Review - Japan Airlines First Class B777-300ER Tokyo Haneda to Chicago O’Hare

JL10 HND-ORD

March 24th, 2025

In-transit:

I don’t think I’ve ever written a review this promptly after a flight, but I was compelled to document and share all the details while my memory is still accurate. It was, unmistakably, a perfection of a flight. Flying with JAL makes me wonder why I don’t go to Japan every year.

An important caveat to note before we dive in further - I truly lucked out, as I was the only passenger in first class. I’ve flown in JAL first class a couple of times before, and they were great. Yet, nothing compares to having an entire first class cabin to yourself, though.

I’ve reviewed JAL’s long-haul business class here and medium-haul business class here in the past.

Lounge:

This was actually my first time at Haneda Airport, so I visited both the Cathay Pacific Lounge and the JAL First Class Lounge.

Boarding:

Boarding was scheduled to start at 10:20am for our 10:50am departure. In reality, it started at 10:15am. Shame! You might wonder how JAL was able to board a B777-300ER (B77W) in 30 minutes. Well, first of all, we’re in Japan. Second of all, the strategy for both Japanese airlines, ANA and JAL, is to heavily focus their long-haul flying on premium capacity.

Take the below JAL B77W seat map for example - half of the aircraft is taken up by first and business class. JAL is one of the last few airlines in the world to maintain 9 seats per row in economy. In total, JAL’s B77W only holds 244 seats.

For other airlines with the same 4-cabin layout (first, business, premium economy and economy) on their B77Ws, Emirates has 324 seats, American Airlines has 304 seats, and Cathay Pacific has 294 seats.

You think that’s rad? ANA’s B77W only has 212 seats… Like if you’re in the last few rows in business class, you’re seated behind the wings… Speaking of ANA, JAL’s archnemesis, or is it JAL’s secret lover? JAL is the flag carrier of Japan and is as old money as it gets. ANA is more fun and quirky. It doesn’t mean ANA compromises on quality, though. The two airlines are constantly one-upping each other in every regard. You can’t go wrong with either.

Anyway… Given we were in Tokyo, the boarding lane for first class had dozens of people in it. That’s because oneworld emerald members were also eligible to board with first class. However, once we were down the jet bridge, I was the only one making a left turn.

After being bowed to by 5 ground staff on the jet bridge, I was greeted by 3 flight attendants at door 1L and escorted to my seat.

It’s been years since I flew JAL’s old first class. JAL debuted its spectacular new first class product last year on its A350-1000s, which will replace the B77Ws to become the backbone of its long-haul fleet. I actually already booked it for a year-end trip to Japan, so stay tuned for that.

The old cabin felt familiar. I never loved the aesthetics of the cabin, but what I didn’t expect was how good of a shape the cabin was in. These seats have been around for over a decade, but they were impeccably maintained.

Japan Airlines B777-300ER First Class Cabin

Similar to many previous-generation first class products out there, there were 8 seats spread across 2 rows in a 1-2-1 configuration.

Japan Airlines B777-300ER First Class Seat

I assigned myself 2K, the last window seat on the starboard side. Immediately after I boarded the plane, I saw the flight attendants closing the cabin door. It’s wild to think that they deployed the jet bridge just for me😜.

Over the course of 10 minutes, all three flight attendants came by to introduce themselves on separate occasions. Taking care of me on today’s flight were the purser Ozawa-san, first class attendant Mori-san and kitchen supervisor Saeka-san. Let me just say upfront that I could not have asked for a better crew. They struck the delicate balance between formal and casual, upholding a high level of service without coming off as stuffy.

While not the most private seats, it wasn’t an issue on this flight, since I had the whole cabin to myself.

Awaiting at my seat were an amenity kit, a leather binder containing menu and wine list and a Shiseido skincare kit, which has been a staple in JAL first class for as long as I remember. The amenity kit was in collaboration with Heralbony, a Japanese creative collective with a mission to showcase artists with disabilities. The kit itself was well stocked, with the usual eye mask, earplugs, hand cream and lip balm from Payot. There were also a steam eye mask, a shoehorn and a charging cable. I kind of don’t like how there were so many different brands involved here. You have Shiseido, Payot and Clé de Peau, which was provided in the lavatory (not that I would complain about Clé de Peau but…). It’s like what’s going on at St. Regis at the moment, where the shampoo, conditioner and body wash are all different brands. I wish JAL would just offer Clé de Peau across the board, lol.

Japan Airlines First Class Amenities HND-ORD

Mori-san stopped by to offer champagne before departure. JAL served Delamotte on the ground.

