Now, we all know that airplane is never going to be Michelin-star but you'd at least hope it was tasty.
Well, one outraged passenger was in for quite the shock after an airline served her the 'worst meal ever' during a long-haul flight from the UK to Australia.
Nicola Easterby, a travel blogger, booked the last-minute flight with her husband, James, to surprise her family with a visit over the Christmas holidays.
The 29-year-old was struggling to find any tickets from London to Brisbane under £1,200 when she stumbled upon a cheap one-way ticket from Rome to Brisbane for £500.
Following a quick mini-break in Rome, Nicole and James had their fix of yummy Italian cuisine before being served up four 'barely edible meals' from China Eastern airline.
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Nicole, from South East London, said she was left starving after their first meal of a tuna fish pie and couscous salad and, by the time 'breakfast' rolled around eight hours later, she was upset to be faced by noodles and a pasta salad.
"We'd just been in Rome and had such great food so we really went on a rollercoaster ride," she said. "We thought 'how bad could it be?'"
According to the jet-setter, the tuna pie 'tasted even worse than it looked', adding: "Out of all the things to serve on a plane, the smell was so bad.
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"The couscous salad was one of the saddest things I'd seen in my life. It was just couscous with frozen vegetables and black olives.
"We got a little ricotta and pear dessert which wasn't too bad. That was the only fully edible part of the meal."
By the time the second meal came around, Nicole was 'really hungry'.
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"We got a pasta salad which was pasta with frozen veggies. Just in case we didn't have enough carbs, we got some more noodles with pork and veggies," she explained.
But it was the final meal that really took the biscuit.
"The final meal was the worst one of all. It was our breakfast," Nicole continued. "We had mac and cheese topped with shrimp and slimy mushrooms.
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"I think I had one bite and was like 'no, I actually can't do this'. It was a monstrosity. While this would be bad at any time of the day, for breakfast I couldn't think of anything worse.
"My husband ate the whole thing, he was so hungry. At this point, he was eating anything but I couldn't.
"There was some other weird artificial desert and some flavourless watermelon."
While admitting she'd previously had 'really bad airline meals before', Nicole revealed this particular meal was 'the worst for sure', adding: "Now we understand why they were so cheap."
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Yikes.
China Eastern were contacted for comment repeatedly but failed to respond.
Topics: Travel, Food and Drink, Plane Etiquette, Real Life
Rhiannon Ingle