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Daily news and analysis about the food tech revolution

Daily Harvest

Could the Secret to Alt-Meat Success Be in Making it Less “Meaty”? Daily Harvest Thinks So

This week direct to consumer darling Daily Harvest launched its first meat substitute. Called Crumbles, the new frozen food product features 13 grams of protein per serving and can be added to tacos, soups, or pasta sauces.

Not surprisingly, for a brand that built a name for itself with millennials craving a healthy alternative to meal kits and uninspiring choices in the frozen food aisle, Crumbles features a pretty simple ingredient list. The French Lentil + Leek Crumbles, which Daily Harvest says tastes like a “Herby Lentil Burger,” has five ingredients: Lentils, butternut squash, hemp seed, quinoa, cremini, and tara. Compare that to the ingredient list of, say, an Impossible Burger, and it’s a lot shorter and a lot more likely to include ingredients you recognize.

And that seems to be the point. While companies like Impossible have chased realistic meat flavor in their alt-meats by using genetically-engineered heme and other science-forward ingredients, Daily Harvest has taken an alternative tack: create something that packs the same protein punch as meat, is “meat-ish” in its savoriness and mouthfeel, while not trying to fool you into thinking its meat.

I asked Daily Harvest CEO Rachel Drori if this was intentional.

“When we launch something new, we always go back to our main goal: to help people eat more real, minimally processed fruits and vegetables every day,” Drori said via email. “Instead of trying to mimic meat or engineer an alternative in a lab, Daily Harvest cooked up a new collection built entirely on nuts, seeds, legumes, and vegetables.”

In a way, it feels like a return to alt-meat 1.0 when products like the BocaBurger offered vegans and reducetarians an option besides a salad or veggie skillet at their local restaurant. But Daily Harvest takes things even further, creating a meat substitute that can act as a savory substitute for meat but doesn’t pretend to be meat at all.

There’s a particular genius to this approach because not only does help avoid any uncanny valley vibes for consumers, but it also simply tells us we don’t need meat. Crumbles, says Daily Harvest, is just as good and will give you the same satisfaction.

While Crumbles probably won’t convince hard-core carnivores to switch over, I think it could provide those who want to reduce their meat intake but aren’t excited about the current crop of analogs trying to mimic the taste of meat a potential solution.

For Daily Harvest, the Crumbles launch comes six months after their last funding round, a $77 million raise. At the time, the company was valued at $1.1 billion, in large part to the company’s strong sales growth. With a meat substitute arrow now its quiver, Daily Harvest has created another reason for potential investors to like it as it eyes an eventual IPO.

Food Tech News: DeliverZero Reduces Food Delivery Waste, N!ck’s Ice Cream Partners with Perfect Day

Welcome to our weekly Food Tech News round-up. This week, we have stories on DeliverZero’s waste-free food delivery, a partnership between N!ck’s Swedish Ice Cream and Perfect Day, changes to Albertson’s delivery fleet, and Daily Harvest’s new product.

DeliverZero uses reusable packing for food delivery

DeliverZero is a third-party food delivery service (like DoorDash or GrubHub) based in NYC, but what differentiates the company is its use of reusable packaging. When the food is delivered to customers, it arrives in reusable clamshell packaging made from BPA-free polypropylene plastic. Customers won’t have to worry about a pileup of reusable to-go containers, though. For each order they make, a delivery driver will also retrieve the previous order’s packaging and return it to the participating restaurant. If the packaging is not returned within six weeks, the customer gets charged $3.25.

At the moment, DeliverZero has partnered with over 100 restaurants in NYC. The company also announced that it will soon be expanding to Amsterdam and Chicago.

N!ck’s Swedish Ice Cream uses Perfect Day’s tech to create vegan ice cream

N!ck’s Swedish Ice Cream shared in a press release that it recently partnered with Perfect Day to produce several new vegan flavors. The company will use Perfect Day’s animal-free dairy proteins and a plant-based fat called EGP (N!ck’s has 14 patents for this) to create an ice cream that boasts a smooth and creamy texture. The new line will contain seven vegan flavors, will be keto-friendly, and contain no added sugars. Three flavors, Swedish Mint Chip, Choklad Choklad, and Karamell Swirl, are currently available for purchase on N!ck’s website, and one pint goes for $9.99. The rest of the flavors will be available on the website in February, and several undisclosed retailers will carry the ice cream in Spring 2021.

