With the 2026 World Travel Catering and Onboard Services Expo in Hamburg, Germany right around the corner our travel dietitian Melissa Adamski shares a leading article on travel nutrition and the future of healthy food onboard in her role as Travel Nutrition Ambassador. In a follow up to her 2024 and 2025 articles which discussed the dichotomy of expanding nutritious foods onboard, and travel nutrition (why bother); this 2026 article explores comfort foods vs nutritious foods onboard exploring a common response by industry that passengers don’t want healthy food onboard and that they want comfort foods. However does it have to be one or the other? This article is a timely exploration around why does comfort food have to be pitched against nutritious food when flying?
What is healthy anyway? Comfort foods vs nutritious foods onboard -why does comfort food have to be pitched against nutritious food when flying?
Dr Melissa Adamski PhD APD
Travel Nutrition Ambassador WTCE
As a travel dietitian I am regularly told from the travel industry that passengers have no interest in healthy food while flying and that comfort foods are what they want. As a dietitian and researcher with a passion for all things travel, this point has always fascinated me as it seems to contradict industry trends reports which suggest people have a strong interest in nutrition and diet. Exploring this contrast, it got me thinking – what exactly are comfort foods and why are they always pitched against the idea of healthy food while flying? Is it possible for comfort foods to be both comforting and nutritious, therefore fulfilling the evolving expectations of a broad range of passengers?
What is comfort food?
Research suggests people eat comfort foods not only to reward themselves but also to alleviate boredom and cope with negative emotions. For those designing inflight menus and meal concepts you can see the attraction of comfort foods if they help make passengers journey’s more comfortable and enjoyable.
But what exactly is comfort food? Many different foods have been given the label of comfort foods overtime. For some people the term comfort food conjures up images of warm and hearty food, for others it can mean foods we typically eat when we are sick or unwell. It can also be used to describe food that helps us feel good, especially when we are feeling down or low.
The definition of comfort foods varies across sources. Delish.com gives examples of comfort foods as classic dishes such as meatloaf, casseroles, chilli, and soups. The Cambridge Dictionary define ‘comfort foods’ as “The type of food that people eat when they are sad or worried, often sweet food or food that they ate as children” while the Merriam – Webster Dictionary defines comfort food as “Food prepared in a traditional style having a usually nostalgic or sentimental appeal”. And looking towards the published academic literature, one paper describes comfort foods as food that provides psychological comfort.
With such diversity in the definition of comfort food, research in 2019 explored categorising comfort foods into a number of categories: negative emotion (stress, break-up, and lonely), positive emotion (celebration and cultural), illness, reward, and remembrance.
Although the term comfort food is broad (and varies across cultures), why does the term tend to be used to describe, or suggest, passengers don’t want ‘healthy food’?
To read the rest of the article on travel nutrition and comfort foods vs nutritious foods onboard visit the World Travel Catering and Onboard Services Expo industry article.