Japan Airlines First Class pre-departure Drink HND-ORD

I perused the wine list and menu while we waited for pushback. I noticed that JAL had removed its old “BEDD by Sky Auberge” branding.

There was a voucher for the inflight wifi. JAL does a great job of posting its menus online. These aren’t sample menus that are subject to change, but rather they’re actual menus sorted by months and routes. You can find both below.

For flights departing Japan, JAL collaborated with not one, but THREE 3-Michelin star restaurants - Kagurazaka Ishikawa and Kohaku for the Japanese menu, and Quintessence for the western menu. And how many 3-star restaurants are in Tokyo? Twelve. Honestly, it’s easier to fly JAL first class than to get a reservation at these restaurants…

I was then presented with a set of pajamas. I took the opportunity to check out the first class lavatory. There were actually two lavatories at the front of the plane, but I believe one was reserved for the crew. Again, not that it would’ve mattered on this flight anyway…

Japan Airlines B777-300ER First Class Lavatory

While not the most spacious lavatory, it was equipped with a bidet, a stepping board for you to change clothes on without standing on the floor, and behold, the Clé de Peau intensive fortifying emulsion and radiant multi-repair oil. These retail for $190 and $175, respectively.

Who else sees poubelle and thinks of The Gstaad Guy, lol. I don’t think even the Gstaad Guy would à la poubelle JAL first class, though.

The pajamas weren’t branded, but they were cozy and of good quality.

Japan Airlines First Class Pajamas HND-ORD

The headphones were from Panasonic and had decent noise-canceling capability.

Japan Airlines First Class Headphones HND-ORD

We pushed back 5 minutes ahead of schedule and taxied past an EVA Air B787-10. I had a phenomenal flight with EVA Air from London on its B77W, which you can check out here. Asia is in a league of its own when it comes to premium airlines. Following a rather lengthy taxi, we eventually took off from runway 04.

Inflight:

During our ascent, I checked out the IFE system. JAL was never known for its inflight entertainment, but I always managed to find enough Japanese documentaries or shows to get through the flights. One of the commercials was for Qoo juices, which was a throwback for me.

Japan Airlines B777-300ER First Class IFE

I connected to the internet. I’m not sure why it was yelling at me…

Japan Airlines B777-300ER First Class WiFi

Full flight plan cost a reasonable $18.80. Both ANA and JAL use Panasonic wifi, but I found ANA to have faster speed than JAL.

Japanese airlines tend to have their seatbelt sign on for much longer. Around 30 minutes into the flight, the flight attendants were released from their stations. Lunch started with a hot towel.

Japan Airlines First Class Lunch HND-ORD

The table was then set for amuse-bouche and apéritif. The amuse-bouche consisted of some Spanish ham on cracker and chicken bites in a mustard sauce.

Japan Airlines First Class Lunch Amuse-bouche HND-ORD

JAL served the paragon of champagne on any airline in the world - the Salon Blanc de Blancs. At a retail price frequently nearing $1,500 a bottle, Salon blows any normie Dom P or Krug out of the water. The catch is that Salon is only served on flights departing Japan, and each flight is only loaded with one bottle. In the worst case scenario, you’d have to share it with 7 other passengers, which isn’t a whole lot to go around… Back in the days, JAL served Salon even when leaving outstations.

Japan Airlines First Class Lunch Apéritif HND-ORD

Well, I had the opposite issue to worry about on this flight. I felt bad for wasting half of a bottle…

For me, the best part of eating on a Japanese airline is the assortment of appetizers. So much thought went into each of these bite-sized dishes.

Japan Airlines First Class Lunch Appetizer HND-ORD

The presentation was simple yet elegant.

However, it’s the content that shone. Clockwise, we had deep-fried black rockfish with yellow chives in truffle sauce, wagyu and spring vegetables (fiddlehead, taranome buds and broad beans) in dashi and soy sauce, kelp marinated and seared amadai tilefish with asparagus in vinegared ginger broth jelly, horsehair crab and Udo Mountain vegetable in white sesame sauce and lastly, steamed sea urchin and freshly picked wakame seaweed in dashi soup.

Opulence. You know JAL didn’t mess around when the wagyu was one of the cheaper dishes… The lavish inputs aside, it was mind-blowing that JAL replicated some of the same dishes that are served in these restaurants. I’ll talk about this more as we progress through the courses. This isn’t Wolfgang Puck or Gordon Ramsey slapping their names in exchange for some fees, when in practice they had nothing to do with the menu whatsover.

