What is good and bad on Singapore Airlines in Economy - Silver Status Doesn't Help At Heathrow

Singapore flag.

What's good and bad in economy class on Singapore Airlines?

Let us start with what is good.
If you are a member of Silverkris or Gold you can use their lounges at Changi airport in Singapore.

Food
I had a wonderful chocolate orange ice cream after dinner going from London to Singapore.
The orange flavour is entrancing and refreshing. The chocolate is in teeny slivers which add a crunch. I tried to isolate them in my mouth and found they were more waxy, like Hersheys chocolate, less creamy, unlike Cadbury's Dairy Milk avaialble on the same flight. However, the crunchiness of the more brittle, rigid waxy chocolate seemed to me to add to the overall sensory effect when mixed in as a contrast to the creamy ice cream.

My understanding of Hersheys chocolate is that it was a dark and brittle chocolate designed for the army in wartime and had to stay with a higher melting point so it did not go soft and mishapen in your pocket when carried.  The softer, creamier chocolate used in the UK and Europe by Cadbury's and Lindt with a milk base once melted and made an awful mess over the back parcel shelf in a car.
I then understood what I had previously read about chocolate.

Between meals on Singapore Airlines you are offered a bar of Cadbury's chocolate, an apple, a wrap (savoury pancake roll), or water. You will see these mentioned on the menu. The crew come around with glasses of water and trays of snacks at intervals. If your waking times do not coincide, you can go to the cabin and ask or catch somebody as they pass down the aisle.

Call Button Or Not?
I have heard it said that if you want attention you ring the call button. That is what it is there for. However, I have also heard, as you might imagine, they don't like people to ring the call button except in an emergency or they would be running backwards and forwards the whole time and unable to proceed in an orderly fashion doing their clockwise rounds giving everybody equal attention.

Drink
The coffee is served with a thimble size ersatz milk but you can ask for real milk.

Singapore Sling is served, not a great one, just pink alcohol and pineapple. It reminds me to go to Raffles Hotel, where it was said to be invented, for the real thing.

If you are a member of Krisflyer, Silver status does not get you into a lounge nor priority boarding at Heathrow.

If you have a compliment or complaint, or suggestion, they will give you a feedback form and post it on for you.

Some hotel feedback forms ask you to mention by name any member of staff who was particularly helpful (especially when the staff have name badges and notice boards on the walls  for employee  of the month). If you ask for a feedback form, the aircraft crew or staff may wonder or worry that you have made a complaint. I made a point of telling the crew that I wanted to praise the ice cream and the service, so put their minds at rest.

When I wrote my form, I started and ended with praise, as we have learned to do when evaluating speeches at Toastmasters International..

Suggestion For Vouchers
I also included a suggestion that Silverkris passengers who are not allowed into the lounge at Heathrow, should be given a voucher for food or drink or both, such as a voucher for a free coffee at Starbucks or Costa or similar or any of two or three outlets.

Useful Websites
visitbritain.com
visitbritainshop.com
Singaporeair.com
visitlondon.com
Other websites are for Changi, Heathrow and Salcombe Diary shop visits.
Ice cream sales at Salcombe Dairy who I have mentioned and praised previously:
salcombedairy.co.uk

Angela Lansbury, travel writer and photographer, author and speaker. Please share links to your favourite posts.

Nutella and Nutty Chocolate Kisses in Umbria

The story of nutty Nutella and the story of Umbrian nutty chocolate Kisses (Baci) are similar.

The Story of How Nutella Chocolate Spread
As a chocoholic I had read, with eyes the size of chocolates, about the Story of Nutella Chocolate Spread in a UK newspaper obituary after the demise of the founder of the company, from the Ferrero family.

Before that I had not even registered that Nutella was of Italian origin. I vaguely thought that peanut butter and chocolate spread must be from the USA, invented by a marketing team who said, "What else can we do to sell chocolate and peanuts? Make them into spreads." I was wrong. Yes, eventually companies spread worldwide and you can find a company which started in one country is now under a global umbrella. But the origin of Nutella is very Italian and very interesting. It's a story illustrating the well known principles of 'necessity is the mother of invention' and as Dale Carnegie said, 'if you've got a lemon, make lemonade'.

The story of Nutella starts in north Italy in Piedmont which means foot of the mountain. In 1946 at the end of WWII chocolate was in short supply, rationed and taxed. But hazelnuts where plentiful in Piedmont. First the father of the company, Pietro (Peter) made solid chocolate blocks.

Reverse 46 and you get 64 - in 1964 his son Michele (in English Michael) issued a spread which he named Nutella. It is now both produced and sold worldwide, consuming a quarter of the world hazelnuts, and in 2014 an Italian postage stamp was issued featuring a jar of Nutella.

I saw Nutella on the breakfast buffet table in the Castello di Monterone, a castle hotel which is a couple of miles outside Perugia. Perugia is the capital of Umbria which is known as the heart of Italy.

Upstairs, in my grand, countryside castle hotel, hidden in a wooden box in the hotel bedroom, was a local chocolate, containing a nut, a hazelnut. This chocolate was invented in the Perugia area, a story very similar to the story of Nutella.

The Story of Chocolate Kisses with Hidden Hazelnut Umbrian
The lady was making chocolates with soft creamy filling, called praline, and wondered what to do with her leftover hazelnuts. She tried placing them stuck on top of an individual chocolate, but people were afraid of swallowing the nuts and choking. So she then placed the nuts hidden underneath, encased in the chocolate shell. Customers were surprised - and delighted!

The name of the chocolate was changed. The chocolates are now called Baci, meaning kisses (like Hershey's kisses). The shape and the name and the foil wrap have been a great success. Now the little domed and foil wrapped chocolates, a Perugia speciality, are a favourite throughout Italy.

Later, in 1982 along comes another Ferrero chocolate with a hidden nut, Ferrero Rocher, rocher being French for rock, named by devout Michele after the rock cave in Lourdes and the shape of the chocolate like a big boulder or rock.

In England my favourite bar was always Cadbury's fruit and nut. Why do I prefer this to plain chocolate? Solid chocolate is hard to break and gives you an overdose of sugar. With fruit or nuts you are getting protein and something to sustain you as well as the immediate sugar rush. Plus the fun and slow down effect of the crunch crunch, munch munch on the nut, as well as the suck and swallow of the chocolate. Lick the chocolate, crunch the nut, swallow slowly, long lasting and doubly satisfying way to eat chocolate.

Chocolate Shops in Perugia
If you visit Perugia, there's a chocolate factory. If you miss it, like I did, you will still enjoy seeing the chocolates in the windows of the shops. Go inside and look around.

If you have time, try the chocolate factory tour. The factory is about 15 minutes drive from Perugia.
https://www.tripadvisor.co.uk/Attraction_Review-g1186124-d196147-Reviews-Perugina_Chocolate_Factory-San_Sisto_Perugia_Province_of_Perugia_Umbria

www.castellomonterone.com
https://www.baciperugina.com/uk/en/
www.umbriatourism.it

Angela Lansbury, travel writer and photographer, author and speaker. Follow me on Facebook and like me on LinkedIn. Read about my books on YouTube. Come back tomorrow and the day after for more posts about Umbria and other destinations and inside stories and humorous comments.