As we often travel with a family of 5 food costs in the airport can rack up quite quickly!  To try to keep our costs as low as possible we utilize the benefits of lounge access that we get from our premium card; American Express Platinum.  With the Amex Platinum card you can enroll for free in the Priority Pass program.  Priority Pass is a network of lounges across the world of over 1000 lounges and expanding weekly!

One of the newer perks with Priority Pass is that many of the new “lounges” are not actually lounges but restaurants.  Basically you get a $28-$36 dollar credit (depending on the restaurant) to be used towards your bill.  Even better you can sign in for 1 guest which gets you double that amount with out actually paying any money as it classified as a lounge visit..

How to use it

Because we travel as a family of 5, I added my wife as an authorized card holder on my Amex account which allows her own priority pass membership.  So for our family with 2 priority pass memberships we get the restaurant priority pass credit ($28-$36) multiplied by 4! We recently used this to have a pre trip lunch in Sydney, Australia and had a credit of $144AUD to spend.  To make things even better there was a restaurant outside security in Sydney so we used our Priority Pass there for breakfast while we waited for the check in desk to open, then again past security at a restaurant for lunch before boarding.  We saved over $200AUD in that day alone!

A lunch from Better Burgers for FREE!

Where to use it

The list grows weekly and I highly recommend downloading the app on your phone and keeping it up to date, you also can find lounges from their website.
Current restaurants as of this writing:

Domestic

• PDX
  House Spirits Distillery
  Capers Cafe Le Bar
  Capers Market
• DEN
  Timberline Steaks and Grille
• MIA
  Corona Beach House
• STL (St Louis)
  The Pasta House
  The Pasta House & Schlafly Brew House
• LEX (Lexington KY)
  Kentucky Ale Taproom
• MSP (Minneapolis)
  PGA MSP
• JFK
  Bobby Van’s Steakhouse
• CLE (Cleveland)
  Bar Symon

International

• SYD (Sydney Australia)
  Better Burger
  Mach2
  Peroni Bar
  Bistro 2020
  MoVida
  Bar Roma
  Wok on Air
• BNE (Brisbane Australia)
  Bar Roma
  Graze Grill and Bar
  Corretto Cafe & Bar
• LGW (London Gatwick
  Grain Store Cafe & Bar
• SIN (Singapore)
  The Green Market

The list continues to expand so make sure you update your app or check online and enjoy!

Better Burger in SYD