What's really weird to me is that you can go to the store and get food that's basically ready to serve after you warm it up.
You could eat steaks, fish sticks, brats, chicken, pork, chicken nuggets, fries, a huge variety of vegetables ready to be steamed from the frozen section. You could eat that every day and pay a quarter of what it costs for this stuff to be hand picked for you.
You don't even need to season any of it and it's delicious fried up in olive oil and butter and a little salt.
Most of the prepared food in the grocery store that you just need to heat up isn't very appealing to me for the most part. Fish sticks and chicken nuggets, blech.
However, there are a lot of things like salmon, brats (as you say), etc. that mostly do just need a quick saute or bake. And vegetables can be very quick and simple as well.
However, some people do like the idea of more complex meals and some of those people find BA makes it a bit easier to get there.
Don't tell me blue apron doesn't have fish sticks ;)
I usually use fish sticks or other frozen fish for making fish sandwiches. 10 mins of cook time vs 60+ for fresh breaded baked fish. But to each their own!
I'm probably fussier than I used to be and the fact that I work mostly from home gives me more flexibility than I used to have :-)
I'd be more likely to bread and saute some flounder--which is a pretty quick meal too. (And flounder is sold in vacuum packed individual servings so it can definitely serve as a "what's in the freezer?" meal.)
I buy the family size of Blue Apron for myself (12 meals at $8.99 per serving). There is no food in NYC of any considerable size/quality/taste that is a quarter of that price for that amount of calories. Ramen noodles and tuna maybe..
> I buy the family size of Blue Apron for myself (12 meals at $8.99 per serving). There is no food in NYC of any considerable size/quality/taste that is a quarter of that price for that amount of calories. Ramen noodles and tuna maybe..
I live in midtown Manhattan, and I could easily purchase 12 prepared meals per week of good quality for $9/meal.
In fact, that's one of the reasons I stopped using Blue Apron when I tried it - even before I factored in the cost of my time, it was slightly more expensive per meal than ordering delivery on Seamless. Once I factored in 15-30 minutes per meal (30-60 minutes divided by two servings), it was clearly way more expensive.
The other reason, though, was that I didn't live in a building with a doorman, and the last delivery window they had on weekdays was 6-8PM. I couldn't guarantee I'd be home by 6PM, and I wasn't thrilled with the idea of them just dumping a box of food on the stoop where anyone could take it.
I go to cheap grocery stores all the time. You said to find comparable stuff for a quarter of the price. I can't get a high quality meal of the same caloric value for $2.50, that's what I was getting at.
You could eat steaks, fish sticks, brats, chicken, pork, chicken nuggets, fries, a huge variety of vegetables ready to be steamed from the frozen section. You could eat that every day and pay a quarter of what it costs for this stuff to be hand picked for you.
You don't even need to season any of it and it's delicious fried up in olive oil and butter and a little salt.