Pardon me while I put on my old man hat and shake my fist: Back in my day, we didn’t have fancy lunchboxes! They were made of metal, had one compartment, and they definitely didn’t heat your food up!
Times have changed and so have lunchboxes, as evidenced by the Heatbox, the portable, self-powered, steam-heating lunchbox, which recently launched its Kickstarter crowdfunding campaign.
While it isn’t emblazoned with old school Marvel superheroes, from the pictures, the Heatbox is one good-looking lunchbox. It has a minimalist, European design (which makes sense given that the company is in Amsterdam), complete with a bamboo lid. But all that form appears to have a function.
There’s a removable compartment that you put your food in, complete with lid to prevent leaks. Add 20 ml of water to the device and charge it using a USB-C cable. When you’re ready to eat, remove the inner lid and push the button. Heatbox doesn’t say how hot it will make your food, only that it takes 8 to 12 minutes to warm it up (there are different intensities of heat depending on what you are heating), and that it will heat three times on the low setting on a single charge.
You can order a Heatbox for $132 with an estimated ship date of July 2020. The campaign beat its goal of raising $33,000 in 24 hours and has since gone on to raise nearly $53,000. Though as always, caveat emptor when it comes to crowdfunded hardware projects as they may never materialize.
If you don’t want to wait until next summer, you could go for the LunchEaze, which also launched on Kickstarter and is shipping now. LunchEaze is $150, doesn’t use steam, and is more like a portable slow cooker.
Another reason to like Heatbox is that it could make taking your leftovers to work more attractive. Instead of nuking them, steam them back to life. Enticing you to eat more leftovers means less food waste. And that’s not something I’d shake my fist at.
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