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Is Airport Food a Scam? The Club Room at Birmingham Airport Tries to Prove Me Wrong!

Airport food is usually the culinary equivalent of a lukewarm, soggy handshake. It's overpriced, underwhelming, and you feel a bit foolish paying me £10 for a sad-looking sandwich you know a pigeon wouldn't touch or by trying to get yourself ready for holiday by drinking the 3rd pint at 6am in Weatherspoon. Thanks to a glorious, 2 hour-long flight delay at Birmingham Airport, I found myself with a mission: To see if a lounge could actually make airport dining not feel like a daylight robbery. Let's enter The Club Room.
Nice decor with dark tone
The decor is actually rather good. Think sophisticated, dark tones, moody lighting—the kind of place where you could almost forget you're about to be crammed next to a snoring stranger for 2 hours.   Service was friendly, if a tad slow on the food delivery front. Maybe they were hunting down the ingredients in the local farmer's market, who knows?
Good crab toast, surprise me only serve 1 piece of toast
Now for the main event: 
Crab Toast: Gasp! Decent! Generous flakes of crab meat, not just a whisper of seafood fantasy. It was a solid, palate-pleasing starter.
Pork Bao: My heart fluttered for a second, then plummeted. As an expert in all things bao, this one was a letdown. The pork was seriously over-seasoned, like it had an argument with the salt shaker and lost. And pairing it with a hoisin sauce that felt more like a misplaced afterthought? Sacrilege!
Chicken Breast: Wait, what? A chicken breast that was still tender and juicy in airport? This was the true shocker of the meal. Paired with a refreshing pearl barley salad, it was genuinely a highlight. 
Beef Lasagna: Average. Just... average. The kind of lasagna you'd forget ten minutes later. Worse still, the wait for this was painfully long. My flight could have landed, and I still might have been waiting.
Snacks: Peanuts and brownies were also on offer and they did the trick. Solid backup dancers.

Surprisingly good chicken breast
So, the verdict? 
It's a nice, relaxed oasis from the airport chaos. If you've got a lounge pass (through packaged bank account or credit card) it's absolutely worth ducking in. The food isn't going to win any Michelin stars, but it’s a massive step up from the usual high-street chain suspects.  
Average Lasagna
Rating:
Food: 4/5 - The chicken and crab were surprisingly great, but the over-seasoned bao and average lasagna dragged the score down slightly.
Service: 3.5/5 - Friendly and helpful staff, but the seriously long waiting time for food was a noticeable drawback.
Decor: 4/5 - Relaxing, sophisticated dark tones, although the lack of proper comfortable lounge seating is a missed opportunity.
Value: 4/5 - Definitely worth the price or pass entry for the relaxed environment and decent included food and drinks compared to terminal prices.
Overall: 4/5 - A great place to escape the airport rush and enjoy a better-than-average meal, especially if you have lounge access.


Estimated Cost Per Person: £15 per person on top if you have lounge pass already, otherwise I will not pay full price for it

Restaurant Info: 
Address: Located in the Main Departure Lounge (after security)
Labels:
Location: Birmingham Airport (BHX), Birmingham B26 3QJ, UK

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