What’s worth mentioning is that JAL partnered with a sensei/seito duo. Koji Koizumi of Kohaku used to train under Hideki Ishikawa at Kagurazaka Ishikawa. The old Ishikawa restaurant moved to a new location some years ago, and the old location became what is Kohaku today. Given the history, both chefs focus on kaiseki cuisine, with Kohaku being a bit more innovative (such as the truffle rockfish above) and Kagurazaka Ishikawa staying true to traditions.

As we were leaving Japan behind us, we hit some pretty severe turbulence. I looked outside the window and was able to see the white caps on the ocean surface.

Onto the next course, I had to try the goat milk bavarois, from the legendary Quintessence in Tokyo. Quintessence is the restaurant that the 2019 TV series “La Grande Maison Tokyo“ is based on. The goat milk bavarois is the exact same dish served in the restaurant, prepared using only goat milk, salt and olive oil.

I have yet to have the privilege of dining at Quintessence, but if JAL’s iteration is anywhere remotely close to the real deal, I’m making it my mission to go there on my next Japan trip.

Next up was the soup course - clear soup with tender abalone, fish cake and freshly harvested bamboo shoot topped with sansho pepper. Much like the bavarois from Quintessence, this dish was also served at Kagurazaka Ishikawa (albeit the seafood changes with the seasons).

Japan Airlines First Class Lunch Soup HND-ORD

Anyone who knows Asian cuisine knows that clear soups are the most challenging to execute. Underneath its unassuming appearance hides an intricate mix of elements that have been blended, discarded and filtered, to achieve the noblest purity. This soup is the exemplar of chef Ishikawa’s naturalist ethos, taking a small number of fine ingredients and cooking them in the most unobtrusive way to highlight their original flavors. Kaiseki is, indeed, all about the season’s bounty.

At this point of the flight, the flight attendants and I had found a comfortable dynamic with each other. I’m a foodie (fattie), so we chatted a lot about different prefectures and what foods they were known for. They were a bit surprised but happy to discover how knowledgeable about Japan I was. I figured this was as good of a time as any to try some Japanese alcohol, and the flight attendants were excited by my request. It’s so precious when the crew share the same enthusiasm as the passenger.

So I present to you, the JAL first class sake and shochu tasting.

Japan Airlines First Class Lunch Beverages HND-ORD

It was surreal. Mori-san and Ozawa-san brought out the whole cellar. It felt like I was a guest at their house. In addition to the two sake and two shochu on the menu, there was even another off-the-menu sake, which was the Mimurosugi Junmai Daiginjo 35.

Of course the off-menu sake turned out to be my favorite. It happened to have the lowest rice polishing ratio of the three. None of them utilized association yeasts, though. I thought I would like the Harukakusei the most, given I enjoyed it at Sushi Noz a couple years ago, and the Harukakusei onboard was brewed exclusively for JAL. Ozawa-san was shocked that I didn’t like Jikon the most, which has a cult folllowing and the most expensive one poured. She said this specific Jikon would cost over $200 in Japan. However, it is unlikely to find it overseas. They were, nevertheless, all fantastic.

I had lost count of how many appetizers we had consumed. The show must go on. To accompany the 3 glasses of sake in front of me, I was served nakazara, the middle dish - Japanese white shrimp with spring turnip and Japanese butterbur stem. When I say JAL is old money, I meant on JAL, caviar is just a garnish.

Japan Airlines First Class Lunch Nakazara HND-ORD

Mori-san, being the sweetheart that she was, saw that I barely touched my shochu. She brought me the soy marinated grilled yellowtail and said it’s more savory and a perfect drinking snack. I smiled and thanked her, but on the inside I wanted to cry. If I get alcohol poisoning on this flight, would it count as workplace injury for insurance purposes?

Japan Airlines First Class Lunch Drinking Snack HND-ORD

Compared to the other dishes, the main course fell a bit flat. The cherry salmon with zenmai fern shoot and bamboo shoot in a thickened broth had a velvety texture, but it was just a little boring to me. Thankfully, chef Koizumi saved the day with his signature scallops gohan.

Japan Airlines First Class Lunch Main Course HND-ORD

When Mori-san dropped off my main course, she said “after your main course, I will serve you Japanese whiskies with dessert.”.

Plural! I want to go home 😭😭😭.

But mama didn’t raise no quitter. So after a brief Jean-Paul Hévin chocolate break…

Japan Airlines First Class Lunch Chocolate HND-ORD

I strode on.

