaction if you were to bring a bag of trail mix or other food containing these allergens.
You can save money by bringing your own food on the airplane; the trick is just to understand what’s allowed and to make wise choices. You don’t want to risk having to throw away your food before getting onboard, getting food poisoning from eating foods that haven’t been kept cold, or causing someone else on the plane distress.
What foods have you brought successfully on an airplane? Do you have any other tips?