Albertsons will stop operating its own delivery fleet in several markets

Albertsons announced this week that it will stop using its own delivery fleet to fulfill grocery deliveries in several markets starting February 27, 2021. Which states and markets this will affect remains to be announced, though it was confirmed that California-based Albertsons, Vons, and Pavilions will cease using their own delivery fleets. The grocer will instead transition to using an undisclosed third-party delivery service. In the past, the company has used a combination of third-party delivery services like Instacart and Shipt with its own fleet. Due to the increase in home deliveries, the company said this transition will allow Albertsons to compete more effectively in the home delivery market.

Daily Harvest adds plant-based Mylk as an option

Daily Harvest is a trendy subscription service that targets millennials with delivered boxes of pre-made smoothies, bowls, and flatbreads. Now, the company has added a new product called “Mylk.” The plant-based milk comes in two flavors, vanilla and plain, and contains no artificial flavors, fillers, or gums. Interestingly, the almond milk does not come in liquid form, but rather a triangular cube that must be blended with water to create liquid almond milk. One order of almond Mylk costs $7.99 and makes eight 8-ounce servings.

Daily Harvest Serves Up Free Ice Cream Through Traveling Vending Machine

During 2020, we have had our fair share of stressful and saddening news. A vending machine that dispenses free vegan ice cream while playing 90’s music is exactly the kind of thing we need to read about right now. 

Daily Harvest is a plant-based meal delivery service that offers pre-made meals such as smoothies, flatbreads, and bowls. Their most recent release, Scoops, is a vegan ice cream made from plant-based ingredients like coconut cream, fruit, black sesame, cacao, and mint, which is now available for purchase in their subscription boxes. To promote the release of Scoops, Daily Harvest recently set up their first outdoor vending machine in Newport, Rhode Island.

The vending machine is regularly sanitized and requires wearing a mask and practicing social distancing while selecting your free ice cream. “Scoops”, an original song written specifically for Daily Harvest by Boyz ll Men, plays as you choose between two flavors: Chocolate + Ooey, Gooey Midnight Fudge, and Mint + Dark, Melty Cacao Chips. The machine has a small sign that reads, “This is not a mirage” because let’s be honest, free ice cream seems too good to be true right now. 

Since the onset of the COVID-19 pandemic, consumers want to minimize human contact and interaction when purchasing food. Less hands on your food, the better. We have seen a rise in food delivery pods, robot cooks,  unmanned convenience stores, and smart vending machines. Our food systems have to adapt in the face of a pandemic, and vending machines like Daily Harvest’s could be part of this new normal we find ourselves in. 

The vending machine popped up in Newport, RI last week for two days, and is now on the move. The Daily Harvest vending machine will pop up in Domino Park in Brooklyn, NY August 21-23rd. According to the website, they will continue to add additional locations, are running an Instagram poll to determine the next site of its vending machine. 

Daily Harvest Switches to Home Compostable Containers

Daily Harvest makes frozen containers of pre-prepped food that are supposed to be better for your health than most frozen meals. But are they better for the planet, too?

The company has taken at least one step towards sustainability. Starting in April, Daily Harvest will roll out its new Re:generation line of containers which are 100 percent home compostable and made from plant-based renewable fibers. They’re also adjusting its portion size; the savory Harvest Bowls + Soups will be 1.5 times larger, and the Oats + Chia Bowls will be .75 times their current size.

Daily Harvest is also working more upstream to make the entire production process — from manufacturing to shipping — more sustainable. According to a release from the company emailed to The Spoon, Daily Harvest is in the midst of “working to eliminate all single use plastic and non-recyclable materials through our supply chain.” Where exactly they are on that process is unclear.

I tried out Daily Harvest’s service last year and really enjoyed the taste, health, and convenience of the frozen meals. I was happy to learn at the time that the cardboard delivery box in which the meals com is recyclable, as are the meal cups themselves. The liner holding the dry ice included in the shipment is supposedly also biodegradable and made of recycled denim.

Making the cups not just recyclable but home compostable is an encouraging step to cut waste in the very wasteful home meal delivery space — and one that I hope to see other companies following. Some already are. UK supermarket chain Waitrose has debuted fully compostable packaging for prepared meals. Pizza tech company Zume also pivoted into compostable packaging last year, though it’s currently dealing with lack of funding and major layoffs.

Other companies, like NadaMoo, are learning just how complex making home-recyclable containers actually is, especially for leak-prone products like ice cream.

One major question I had when learning this news was whether or not Daily Harvest’s new containers will contain PFAS, or chemicals that do not ever biodegrade. Last week Sweetgreen began rolling out new to-go meal bowls that were compostable and free of PFAS (their old containers were compostable but did have PFAS). As of today, Chipotle has pledged to remove PFAS from its own bowls by the end of 2020.

