What is a special meal?

 

Many commercial airlines can serve standard special meals for the benefit,comfort and safety of passengers, or due to special diet needs. These may be related to medical conditions such as diabetes (DBML diabetic meal), high blood pressure (LSML low salt meal), high cholesterol (LFML low fat meal) or food allergies (NLML no lactose or GFML gluten free meal). Other special diet needs are related to lifestyle, cultural or religious reasons (VGML vegetarian meal or KSML kosher meal).Requests for specially-prepared meals must be made by the agent on behalf of the passenger well in advance of the flight, usually with more than a 48-hour notice.For reservations made in a GDS system, requests for special meals are transmitted to booked airlines in a field called Special Service Request (SSR).You will learn more about the SSR field in GDS reservations. Such SSR entries require the use of a standard 4-letter code representing the special meal type.You must understand and remember the most common special meal codes.Keep in mind that not all airlines offer all of the following special meal types. As there is no standard special meal code for passengers with allergies to nuts and seafood, most airlines recommend that passengers with such allergies bring their own food on board for consumption.

What is special meal code?

Code	Meal Category	Meal Type	Explanation
AVML	Lifestyle (including religious/cultural)	SIAN VEGETARIAN MEAL	spicy meal with no fish, shellfish and meat religious/cultural)products
BBML	Passenger type	BABY MEAL	A meal for infants including milk and baby foods
BLML	Medical condition	LAND MEAL	A meal that excludes all spices (no salt, pepper, garlic, mustard, butter, oil)
CHML	Passenger type	CHILD MEA	A meal with fun food for children
DBML	Medical condition	DIABETIC MEAL	A meal excluding sugar and other sweet ingredients for passengers who need to manage the level of blood sugar
FPML	Lifestyle (including religious/cultural)	FRUIT PLATTER MEAL	A meal with only fresh fruit as an ingredient.
GFML	Allergy	GLUTEN INTOLERANT MEAL	A meal for passengers allergic to wheat and other grains
HNML	Lifestyle (including religious/cultural)	HINDU MEAL	A meal with no beef, veal and pork but may contain other meats
KSML	Lifestyle (including religious/cultural)	KOSHER MEAL	A meal prepared under the supervision of a Jewish rabbi
LCML	Lifestyle (including religious/cultural)	LOW CALORIE MEAL	A meal low in fat and sugar
LFML	Lifestyle (including religious/cultural)	LOW FAT MEAL	A meal with high fiber ingredients prepared in low  amounts of fat
LSML	Lifestyle (including religious/cultural)		A meal prepared with natural herbs and spices and lacks salt content normally for passengers with high blood pressure problems
MOML	Lifestyle (including religious/cultural)	MUSLIM MEAL	A meal with no pork or alcohol (spirits) and prepared with ritually slaughtered meats
NLML	Allergy	NO LACTOSE MEAL	A meal prepared with no cheese, milk or other dairy products, usually for passengers allergic to dairy ingredients
SPML	Any	SPECIAL MEAL, SPECIFY FOOD	This is a code used to request a non-standard meal type. The SPML request must explain exactly what the passenger requires in a special meal. Non-standard SPML meal requests have a high chance of being denied.
VGML	Lifestyle (including religious/cultural)	VEGETARIAN VEGAN MEAL	Contains none of the following ingredients: meat, fish or seafood, eggs, cheese, milk or other dairy products
VLML	Lifestyle (including religious/cultural)	EGETARIAN LACTO-OVO MEAL	Contains no meat, fish or seafood, but may contain dairy ingredients such as eggs, cheese and milk