Because I cook a lot and have invested time and money into building a pantry that allows me to easily make dishes from many cultures, I oftentimes forget that I live in a city where it’s a rarity that people actually cook meals and have basic ingredients like salt, pepper, or garlic on hand. I’ve tried to give boxed meal companies the benefit of the doubt and be open minded about their offerings and value, but I’ve never been able to bring myself to test one out. Blue Apron and Plated are fairly mainstream, with companies like Purple Carrot coming out to capture those interested in the concept but geared specifically toward vegan customers. My main gripes are 1) each set only gives you a meal for two people, so if you spend 30-40 minutes on making this meal, you have only two servings to show for; 2) because everything is measured out exactly for these two meals, even down to the spices, this means that a lot of packaging is used, adding to excessive waste to the environment. Also, $10/meal per person isn’t that cheap to me if it’s made at home.

My friend, who uses these services, said that a better comparison is not to compare these boxed meals to buying all the ingredients yourself and making a dish since you probably won’t be spending $10/meal per person if you buy everything yourself and make it. It’s better to compare this to the cost of eating out, a situation that rarely has you spending only $10 per person, especially if it’s not a takeout spot and it’s not lunch time. That’s true, I conceded. But then I thought, if I am going to eat out, that means I won’t have to deal with food prep like cutting vegetables or cleaning up. So it’s not a completely good comparison, is it? I guess it’s the best comparison out there to be fair. When I cook, I want to have food for several days given the effort and time I’ve spent to make the dish, unless it’s something really simple and fast like eggs. I guess I will never be a customer, but at least I can see the value these companies bring in terms of getting people wanting to cook themselves and learn cooking and food prep techniques. That’s a big deal since we live in a society today that devalues homemade things and home cooking as an activity.