Japan Airlines First Class Lunch Digestif HND-ORD

Currently, JAL is serving the Hibiki 100th anniversary blend, which combines two of Suntory’s most recognizable brands - Yamazaki and Hakushu. If you’re a fan of Mizunara oak, you would absolutely love this blend, as it contains Yamazaki’s Mizunara oak cask malt whiskey that has been aged for 30 years. This is exclusively available in JAL first class, and each passenger can purchase 1 bottle to take home. I ended up buying a bottle for 60,000 yen. ANA sold these in the past for 50,000 yen, but they had since discontinued it.

I was more partial to this Ichiro’s Malt Chichibu, quite possibly the best whiskey I’ve ever had (or maybe I had just ingested enough alcohol to kill a horse by now). Chichibu is a small but venerable distillery in the Saitama prefecture and has nothing to do with the conglomerates. This will become available for the month of April in JAL’s first and business class, so make sure to order it online before your flight.

For dessert, chef Koizumi came up with a fresh strawberry ice cream with rum jelly and roasted pine nuts. The rum jelly was, uh, interesting. It would make for an excellent boba topping you know what I’m saying? Now that I thought about it, how good would it be if it were in a black sugar milk tea??!!

Japan Airlines First Class Lunch Dessert HND-ORD

Lunch concluded 2.5hrs into the flight, which was a respectable pace considering how extensive it was. Perhaps the best meal I’ve ever had on an airline. It genuinely resembled a Michelin-starred restaurant in the sky, from the food, to the beverage selection, to the service. If I had to nitpick one thing, it would be that I was asked to retain my chopsticks for other courses. Throughout the meal I thought to myself, how much happier I’d be if I shared this experience with someone I loved. Hell, maybe even my haters. It was too good to enjoy it alone.

Once the table was cleared, Mori-san volunteered to make my bed in a neighboring seat. While I freshened up (putting an ungodly amount of CDP $erum on my face) in the lavatory, she tidied up my seat as well.

JAL offered two mattress options, soft or firm. I went with the former. Needless to say it was a very comfortable bed.

The cabin lights were dimmed as soon as I crawled in bed, and I was ready for some rest after flying ANA on the redeye from Shanghai the night before.

I slept for about 3 hours and tossed around for another 2. With 2.5hrs left in the flight, I admitted defeat and ordered some small things to pass the time.

To drink, I ordered another JAL first class classic, which was the Queen of Blue Deluxe tea from Royal Blue Tea. At almost $200 a bottle, this tea was bottled in a wine bottle and served in a wine glass.

Japan Airlines First Class Breakfast Beverages HND-ORD

The snack menu transformed JAL first class from a Michelin hinoki counter to an izakaya hidden next to a 7-11 with a sign saying “no foreigners”, 😜. I went with assorted yakitori, whitebait and salmon roe rice bowl and JAL's special yuzu-flavored Chinese noodles in chuka-soba Soranoiro-style.

Japan Airlines First Class Breakfast Snacks HND-ORD

Whenever I fly a Japanese airline, I always get the ramen, and it has never failed me. While tonkotsu broth is generally my preference, this broth was so flavorful. The yuzu pepper seasoning in it was to die for. Soranoiro is known for its chuka-soba. I was amazed by how al dente the noodles were. It’s not completely out of the realm of possibilities that they boiled the noodles on the plane. I mean, they have a rice cooker…

Lastly, some fruits, including Japanese melon.

On Arrival:

11 hours weren’t enough to spend in JAL’s first class. Everything was flawless. Well, except for not changing the chopsticks and not folding my napkin when I got up to use the bathroom. But you get the idea. Prior to landing, Mori-san and Ozawa-san both asked me how my flight was and told me I had to come back next month to buy the Chichibu whiskey. Ozawa-san thanked me for making all the duty-free purchases, which I did buy a lot, lol. Hopefully they get a commission out of it. She had to explain to me that they can only charge up to a certain amount on each credit card, so I had to use multiple cards🤪.

We landed at O’Hare 25 minutes ahead of schedule and pulled into Terminal 5 next to ANA’s B777-300ER, having also just arrived from Haneda.

Saeka-san came by to fetch me and escorted me through the mini business class cabin for disembarkation. While waiting in the galley, she told me her sister used to live in Jacksonville, after finding out I was headed to Miami. She shared that for the longer US routes, JAL allowed the crew to spend 2 days on the ground. While for the West Coast routes, they only stay for one day.

Japanese hospitality is, in my humble opinion, a gleaming light of humanity. I’m flying JAL’s new A350 in both first and business class this year. I just need to find a way to review ANA’s first and business class too.

It was yet another round of bowing from the flight attendants at the door. Ozawa-san waved at me and said “we’ll be here!”.

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