British Airways thinks it has the answer for flavorless airline food: umami.
英国航空公司(British Airways)认为该公司已经找到了改善平淡无味的飞机餐的诀窍：鲜味(umami)。
Airline food can take a beating on its way to the plate. It's cooked many hours before a flight, then rapidly chilled, wrapped, trucked, stored and reheated. This often leaves it overcooked, dry and tough. In the air, passengers lose about 30% of their ability to taste as a result of extremely dry cabin conditions and high-altitude pressure inside airplanes. So even food that might be appetizing on the ground tastes bland at 35,000 feet.
在端上乘客的餐桌前，飞机餐的味道可能会层层流失。飞机餐制作的时间是在航班起飞之前的数个小时，之后还会经过急冻、包装、运输、存储和再加热等环节。这往往会导致飞机餐烹饪过头，又干又硬。在高空飞行时，乘客会丧失大约30%的味觉，原因是机舱中极度干燥的环境和高空压力。所以，即使在陆地上颇为可口的食物，在35,000英尺的高空也可能会索然无味。
For years airlines have added salt to give the food a semblance of flavor and ladled on sauces to combat dryness. Competition among carriers has intensified in business class and first class, and airlines now spend as much as $50 a person serving signature dishes from celebrity chefs. But for many travelers, it often still tastes like, well, airline food.
多年以来，航空公司一直通过在飞机餐中增加盐分的方式来改善食物的味道，并浇上酱汁防止食物变得干硬。航空公司在商务舱和头等舱上的竞争愈演愈烈，目前航空公司在每位乘客身上花费的成本在50美元左右，以供应名厨制作的特色餐点。但是，对于很多乘客来说，飞机餐仍然吃起来像，呃，飞机餐。
People typically buy tickets based on routes, pricing and loyalty programs, of course. There's little expectation for good food in coach, where airlines still serve hot meals on long international flights. But on board in first class and business class, the first thing passengers often think about is food, airlines say. 'You could certainly lose a customer,' said Adrian Jaski, British Airways' manager overseeing catering performance in London.
当然，乘客通常是基于航线、价格和会员计划来购买机票的。经济舱乘客对于飞机美食的预期往往不高，在长途国际航班的经济舱上航空公司也提供热餐。但是航空公司表示，头等舱和商务舱的客人登机后考虑的第一件事往往就是食物。英国航空公司驻伦敦的餐饮经理亚德里安?雅斯齐(Adrian Jaski)表示：“你很可能会因为餐食而丧失客户。”
Enter umami, the savory taste found in tomatoes, Parmesan cheese, mushrooms, Worcestershire sauce and other foods. British Airways had previously worked with Heston Blumenthal, a famous London chef, known as a practitioner of scientifically engineered dishes and creator of delicacies like snail porridge.
解决之道是，加入鲜味这种可以在番茄、帕尔马干酪、蘑菇、辣酱油等食物中可以品尝到的味道。英国航空公司此前与伦敦名厨赫斯顿?布拉门斯(Heston Blumenthal)展开了合作，这位名厨是诸多科技型菜品的实践者，并且是蜗牛粥等美味佳肴的发明者。
On a British television series, he first tried cooking food from scratch onboard a flight; it was chaos. He then prepared elaborate cold plates that took too long for flight attendants to serve. He even tried getting passengers to spray saline up their noses to moisten the palate. British Airways decided that wouldn't fly.
在一档英国电视节目中，布拉门斯首先尝试了飞机起飞后从头开始烹饪食物；结果是一团糟。随后，他准备了精心制作的冷盘，不过空服人员需要花费的上菜时间太长了。他甚至还尝试让乘客向鼻子里喷盐水湿润鼻腔以获得更敏锐的感官。英国航空公司认为，上述办法全部不可行。
Then Mr. Blumenthal hit on umami as a breakthrough ingredient for high-altitude food. Umami is an intense flavor first identified by the Japanese and dubbed the fifth type of taste the tongue can detect, along with bitter, salty, sour and sweet. Mr. Blumenthal tweaked a shepherd's pie recipe to include umami-rich seaweed, for example. 'You can't load more salt but you can definitely up the umami,' he said on his show.
此后，布拉门斯突然发现鲜味可以作为打造高空美食的突破性要素。鲜味是最先由日本人鉴别出的一种强烈的味道，是舌头能够检测到的除了酸、甜、苦、咸以外的第五种味道。例如，布拉门斯将富含鲜味的海藻添加到了肉馅土豆泥饼中。他在节目中称：“你不能添加太多盐，但是你完全可以提高鲜味成分的量。”
After that, British Airways began working with the London-based Leatherhead Food Research on more quantitative study. Thirty professional food tasters conducted a series of experiments on the ground and in the air and found the sense of bitterness in food was heightened at altitude.
