Amtrak ups its food game for long-haul riders

(thinks of days when dining cars were like fine restaurants)   (shakes head sadly)  

Apparently the USA reporter didn't do sufficient research. I seem to recall that not that long ago, Amtrak "downgraded" the food service, and now that memories have faded, the current Amtrak management can make headlines over an "up-grade"? 

Some upgrade  

M. Mitchell Marmel posted:

(thinks of days when dining cars were like fine restaurants)   (shakes head sadly)  

We've ridden the Autotrain many times over the past 15 years. I can say that the quality of the food has slipped substantially over that time. Just another cost cutting measure by the bean counters.

Much like air travel, rail travel has become a means to a destination. Remember when you would see everyone dressed in their finest to board a plane.

Bob

We'll see.

What I don't understand is how chain restaurants like an Applebees or Outback or whatever can do food OK but Amtrak cannot/could not find something is at least palatable to a trainload of diners for a similar price?

Or why no chain restaurants or cafeteria foodservice providers are interested in taking on RR food service.  

Railroads may not have the ability or want to provide gourmet meals in the 21st century but can't they at least provide something equal to Saturday night out food?

Something just doesn't fit.

Rule292 posted:

What I don't understand is how chain restaurants like an Applebees or Outback or whatever can do food OK but Amtrak cannot/could not find something is at least palatable to a trainload of diners for a similar price?

Or why no chain restaurants or cafeteria foodservice providers are interested in taking on RR food service.  

Railroads may not have the ability or want to provide gourmet meals in the 21st century but can't they at least provide something equal to Saturday night out food?

Something just doesn't fit.

 

Just my opinions:

1) To my knowledge, Amtrak does NOT accept credit cards in their diners. Only cash, and as a result the "theft of funds" is pretty high.

2) The quality of the waitstaff is very spotty throughout the Amtrak system. Regardless of the complaints against certain poor quality staff, Amtrak doesn't seem to terminate them.

3) The current Amtrak management doesn't want the diners anyway.

4) The cases of "running out of food", especially when the train is delayed (which is fairly common on many of the long distance trains), are quite high.

Amtrak has it’s own Rewards Credit Card and you can use a credit card or debit card on any Amtrak Train.

Amtrak's Credit & Debit Card Policies

"On Amtrak cars, we offer a variety of carry-out style foods, including sandwiches, pizza, snacks, and beverages including liquor, wine and beer. ... Credit cards(MasterCard, American Express, Visa and Discover) and debit cards featuring a credit card logo are accepted for payment on all trains that offer food service".

Source: Amtrak

Remember: Keep looking for the hidden agenda.

Gary: Rail-fan

Amtrak certainly does accept credit cards in dining and café/lounge cars.  I get the feeling they prefer them to counting out change (though I don't understand why anybody has a problem with that). 

I guess this is an upgrade from airline crackers and soda.  

The "café" cars between NYC and Montreal take credit cards for sure …. I had cheeseburgers and Coors' both ways using my MC.

(Very pleasant trip, BTW …. the route, the passengers, and the staff)

“This contemporary style of service has been well received by customers......"

Well, perhaps by those used to eating out of vending machines. Certainly not by any sane person who's eaten in a proper dining car.

I have that credit card. I love it. 

Breezinup. I agree with you 100%.

You people that criticize Amtrak do you ever ride long distance Amtrak trains.  Because my experience is a whole lot better than your opinions. 

Clem 

CLEM K, You do know that I ride them very often.

I have always found Amtrak dining car food to be tasty and fresh.  And this has been based on several trips spanning years.  I had a filet on Acela First Class...and although its prepared like airline food...it too was good.  I just wish the cafe cars had higher quality options or even the hot meals to order...and it seems they are improving those menus a bit.  

A key factor hasn't yet beenm mentioned in this discussion.  As part of the most recent funding legislation, the  tax-cutting Congress  required that Amtrak break even on dining car service.  It is my understanding that that is the main reason for eliminating the kitchens in dining cars and preparing all meals in a commissary to be heated on board.  It's the cheapest possible way of providing food service.

I had been thinking about a transcontinental trip on Amtrak, but if I can get eggs cooked to order for breakfast, or a freshly made salad for dinner, I'm not sure I want to do any long distance travel on Amtrak.  I'll save my money and maybe have enough to travel on the Canadian.  

mlaughlinnyc posted:

A key factor hasn't yet beenm mentioned in this discussion.  As part of the most recent funding legislation, the  tax-cutting Congress  required that Amtrak break even on dining car service.  It is my understanding that that is the main reason for eliminating the kitchens in dining cars and preparing all meals in a commissary to be heated on board.  It's the cheapest possible way of providing food service.

