June 5, 2025
Gastronomy

Air France reaches new culinary heights on departure from Paris

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In June 2025, Air France is renewing its collaboration with leading French chefs to create menus exclusively for customers in its long-haul cabins on departure from Paris. On board the La Première suites, triple Michelin-starredchef Arnaud Lallement has created the starters and main courses available on the à la carte menu, alongside world’s best pastry chef Angelo Musa. In Business, triple Michelin-starredchef Régis Marcon has prepared new dishes in collaboration with renowned pastry chef Nina Métayer. In Premium, new dishes have been created by Michelin-starred chef Frédéric Simonin, who continues to delight customers.

To offer this refined, Michelin-starred cuisine, the chefs work in collaboration with Servair, a world leader in in-flight catering, using fresh, local produce that changes with the seasons. As part of the airline’s commitment to more responsible catering, the meat, poultry, dairy products and eggs on each menu are of French origin, and the fish sourced from sustainable or French fisheries. Vegetarian options are also systematically available in all cabins.

Arnaud Lallement and Angelo Musa in the La Première cabin

To offer the very best of French cuisine on board its La Première suites, Air France is once again working with triple Michelin-starred French chef Arnaud Lallement to create the starters and main courses in this exceptional cabin. With langoustine, creamy court-bouillonand lemon caviar as a starter, and raviole, parmesan sauce, spinach and mushrooms as a main course, the chef from the Champagne region of France offers a gourmet cuisine bursting with emotion. This season, he is creating a total of four starters and eight main dishes for guests to enjoy over the coming months.

“For Air France, I wanted to remember the seasons, to let my unconscious speak, and share with travellers a gourmet pleasure marked by emotion and indulgence”, explained Arnaud Lallement.

Alongside him, Angelo Musa, Meilleur Ouvrier de France and world’s best pastry chef, adds a sweet, elegant touch to a menu worthy of the finest restaurants. The chef has created four desserts that combine balance, delicacy and harmony of flavours, such as Ode chocolat-caramel and Cake with candied citrus fruits from Corsica.

Régis Marcon and Nina Métayer in the Business cabin

In the long-haul Business cabin, triple Michelin-starred chef and Bocuse d'Or winner Régis Marcon is taking charge of the new onboard menu. Nature continues to inspire this chef, who draws his inspiration from the Auvergne-Rhône-Alpes region to create unique dishes for Air France. With a Camargue rice trio with lemon, carrot and orange sauce, butternut and red beans or Royale of salmon and prawns in a tangy sauce, snow peas and yellow carrots, no less than sixteen tasty dishes have been created for optimum culinary pleasure on board.

"Cuisine is always delicious when it's close to nature. It's this emotion that I wanted to convey to Air France customers" said Régis Marcon.

As for desserts, Nina Métayer is continuing her collaboration with Air France, which began in April 2024. Named World’s Best Pastry Chef in 2023, the chef has created light yet powerful desserts such as Raspberry lemon delight and Tatin-style crunchy delight.

As part of the fight against food waste, Air France is offering its customers travelling in the Business cabin the option of pre-selecting their main dish up to 24 hours before the flight. This service combines the guarantee of availability of the customer's choice with fairer consumption on board.

Frédéric Simonin in the Premium cabin

In the Premium Economy cabin, the one-starred chef and Meilleur Ouvrier de France Frédéric Simonin continues to delight Air France customers as part of an on-going partnership initiated with the company in November 2023. The Chef has created a new cycle* of four dishes in total, exclusively for Air France Premium customers prepared with the greatest respect for the products chosen, such as Salmon, shellfish sauce, pasta and wild rice, leek and mushroom or Prawns with tomato and squid ink rice.

“For Air France customers, I have carefully chosen each product from our French regions that I can transform with delicacy and precision, for a special culinary experience”, said Frédéric Simonin.

*dishes available on departure from Paris as well as from Pointe-à-Pitre, Fort-de-France, Cayenne and La Réunion.

