Dinner has become an event in our house during the second lockdown –something carefully planned, anticipated and prepared, breaking up the monotony of the day.
But continually coming up with new, exciting ideas when you’re staring at the same supermarket shelves or online delivery baskets can be difficult.
If you too are in need of some cooking inspo and want to make dinner something to look forward to, a food delivery box could be the answer.
Delivery boxes often contain ingredients you may not have considered buying in a regular shop – forcing you to expand your culinary repertoire. Many also help you to support small businesses and wholesalers, and offer more sustainable options than the supermarket stalwarts.
You can also pat yourself on the back for reducing your contact with others in your local Tesco or Morrison’s aisle and freeing up a supermarket home delivery slot for a vulnerable person who really needs it.
Convinced it’s the treat you need? Here are just seven of the great options out there:
Fruit And Veg
Oddbox is a food-waste-fighting fruit and veg delivery box scheme, working with growers across the UK to rescue produce at risk of going to waste.
Inside each box you’ll find a mix of fresh seasonal produce ranging from imperfect and surplus produce to out of specs and trial varieties.
Prices start at £10.99 and you can opt for fruit and veg, fruit only or veg only, in sizes small, medium and large.
Delivery: London, south and south-east England. Postcode checker available at www.oddbox.co.uk
Abel and Cole is one of the best-known names in the food delivery game. Its small fruit and veg box (pictured above) is priced at £14.25.
There are lots of fruit and veg variations and sizes available and handily, you can also ‘build your own box’ if there’s something specific you’d like. Abel and Cole also offer the option to add pantry essentials, such as rice and pasta, dairy, plus household goods (such as laundry detergent) – useful for anyone in a vulnerable group who’s doing all their shopping from home, but fancies shaking things up.
Delivery: nationwide. Find out more at abelandcole.co.uk
Meat Boxes
If you’re looking for a sustainable meat box, you can’t go far wrong with Pipers Farm; the deliveries come in 100% recyclable packaging and the brand is committed to using “regenerative farming techniques”, nurturing the land and working with 25 small-scale farming families.
You’ll find a number of options but the ‘essentials meat box’ at £40 is a good place to start. It even comes with a carton of bonus Jersey milk.
Delivery: nationwide. Find out more at pipersfarm.com
Flat Iron has launched its own delivery scheme while doors to the restaurant remain closed. Contents of each ‘butcher’s box’ have been selected by Flat Iron’s head of beef, Fred Smith, and hand prepared in the butchery by in-house butcher, Calum Eades. Each box contains a mixture of prime steaks and secondary cuts, plus burgers and a traditionally prepared hind-quarter roasting joint.
It’s not the cheapest at £90 per box, but boxes have been selling out. A limited number of boxes becomes available at the start of each week.
Visit shop.flatironsteak.co.uk to get your hands on one.
For Fish Lovers
ChalkStream grows award-winning English trout on the Test and Itchen Rivers in Hampshire. Slow grown for two years in fast flowing pure chalk stream water, the brand describes its artisan-farmed trout as “lean, well defined trout low in fat”.
A number of boxes are available, containing everything from trout steaks to smoked trout pâté. Prices start at £25.
Delivery: nationwide. Find out more at chalkstreamfoods.co.uk
Smith & Brock usually supply hotels and Michelin star restaurants in London with top quality seasonal produce. They rapidly pivoted their business at the start of lockdown in March 2020, by launching Knock Knock, a premium grocery box delivery service giving Londoners at home access to exciting ingredients.
The company offers a number of food boxes, including the roast dinner box, a cheese and charcuterie box and a pasta box. But it’s their seafood box (pictured above costing £50) that’s really got our mouths watering.
Delivery: London only. Prices start at £18.50. www.knock-knock-groceries.com
For new ideas
Feast Box is a great way to expand your repertoire of dishes and try ingredients you may not normally buy to shake up your weekly meals.
Expect to find ingredients such as Peruvian aji amarillo peppers, fresh curry leaves, galangal, Sichuan pepper, okra and more.
Recent recipes have includes Cantonese pork, cauli steaks and channa masala, ginger chicken, Korean fried tofu and beef and mushroom dashi stew.
Recipes start at £5 per person and you can choose from 12 new recipes each week. You’ll need to sign up to a commitment-free subscription, but this can be cancelled after your first box if you wish.
Find out more feastbox.co.uk