Generally because they prioritize ease of operations over helping customers overcome jetlag. In this particular situation I'd guess the ease of operation comes from:

* full customers are easier to deal with than hungry customers

* Doing meal service early avoids the risk that weather turns rough, making a late meal service hard/impossible.

* Crews are fresher earlier in the flight, and so are do a better job and prefer doing meals early.

* Waking customers up is extra work for crews, and may not be wanted by passengers.

I suspect a lot of people expect an airline meal on their long haul flight, so that’s what’s done.

Like you, one can always ignore them - I’ve missed many a dinner and breakfast by sleeping through them on a flight back to Europe.

Generally your body can only adjust 1 hour per day (varies by direction of travel). So shifting at the start of your travel is a bit late. You probably want to shift gradually a few days before travel if it’s a major shift.

I just took this flight and that was not my experience. Food was served in the first 2 hours and the last 2 hours of the 10 hour flight leaving 6 hours of dark for sleep. Unfortunately my toddler did not want to sleep beyond his late nap so I was up for the entirety of it.

On SFO to LHR flights I tend to eat in the lounge, down a shot of Dream Water and just sleep until LHR.

Sadly the Virgin arrivals lounge closes by the time you get through immigration and baggage collection, so you'll need to grab a bite to eat, but it's not the end of the world. I can usually average 6-8 hours of decent enough sleep doing that.

>They kept everyone up for hours with food and then let them sleep for about 2 hours before waking people up for arrival at 12pm.

Weird, must be airline specific? All the intercontinental flights I've taken recently follows a "take-off -> food -> dark -> food -> landing" schedule, regardless of what time it is outside.

Yeah there's no way you're going to fix the jet lag on SFO-LHR or any similar city pair in one day