此后，英国航空公司与位于伦敦的莱瑟黑德食品研究所(Leatherhead Food Research)开始了合作并展开了更多的定量研究。30位职业味道鉴定师在地面上和高空中进行了一系列实验，他们发现，随着海拔的升高，食物的苦味会增加。
In addition to low humidity, they found that cabin lighting and temperature affect taste -- cold temperatures and gray lighting have been shown to dull the experience of eating. Stress levels of travelers also affected taste.
除了低湿度之外，他们发现机舱的灯光和温度也会影响食物的味道――研究显示，低温和昏暗的灯光会令就餐的体验大打折扣。旅客们的旅途压力也会令食物的味道变差。
And the researchers agreed with Mr. Blumenthal that umami didn't lose its punch at high altitude and could be added to recipes to bolster flavors. Even for items like steak -- notoriously difficult to serve aboard planes without ending up tough and dry from double-cooking -- a crust made of umani-rich ingredients bolsters flavor. 'It's a salt substitute without the sodium,' said Sinead Ferguson, BA's menu design manager.
这些研究人员同意布拉门斯关于鲜味不会随着高度增加而变淡的观点，他们认为可以在菜谱中添加鲜味让食物变得更美味。甚至对于牛排这种很容易因过度加工导致干硬而不适宜在飞机上提供的菜式来说，把富含鲜味的原料裹在它外面也可以改善它的味道。英国航空公司的菜单设计经理辛尼德?弗格森(Sinead Ferguson)说：“这是不含钠的食盐替代品。”
Over the past year, British Airways has altered its recipes to load up on umami-rich foods. And it has pushed catering companies to overplay particular tastes in sauces so that tastes will come through for even the driest palate.
在过去的一年中，英国航空公司已经在菜单上加入了很多富含鲜味的食物。并且该公司已经敦促配餐公司强化酱料中的某些特殊味道，以使飞机餐能令最干燥的味蕾感到可口。
One example: The airline is serving a special tasting menu from the Langham, one of London's grand hotels, in the first-class cabin of its Airbus A380 super jumbo jets, and several recipes were reworked for high-altitude eating.
例如：英国航空公司目前向空中客车(Airbus) A380巨型喷气式飞机的头等舱乘客提供伦敦知名酒店朗廷酒店(Langham)的特别主厨菜单，菜单中的几款菜品的菜谱已经根据高空就餐的特点进行了调整。
For a pork cheeks dish, 'we had to pack more lime and lemon grass into the sauce,' said Kevin Levett, executive chef for production at Gate Gourmet in London, which caters BA's flights.
伦敦Gate Gourmet餐厅的餐饮行政主厨凯文?莱韦特(Kevin Levett)表示，拿一道猪颊肉的菜式来说，“我们在酱料中加入了更多的酸橙和香茅草”。Gate Gourmet餐厅为英国航空公司提供配餐服务。
Subtle wines don't cut it at 35,000 feet. The key at altitude is to minimize any bitterness in red wine tannins, since altitude makes them stand out more, and maximize fruit in white wine, because that gives it more taste in the sky, according to Keith Isaac, general manager of Castelnau Wine Agencies, the wine buyer for British Airways' business class service.
清淡的葡萄酒在35,000英尺的高空行不通。据卡斯特诺葡萄酒代理公司(Castelnau Wine Agencies)的经理基斯?艾萨克(Keith Isaac)称，选择高空酒品的一个关键是红葡萄酒中单宁酸的涩味要尽量小，原因是高度会让涩味更突出；白葡萄酒中的果味则要尽量浓，原因是果味会在高空中让白葡萄酒更浓郁。卡斯特诺葡萄酒代理公司是英国航空公司商务舱业务的葡萄酒采购商。
'Wine could be overly expressive and that is good in the air,' said Mr. Isaac, who so far this year has tasted 850 wines for his airline client. 'To me, above all, it's fruit. I spend all day on fruit.'
艾萨克表示：“葡萄酒的口感可能会过于饱满，这对高空品酒来说是好事。就我来说，最重要的就是果味。我每天都在探索葡萄酒中的果味。”艾萨克今年迄今已经为英国航空公司品尝了850款葡萄酒。
Other airlines say they try to tailor food and wine for parched palates, but most haven't gone down the umami road. United, Delta, American and Singapore Airlines, a carrier heralded for its food, say they serve some foods containing umami, for example, but they don't make an effort to pump up use of it.