About Arnaud Lallement

Cooking was a childhood dream for Arnaud Lallement, born in the family restaurant l'Assiette Champenoise. After an apprenticeship with the greatest chefs, Arnaud Lallement was crowned with the title of chef of the year and 3 stars in the Michelin Guide before he was 40 years old. Today, Arnaud Lallement remains attached to his home region of Champagne, his family and his love of cooking. This is a constant tribute to the memory of his father who passed away in 2002. If his father is no longer here to see him flourish, this virtuoso has chosen to work with his family, surrounded by the three women in his life - his wife Magali, his sister Mélanie and his mother Colette, who ensure that the warm atmosphere and spirit of excellence of the Assiette Champenoise are preserved. The chef's credo? A refined cuisine with no frills or fuss. Arnaud Lallement cooks the way he lives his life, concentrating on the essentials. His cuisine is “real food”, which is really important for Air France.

About Angelo Musa

As the World’s Best Pastry Chef and Meilleur Ouvrier de France, Angelo Musa is the author of artistic techniques that have marked the history of the profession. As executive pastry chef at the Plaza Athénée Hotel in Paris, and head of his tea room at the iconic Harrods in London, Angelo Musa continues his passion for desserts by giving them a renewed creative force. An aura that extends beyond borders, whose textures determine the taste, a true expression of the elegance and diversity of French confectionery. In his collaboration with Air France for the creation of desserts in the La Première cabin, Angelo Musa shares the same desire to take confectionery to a higher level, and to rediscover on board a French art de vivre that combines the arts of the table, fine dining and the art of entertaining.

About Régis Marcon

Bocuse d’Or in 1995 and acclaimed with three Michelin stars, Régis Marcon embodies an entire story of fine French dining. More than a style or a period, his cuisine symbolizes his own story. In the department of Ardèche, in the region of Auvergne, between Velay and Vivarais, Régis Marcon found the roots of his cuisine in a familiar and family territory. Since taking over the family-run hotel restaurant in 1979, and never leaving his cocoon in Saint-Bonnet-le-Froid, Régis Marcon became one of the greatest chefs of our time, by highlighting his regional products such as mushrooms and green Puy lentils.

About Nina Métayer

Distinguished two years in a row as Pastry Chef of the Year, and crowned “World Pastry Chef 2023” by her peers, Nina Métayer followed dual training in baking and pastry-making. Inheriting from her family a taste for good things, after a year's school exchange in Mexico, she decided to enroll on a baking and pastry-making course, with her mind already set on sharing this French know-how internationally. After completing her apprenticeship in La Rochelle, she went to Australia, practicing her craft in Melbourne before gaining experience as a restaurant pastry chef. Back in France, the young woman continued her training in Paris at the Ecole Ferrandi before starting her career in the Parisian palaces. She created her first signature dessert, The Exotic Floating Island, while working as head pastry chef at the hotel***** Le Raphaël. She then joined Jean-François Piège who entrusted her with the creation of the dessert menu for his new Parisian establishment, Le Grand Restaurant, which was awarded 2 Michelin stars six months after its opening. Luxury hotels, Michelin-starred restaurants, pastry shops and bakeries have forged her insatiable curiosity for taste as a vehicle for emotion. The chef has started giving Masterclasses around the world and has joined the juries of prestigious competitions such as the Bocuse d’Or and the World Chocolate Masters. In 2020, Nina also took a gamble on the future by inaugurating her first pastry shop, initially a digital store, delicatisserie.com. This agile and flexible concept is consistent with her conviction that excellence, ecology and societal commitment are values that are as necessary for a sustainable future as they are economically viable.

About Frédéric Simonin

Frédéric Simonin is an undisputed Chef who has always demonstrated outstanding talent. First Young Chef of the year 2004, then Chef of the year 2011, he was awarded the title of Meilleur Ouvrier de France in 2019 and the Gault et Millau “trophy for culinary excellence” in 2022. At just 18 years old, he was named best apprentice in Brittany, so he packed his bags and went to Paris to train alongside some of the best. He started with Chef Ghislaine Arabian at the Pavillon Ledoyen. He then began his ascent, working in renowned establishments such as Le Meurice, Taillevent and then Le George V with Philippe Legendre where he rose through the ranks. At the age of 27, he was awarded his first Michelin star at the restaurant Le Seize au Seize. Keen on adventure and discovery, the Chef continued his career with Joël Robuchon who offered him the position of head chef at “La Table de Joël”. Frédéric Simonin was subsequently awarded 2 Michelin stars and opened two other restaurants for Chef Robuchon in London, each of which earned him a Michelin star. In 2010, he returned to Paris and opened his own restaurant for which he was awarded a Michelin star.