I had been thinking about a transcontinental trip on Amtrak, but if I can get eggs cooked to order for breakfast, or a freshly made salad for dinner, I'm not sure I want to do any long distance travel on Amtrak.  I'll save my money and maybe have enough to travel on the Canadian.  

 

I'm not sure how this is any different than any other cafeteria-type setting, whether a hotel, corporate office or a hospital.

They can't give the food away, there has to be some type of acceptable profit/loss ratio. 

Hotel restaurants are often filled at O scale meets with people buying overpriced (but good) food.

Why can't Amtrak make a go at it?

Perhaps they just don't have it in their gut the way the Fred Harveys did in the days gone by.

"Amtrak:  We've upped our food game, now UP YOURS!"  

Mitch 

My buddies Mom("Cook") cooks for the airlines and used to make similar at home, adding a few spices they avoid to please the most people. Not a filet in 1st class, but I had no complaints or problems asking for seconds.

The hot meals are made and put in a thermal box and wheeled on; basically like catering for weddings (Cook's side gig)

I never ate on a train or airplane, but it all seems pretty simple to me; so I feel like someone, somewhere just doesn't want to be bothered with such low profit services. I.e. They don't travel coach anyhow so, ......what Mitch said 

Hard to "up the food game" when they've removed the dinner from the Silver Star, a trip of over 28 hours to Miama with only the cafe car and its microwaved pizza.

Ride it once or twice a year to Lakeland, about 24 hours if on time, and we bring a cooler with food to survive the trip into our bedroom.

A couple of thoughts here:

1.  While it seems like an obvious choice to us to subcontract out the food service portion of Amtrak, or even "lease" the dining cars as rolling restaurants to an entrepreneur or regional contractor, there may be union/governmental entanglements that we're not aware of.

2.  We just rode the Champlain Valley Dinner Train on the Vermont Rail System.  There was a choice of four entrees, cocktails, and two dessert options.  The food was cooked to order in the former Ringling Brother's Kitchen Car for four packed dining cars.  Price was $90/per... BUT that included the train/transportation.  I can't estimate how much the meal would have been without the train, but probably more than Amtrak is charging.

Jon

eddie g posted:

CLEM K, You do know that I ride them very often.

eddie g............Yes Ed I do know that,  and you have every right to criticize. Because you do long distance Amtrak,  you know first hand. I also travel Amtrak One or two long-distance trips every year. I watched dining car degrade from linen and china to plastic and paper. My first trip was the Empire builder during the rainbow era.

Clem 

Rule292 posted:

mlaughlinnyc posted:

A key factor hasn't yet beenm mentioned in this discussion.  As part of the most recent funding legislation, the  tax-cutting Congress  required that Amtrak break even on dining car service.  It is my understanding that that is the main reason for eliminating the kitchens in dining cars and preparing all meals in a commissary to be heated on board.  It's the cheapest possible way of providing food service.

I had been thinking about a transcontinental trip on Amtrak, but if I can get eggs cooked to order for breakfast, or a freshly made salad for dinner, I'm not sure I want to do any long distance travel on Amtrak.  I'll save my money and maybe have enough to travel on the Canadian.  

 

I'm not sure how this is any different than any other cafeteria-type setting, whether a hotel, corporate office or a hospital.

They can't give the food away, there has to be some type of acceptable profit/loss ratio. 

Hotel restaurants are often filled at O scale meets with people buying overpriced (but good) food.

Why can't Amtrak make a go at it?

Perhaps they just don't have it in their gut the way the Fred Harveys did in the days gone by.

This reply misses a couple of key points.

Fred Harvey did not make their money on dining car service.  It was a fixed base restaurant chain.  Santa Fe may have used Fred Harvey as its caterer, but their actual dining car operation lost as much money as any railroad.  It used Santa Fe cars and the crews were railroad employees. 

It was well known , even in the 50's, that all railroads (except the New Haven) had big out-of-pocket losses on dining car service.   The purpose of dining service wasn't to make money.  It was considered as just one part of the cost of providing a long distance passenger service.