I’ve reached out to Daily Harvest to find out if its new packaging does, in fact, contain PFAs and will update this post when I hear back. Until then, it’s still encouraging to see a company so synonymous with frozen food delivery taking steps to reduce its packaging footprint. Here’s hoping Daily Harvest’s actions will encourage other delivery-only meal companies to follow suit.

Meet Blix, an All-in-One Blender & Subscription Service For Soups, Spreads & Smoothies

In a world where seemingly every other kitchen hardware startup has a pitch for a Keurig-esque business model of recurring revenue on their investor deck, it helps when your cofounder has actually sold a company to Keurig for hundreds of millions.

That’s the case with Blix, a startup cofounded by longtime beverage executive Eduoard Sterngold, who previously was the CEO of a company called Bevyz that was acquired by Keurig Green Mountain in 2014 for approximately $220 million.

It’s this type of pedigree that has no doubt helped Blix raise funding and build a team on the way towards launching a new blender-based food system that, yes, uses a proprietary cup-system to make a variety of soups, spreads and smoothies.

I caught up with the company’s president Ariel Sterngold (son of Blix CEO Eduoard) by phone, who told me that after rolling out the product in trials in 2019, they are pushing out the product nationwide over the course of 2020.

So how does the Blix work? The system is built around a blender and a single-use recyclable cups filled with pre-portioned and packaged ingredients. The ingredients are frozen using a technique called IQF (Individual Quick Freezing) where each ingredient – a strawberry, piece of squash, etc – is frozen independently before they are assembled.

The most unique part of the Blix system is the lid, which includes a single-use blade to chop up and mix the meal. The blade for each meal is developed specifically for that meal. By reading the included RFID chip, the system can determine the meal for each cup and adjust the blend accordingly.

One of the things that first struck me when looking at Blix were the words “single-use,” which in today’s world of increased focus on sustainability seems like a problem. Sterngold told me that the system, including the blade on the lid, are fully recyclable, which does mean it’s better than Keurig pods, which only are only partially recyclable. Still, compostable would be better, and reusable would be event better than that.

The main advantage Blix pitches is its ease-of-use as compared to normal smoothie making, which usually requires some chopping and measuring of ingredients and, if it’s a normal blender, a little clean up time. You’ll have to pay for that convenience, however, as each cup clocks in at $7.49 to $7.99 depending on the plan.

Yes, there are subscription plans and, as of now, it’s the only way to get Blix. According to Sterngold, they experimented with a la carte and subscriptions over the past year and found subscription was the preferred method. The subscription plans come in six or twelve cup a week plans and can be paused any time.

What’s in the cups? Right now, users of the Blix can choose from up to twelve smoothie varieties, three types of soup and three types of spreads (two types of hummus and a pesto).

Currently cups are only being shipped on the east coast, but Sterngold told me they plan to open up with a second copacker in California (they currently have one one in New York state) later this year. The products are packed with dry ice and, according to the company, can be shipped across state lines.

I’ve heard lots of pitches for proprietary pod systems over the years. Outside of the coffee space, most have struggled to gain traction. However, like many, I do avoid making smoothies and other blender food largely because the clean up is a pain. Add in that is makes soups and spreads, and I admit the Blix is intriguing.

That said, given that I’m focused on reducing the amount of packaging waste I add into the the wastestream, I’m not super excited about the idea of single use container anything. While Blix say they are fully recyclable, compostable would be better, and resuable preferred. And this is even before we get to the shipping packaging or the RFID tag included with the cup.

In a way Blix reminds me of Daily Harvest, which offers frozen, pre-portioned ingredient cups for smoothies and soups, only without the hardware. Like Blix, Daily Harvest offers subscription plans for its single-use cups, and packaging is recyclable.

A closer analog might be Blendid, which launched a dedicated smoothie making ‘robot’ with a single-use cup system targeted at both smoothie shops and offices in 2016. The product never really took off, but that probably had more to do with not finding traction in the tough-to-crack office food market.

Will the Blix model of subscription food and blender land with consumers? We’ll soon see. The promise of the company’s ready-to-blend food combined with a proprietary blender system was enough for investors to put $13 million so far behind the company, a decent amount of backing in what have been relatively difficult days for hardware startups over the past year.

You can see how the Blix system works in the company-produced demo video below.

I Tried Daily Harvest, The Pre-Made Frozen Meal Delivery Service For Millennials

I’ve always wanted to be a smoothie person: someone who starts the day on a healthy note with a cup of blended vegetables. Instead I usually settle for toast.