其他航空公司表示，他们也针对飞行中的味觉变化尝试了调整飞机餐和酒品，但是大多数航空公司还没有采用鲜味。例如，美国联合航空公司(United Airlines)、达美航空公司(Delta Airlines)、美国航空公司(American Airlines)和飞机餐饮的先驱者新加坡航空公司(Singapore Airlines)表示，他们提供的一些餐点中含有鲜味，但是他们并没有大力推进鲜味的使用。
One reason: Many customers have a difficult time noticing any difference. Skytrax, a London-based consultancy that polls travelers world-wide about airline service, says it has seen 'no visible difference' in customer feedback on British Airways food.
一个原因是：很多客户并不能轻易地发现其中的变化。针对全球旅行者进行航空公司服务调查的伦敦咨询机构Skytrax表示，在客户反馈中，对英航所提供食品的评价“并没有明显的变化”。
Jamie Moore, a London technology executive and top-tier flier on British Airways, says that while food service has gone downhill on shorter flights, he thinks food on long trips across oceans has subtly improved. On a recent flight to New York, 'the beef wasn't quite as destroyed as it used to be,' he said, and the bread rolls were soft, warm and tasty. Business class food, he said, 'tends to be quite good.'
来自伦敦的某科技企业高管、英国航空公司的顶级贵宾杰米?摩尔(Jamie Moore)表示，虽然短途航班的餐饮服务与日俱下，但他认为洲际长途航班的餐饮水平似乎提高了。他说，在最近一次飞往纽约的航班上，“牛肉并不像之前那样难以下咽了”，面包卷也很松软、温热、可口。他说，商务舱的食物“似乎越来越好了”。
Others say it's still airline food. 'My test of a restaurant is simply whether I was served a meal I'd want to go back for,' said Howard Long, also a gold-level British Airways customer, 'and I've never had a meal on an airline I wanted to go back for.'
其他人表示，飞机餐仍旧是以往的飞机餐。同样身为英国航空公司金卡客户的霍华德?朗(Howard Long)表示：“我对餐厅好坏的评判标准就是我是否愿意再回来就餐，而从来没有哪餐飞机餐是我愿意重温的。”
But British Airways is undeterred. Internal customer-satisfaction surveys score food higher, the airline says, and it is continuing what it calls its 'Height Cuisine' effort.
但是，英国航空公司并没有气馁。该公司表示，内部客户满意度调查显示，食物的分数有所提高，并且该公司仍在继续推进其称之为“高空美食”(Height Cuisine)的项目。
Steam ovens have been installed in first class to supplement the convection ovens airlines typically use. The new ovens are a gentler way to heat bread and pastry without hardening them.
英国航空公司已经为头等舱乘客安装了蒸汽加热炉，以取代通常使用的对流加热炉。新的加热炉在加热面包和糕点时不会使它们变硬。
The airline challenged Twinings, its tea supplier, to develop a blend that would work better at altitude. Typically regular tea blends get brewed to taste either too strong or too bland, said Christopher Cole, BA's food and beverage and product change manager. Research took six months, testing with aircraft water and factoring in the lower boiling point of water aboard airplanes.
英国航空公司还要求其茶叶供应商川宁(Twinings)研发一种更适合高空饮用的混合型茶叶。英航的饮食调配经理克里斯托弗?科尔(Christopher Cole)称，一般的混合型茶叶总是泡得要么太浓、要么太淡。研发共历时六个月，实验使用了航空饮用水，并考虑了高空飞行时水的沸点较低的问题。
The airline settled earlier this year on a tea that's a mixture of Kenya, Assam and High Ceylon teas.
今年早些时候，英航决定采用一种由肯尼亚茶、阿萨姆茶和锡兰高地茶混合而成的茶叶。
The next piece of this high-altitude puzzle? Coffee.
下一个需要攻克的高空难题？咖啡。
'We haven't yet come up with something that is noticeably different,' he said. But one promising blend will be tested in-flight after Christmas. With coffee, bitterness really comes through in-flight.
科尔表示：“我们尚未找到解决问题的绝妙办法。”但是，一种很有希望成功的混合型咖啡将在 诞节后进行高空测试。在高空，咖啡的苦味总是特别突出。
'It's a difficult nut to crack,' Mr. Cole said.
科尔称：“这是一块难啃的骨头。”