The cafe owner has a lot of business flexibility that the railroad doesn't have.  A railroad dining service has to pay crews fora fixed amount of time for all members of the crew including during their idle time.  The cafe owner on the ground can tailor the work force to actual need, daya by day and hour by hour.  Also they can use cheaper labor.  Amtrak can use only employees under union contract with fixed hours and rates of pay and in addition has to provide sleeping accomodations for them - not a cheap affair.

mlaughlinnyc posted:

Rule292 posted:

mlaughlinnyc posted:

A key factor hasn't yet beenm mentioned in this discussion.  As part of the most recent funding legislation, the  tax-cutting Congress  required that Amtrak break even on dining car service.  It is my understanding that that is the main reason for eliminating the kitchens in dining cars and preparing all meals in a commissary to be heated on board.  It's the cheapest possible way of providing food service.

I had been thinking about a transcontinental trip on Amtrak, but if I can get eggs cooked to order for breakfast, or a freshly made salad for dinner, I'm not sure I want to do any long distance travel on Amtrak.  I'll save my money and maybe have enough to travel on the Canadian.  

 

I'm not sure how this is any different than any other cafeteria-type setting, whether a hotel, corporate office or a hospital.

They can't give the food away, there has to be some type of acceptable profit/loss ratio. 

Hotel restaurants are often filled at O scale meets with people buying overpriced (but good) food.

Why can't Amtrak make a go at it?

Perhaps they just don't have it in their gut the way the Fred Harveys did in the days gone by.

This reply misses a couple of key points.

Fred Harvey did not make their money on dining car service.  It was a fixed base restaurant chain.  Santa Fe may have used Fred Harvey as its caterer, but their actual dining car operation lost as much money as any railroad.  It used Santa Fe cars and the crews were railroad employees. 

It was well known , even in the 50's, that all railroads (except the New Haven) had big out-of-pocket losses on dining car service.   The purpose of dining service wasn't to make money.  It was considered as just one part of the cost of providing a long distance passenger service.

The cafe owner has a lot of business flexibility that the railroad doesn't have.  A railroad dining service has to pay crews fora fixed amount of time for all members of the crew including during their idle time.  The cafe owner on the ground can tailor the work force to actual need, daya by day and hour by hour.  Also they can use cheaper labor.  Amtrak can use only employees under union contract with fixed hours and rates of pay and in addition has to provide sleeping accomodations for them - not a cheap affair.

 

Pretty sure we're on the same track.

Food service, whether in a hospital or on the railroad, is a value-added service.

The question is not whether Amtrak can make money off of their service.  They cannot.   Food, at least for first class, is a value-added service.

The question is why can others provide palatable meals,  from hospitals to offices to ships, who also have overhead costs,  but Amtrak cannot. 

Well, one can get, for example,  Marie Callender frozen meals for $3 or so that look as good and probably taste better than the Amtrak entree shown in the OP.  Why doesn't Amtrak go that route?  

Rule292 posted:

mlaughlinnyc posted:

Rule292 posted:

mlaughlinnyc posted:

A key factor hasn't yet beenm mentioned in this discussion.  As part of the most recent funding legislation, the  tax-cutting Congress  required that Amtrak break even on dining car service.  It is my understanding that that is the main reason for eliminating the kitchens in dining cars and preparing all meals in a commissary to be heated on board.  It's the cheapest possible way of providing food service.

I had been thinking about a transcontinental trip on Amtrak, but if I can get eggs cooked to order for breakfast, or a freshly made salad for dinner, I'm not sure I want to do any long distance travel on Amtrak.  I'll save my money and maybe have enough to travel on the Canadian.  

 

I'm not sure how this is any different than any other cafeteria-type setting, whether a hotel, corporate office or a hospital.

They can't give the food away, there has to be some type of acceptable profit/loss ratio. 

Hotel restaurants are often filled at O scale meets with people buying overpriced (but good) food.

Why can't Amtrak make a go at it?

Perhaps they just don't have it in their gut the way the Fred Harveys did in the days gone by.

This reply misses a couple of key points.

Fred Harvey did not make their money on dining car service.  It was a fixed base restaurant chain.  Santa Fe may have used Fred Harvey as its caterer, but their actual dining car operation lost as much money as any railroad.  It used Santa Fe cars and the crews were railroad employees. 

It was well known , even in the 50's, that all railroads (except the New Haven) had big out-of-pocket losses on dining car service.   The purpose of dining service wasn't to make money.  It was considered as just one part of the cost of providing a long distance passenger service.

The cafe owner has a lot of business flexibility that the railroad doesn't have.  A railroad dining service has to pay crews fora fixed amount of time for all members of the crew including during their idle time.  The cafe owner on the ground can tailor the work force to actual need, daya by day and hour by hour.  Also they can use cheaper labor.  Amtrak can use only employees under union contract with fixed hours and rates of pay and in addition has to provide sleeping accomodations for them - not a cheap affair.

