The Most Fun Meals in North American Business Class

Delta Shake Shack

Last week, we took a look at ice cream sundaes, and this week, we shift our eyes (and stomachs) to the main meals served onboard. From Shake Shack to Magnolia Bakery, brand collaborations really do make a difference. Once again, consider this a request to Air Canada to bring the fun factor to its (very good) business class cabin.

Delta x Shake Shack

Delta launched its Shake Shack partnership in December 2024 and has since expanded the offering to 12 cities. If you’re flying Delta First Class (U.S. airlines call intra-North America business class “First Class”) on a flight over 900 miles, you’ll have Shake Shack offered onboard when flying to or from the following cities:

• Atlanta (ATL)
• Boston (BOS)
• Detroit (DTW)
• Las Vegas (LAS)
• Los Angeles (LAX)
• Miami (MIA)
• Minneapolis (MSP)
• New York (JFK and LGA)
• Orlando (MCO)
• Salt Lake City (SLC)
• San Francisco (SFO)
• Seattle (SEA)

Catering involves a Shackburger, ShackSauce, chips, a Caesar salad, and a dark chocolate brownie. Delta lets you pre-order your meal through the app between seven days and 24 hours before departure, and it’s the only way to secure a Shake Shack meal since Delta does not cater extra burgers onboard.

Delta serves Shake Shack in domestic First Class

A few other restrictions apply. Delta only offers Shake Shack on flights with lunch or dinner service, so you won’t find it on breakfast flights. I haven’t found any definitive information about late-night departures, but Shake Shack should remain available whenever Delta serves dinner.

There’s been nothing but rave reviews online and the Shackburger is definitely a must-try if you find yourself on a qualifying flight.

American Airlines’ Beef Wellington

While not quite as iconic as Delta’s Shake Shack partnership, American has been making the rounds by serving “Centennial Beef Wellington” as part of its special themed menus for its 100th anniversary. Like Delta, this is only available via pre-order and, regardless of how good it is, I would definitely order it for the novelty factor alone.

Centennial Beef Wellington is available on international and transcontinental Flagship First, Flagship Business, and domestic First Class. Basically, any premium cabin flight on American Airlines should have Beef Wellington on the menu.

On international flights, you can also expect an appetizer featuring caviar as American looks to elevate dining for its 100th year.

It looks like Sash ordered Beef Wellington on his AA Flagship First flight to/from Buenos Aires, and I take his feedback as evidence that it was delicious, given he did not write anything negative about it. 😉

Beef Wellington on the bottom left and per Sash, “Food from JFK was decent”

For what it’s worth, American also serves a very popular “slider and fries”, but it looks nowhere near as good as Shake Shack, and the Beef Wellington is a more compelling menu option, with its rollout as part of AA’s 100th anniversary.

United x Magnolia Bakery

In December 2024, United launched a partnership with Magnolia Bakery, serving its very famous banana pudding on board United First (that is, domestic First Class within the U.S.). United rotates the flavours being served:

• Banana Pudding Wafer Cookie Bits
• Banana Pudding Chocolatey Hazelnut Swirl
• Banana Pudding Red Velvet Cookie Bits

As part of its 100th anniversary (United and American were founded in the same year), United is serving a new flavour called “Jetstream Dream”. It’s a vanilla pudding and is the first Magnolia Bakery pudding without banana onboard.

These are served on select flights of over 901 miles, but the exact cities are unspecified. For what it’s worth, I’ve flown a number of United First Class domestic flights and have yet to be served the banana pudding, which could just be bad luck.

Anshul received the Magnolia Bakery pudding on his United First Class flight from Washington D.C. to Mexico City last October.

Anshul’s Magnolia Bakery pudding on IAD-MEX

Takeaway

Just like with ice cream sundaes, it’s quite a phenomenon how passengers paying hundreds (if not thousands) of dollars for premium cabin flights get so excited about a $15 burger meal. It comes down to the sense of occasion it creates, a way to differentiate one airline experience from another, and simply something to look forward to when flying.

Collaborations with well-known brands or special catering is a great way to create a strong impression for the customer and remember that loyalty is a complicated business where a $15 burger could be the difference between that customer spending tens of thousands with one airline compared to another.