But all that changed this week when I worked my way through a box of Daily Harvest’s smoothie and meal cups. The company is a subscription service that sends pre-portioned cups of frozen healthy food to your door, from smoothies to overnight oats, matcha lattés, grain bowls, and even soups.

Photo: Catherine Lamb

How it works
To get Daily Harvest delivered to your door, you first have to select your subscription level: either weekly (6, 9, 12, or 24 (!!!) cups per week) or monthly (24 cups per month). Next, you select your cups from Daily Harvest’s selection of sweet and savory pre-prepped options.

Subscriptions can be an issue when it applies to food that can go bad (case in point: meal kits). However, this issue doesn’t really apply to Daily Harvest since all their food is frozen, so consumers can choose exactly when they want to make their kale smoothie or harvest bowl. They can also stop or pause their subscription whenever their freezer gets full or they want to take a break. Bonus: pre-frozen ingredients means you don’t have to dilute your smoothie with ice.

The pros
When the order arrived at my door I was initially concerned about the excessive packaging — a blight for many meal delivery services. But, at least according to Daily Harvest’s website, the cardboard delivery box is recyclable, as are the meal cups themselves. The liner holding the dry ice is biodegradable and purportedly made of recycled denim, which is pretty cool. So props to Daily Harvest on the packaging front!

My box had a mixture of sweet and savory options, including:

  • Matcha + Lemongrass Latte
  • Cacao + Avocado Smoothie
  • Ginger + Greens Smoothie
  • Sweet Potato + Wild Rice Hash
  • Cauliflower Rice + Pesto
  • Brussels Sprouts + Lime Pad Thai

The preparation itself couldn’t be easier. For the smoothies, you fill the cups of pre-chopped ingredients to the top with the liquid of your choice, dump the whole thing into a blender, and blitz into oblivion. My one small critique is that I found a few smoothies too thick and had to eventually add more liquid to thin them out.

The savory bowl options were even simpler: just dump the cup into a bowl, microwave, and eat.

Another benefit is that you can pour the smoothies/bowls right back into their cup container for transport or on-the-go consumption. There’s even a little opening on the lid for a straw.

I was pleasantly surprised by the taste. The smoothies taste “healthy,” but not in an undrinkable way. The ingredients were clearly fresh-frozen and the caliber was about as good as I’d get at an artisanal smoothie bar. There were a few misses in the savory options — undercooked sweet potatoes or mushy cauliflower rice — but overall the flavors there were also pretty delicious.

The cons
My biggest qualm with Daily Harvest was the size of some of the portions. The smoothies were pretty hearty, filled with good fats from avocados and almonds, and always kept me full throughout the morning. However, the savory cups usually only filled up half a bowl at most topped out around 300 calories. If I ate one for lunch, I typically ended up hunting for a snack by 3pm.

Daily Harvest’s pricing is also pretty high. Weekly delivery shakes out between $7.49 and $7.99 per cup, while monthly delivery will set you back $167.76 ($6.99 per cup).

That said, if you buy a smoothie at a fancy-pants juice bar it’ll likely cost you around 10 bucks, so Daily Harvest’s options are actually slightly cheaper. And since you don’t have to shop or prep any of the ingredients yourself, you’re certainly paying a premium for convenience and flexibility. But it still feels pretty expensive to me, especially since you can buy pre-chopped frozen fruits and veggies at the supermarket on the cheap. For the savory bowls, the cost doesn’t seem worth what you got.

Conclusions
Though Daily Harvest probably isn’t for me — I like doing my own shopping and cooking too much, and am a real cheapskate — I think it merges a few trends we’ve been seeing a lot of lately.

First and foremost, Daily Harvest nails it on convenience from every aspect. Its meals are pre-prepped, pre-cooked, and ship directly to your door. The company also capitalizes off of the recent boom in frozen food, which gives consumers access to healthy food with flexibility around when and what they want to eat. Lastly, with its bright hues and prominent avocado imagery, Daily Harvest really pops on Instagram and other social media sales channels.

Then again, the cost aspect is a real issue. I can’t be the only person who would balk at the thought of spending that kind of money for someone else to chop my vegetables and assemble them into smoothie-ready packages.

In the end, I think Daily Harvest’s pre-prepped meals are a smart offering. By combining ease and convenience, they’re sure to attract a contingent of busy millennials who wants to take the guesswork out of healthy eating. The question is if those customers will stick to their Daily Harvest subscription plan even as the costs add up, especially if the offerings don’t alway satisfy.

Me? I’m sticking with toast.

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