 

Pretty sure we're on the same track.

Food service, whether in a hospital or on the railroad, is a value-added service.

The question is not whether Amtrak can make money off of their service.  They cannot.   Food, at least for first class, is a value-added service.

The question is why can others provide palatable meals,  from hospitals to offices to ships, who also have overhead costs,  but Amtrak cannot. 

 

Hospitals are irrelevant as what the payor pays for the room includes the food service.  When the hospital sets its daily room charge, all costs including the food service are included in setting that price.  Same thing with ships.  They include all costs when calculating the price of a day's stay.  Amtrak cannot do that. 

As I mentioned yesterday, Amtrak funding legislation requires that they break even on food service.  It's the law.  "If the law supposes that", said Oliver Twist (Dickens), "the law is an ***", but it is the law.

clem k posted:

You people that criticize Amtrak do you ever ride long distance Amtrak trains.  Because my experience is a whole lot better than your opinions. 

Clem 

I agree. The meals we got on the Silver Meteor to Miami were very good.

In my area we have a number of upscale hamburger restaurants.  They start with the same ingredients as your fast food hamburger place, but how they are prepared and served makes a difference.  I appreciate that Amtrak is trying.  However nice food that is quick frozen, stored in plastic pouches, heated in a microwave or warmer and served in a box is still a TV dinner.

Amtrak's operating constraints may prevent their diners from serving food the quality that you would find at a moderately priced restaurant.  They would not prevent Amtrak from operating a decent deli serving made to order subs and sandwiches and salads at lunch and dinner, or from offering freshly cooked eggs for breakfast.  Individual cook staff should be allowed to make up custom items based on ingredients they have on hand.

Another option would be to team up with restaurants along the route.  It is 3:30 and the train is 75 minutes outside of Smithville.  The dining car chief calls the Smithville Pizza Palace and orders 20 medium pizzas to be delivered to the train.  Now the dining or club car has 160 slices of pizza they can sell to riders by the slice.

Trains are not airplanes.  Amtrak needs to look beyond airplane food.

Hard to do any of this when they've already taken the dinners off two of the long distance trains. Gossip among the crew on our last trip to FL on the Silver Star was that the dinner would be coming off the Meteor soon. They were concerned not only for the passengers but the dinner crews and car attendants are apparently all in the same seniority pool and the dinner folks have more seniority so they will be bumping car attendants to less desirable jobs. Hard to pickup and move when you've got a home near Miami as most of the Silver crew appear to do.

Amtrak just has new Viewliner diner cars and then starts not having diners.  This new CEO is a disaster.  Dining is the #1 thing to do on a long distance train for most folks.

I think he thinks he's  running an airline.

Domino's Pizza delivers "anywhere" now... If you like the "heartburn sauce"

  With age I have hypoglycemic, food allergies, and having some esophageal issues requiring drink with food, I wonder what the "carry on" rules are for food & drink on a long trip.

A trip to the theater I've frequented my whole life is hard enough lately since one of the big names took over.."sorry, can't allow that"

You can eat anything you can carry on. We bring an insulated bag into our bedroom with a variety of food to last the 24 hour trip Newark to Lakeland, FL. Cafe car food is bad and its packed as there is only the one cafe car for the sleepers and coach passengers.

Alcohol may only be consumed in the coaches if you buy it in the cafe car (but on my 7 hour trip to Williamsburg I often bring a bottle of wine as the cafe car prices are rather high). In the sleepers you're allowed to carry all the booze you want.

I will comment on one thing about the dining car on the Silver Meteor. The car was never over 2/3rds full during our 3 meals, and no one came in or out from the coach end of the car (the diner and cafe car were between the sleepers and the coaches) . This leads me to believe most coach passengers were happy enough with the cafe/snack car. 

Remember the meals are included for sleeper passengers, perhaps folks are eating them because they've already paid for them. Many of the passengers in the coaches probably find the prices too high for them.

Back when the Star had a dinner about half the time my wife and I would be sitting with coach passengers. Of course there are many more of them so not a lot use the dinner.

We're talking about diners, not dinners.  Dinner is what you eat.  The diner is where you eat it.

Thank you for the correction--I'm usually a bug on correct grammar and etc and this time I blew it. Mea culpa.

Scotie posted:

 Many of the passengers in the coaches probably find the prices too high for them.

 

Yes, but the cafe car is pricey as well: cheese burger $7.50, hot dog $5.25. For the coach passengers in the full diner, a chicken breast dinner is $17.50, steak dinner $25. (which is par for most restaurants).