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The Spoon

Daily news and analysis about the food tech revolution

Review

We Tried Next Meats Plant-Based Beef and Steak. Here’s Our Review.

One of the most frustrating aspects of eating at dining halls as a college student is the difficulty of finding a quality protein that will make a filling meal. This is probably why I’ve adopted an almost vegetarian diet and although I’m thinking of going fully plant-based, I still sometimes miss the taste of meat. So when Next Meats sent me samples of their plant-based short rib, skirt steak, and beef bowl, I decided to see if I could fully commit to a diet of less meat. 

Next Meats was founded in 2017 in Japan by Ryo Shirai and Hideyuki Sasaki. After three years of research and development, their first products were launched in 2020 and they currently sell plant-based skirt steak, short rib, beef gyudon and chicken. The company, which opened up a new production facility in 2021, launched in the US market early this year and now can be found in supermarkets on the East Coast and California, as well as online for delivery.

Uncooked Next Meat in the frying pan

I invited a vegetarian friend over to try it because I wanted to get her thoughts on it as well. It was my first time cooking plant-based meat, even though I’ve eaten things like Impossible and Beyond Meat. My friend also doesn’t cook a lot of plant-based meat and typically eats eggs and beans since they’re easier to cook and cheaper. 

Next Meats’ products came frozen, and although they can be refrigerated, I kept it frozen and found that it didn’t take long to go from frozen to cooked. We cooked it the way we normally cook meat in a frying pan and ate it with white rice. Since the samples were pre-cooked and pre-seasoned, we didn’t add anything else to the pan except some oil. At first, it was a bit difficult to cook because the product started as a single, unappetizing chunk, and there weren’t any instructions on the packet about how to best cook the meat.

We used a spatula to separate it and it gradually began to look more like meat. Although we were concerned about how long to cook it for and whether it would be better tender or seared, the smell and texture of the meat helped us decide when it was done cooking. Compared to normal meat, the plant-based meat had a similar crispy texture on the outside edges when seared and smelled the same, which is probably because of the way it is seasoned. 

Cooked Next Meat

The flavor of the short rib wasn’t very meaty and it reminded us of Chinese vegetarian duck which is made from bean curd. In fact, all of the samples Next Meats sent me reminded me of that dish which is likely because they are made from non-GMO soy. I liked the flavor of the skirt steak more because it was sweeter and we could taste the flavor of sesame oil. 

My favorite was the beef bowl and it felt easier to cook since the beef was already shredded; even though it still came as a frozen chunk, it was easier to separate and to eat. The flavor was very authentic and reminded me of how my mom prepares beef, which has been hard for me to imitate. It had the perfect balance of sweet and salty, and the pieces of onion were a nice addition. 

Overall, we enjoyed trying Next Meats’ meat and thought that they were tasty products, even if they didn’t taste exactly like real meat. And while Impossible and Beyond burgers taste more like regular meat, there aren’t many brands making plant-based meat inspired by Asian dishes which is why I would eat Next Meats’ plant-based meat again. The authentic flavors, combined with the convenience of the frozen packaging, makes it an easy and filling meal.

Armored Fresh Debuted Its Vegan Korean Mochi at CES. Here’s Our Review

Armored Fresh is the U.S. subsidiary of Yangyoo, the Korea-based food tech company behind Korea’s first vegan cheese and other food alternatives aimed at helping the environment. This January, Armored Fresh was the first Korean company to showcase at the convention’s first “Food Technology” section at CES and is preparing to enter global markets. 

I visited the Armored Fresh booth at CES and tried a couple of their products: the vegan cube cheese and the vegan cheese cream dduk. The plain cube cheese had a very mild cheese flavor and a crumbly texture that I wasn’t expecting. I didn’t really like it because I expected it to be either soft and spreadable or hard and firm when I bit down, and it was neither.

Although I wasn’t a big fan of the vegan cube cheese, I thoroughly enjoyed the vegan cheese cream dduk. Dduk is a type of Korean rice cake made with steamed rice flour that resembles mochi, and Armored Fresh’s contains cream made from coconut oil. While there are some vegan mochi ice cream products on the market in the United States, few product lines are entirely dedicated to vegan mochi and none are as traditional as Armored Fresh. 

The dduk was perfectly soft and had a light chew, and the texture of the cream inside tasted similar to ice cream since the dduk is meant to be stored frozen and eaten slightly thawed. I tried three flavors: corn, rice milk, and injeolmi. The corn flavor was very subtle and fresh, which I liked because I’m not fond of the artificial taste of some corn-flavored products. The rice milk was my favorite because it had a smooth sweetness and reminded me of the mochi I grew up eating. The injeolmi had a unique flavor that was nutty and fragrant. For those that haven’t tried injeolmi before, it is a Korean sweet rice cake made with glutinous rice flour and covered with powdered dried beans and often roasted soybean. The Armored Fresh injeolmi flavor reminded me of roasted soybean or sesame. The cream inside each flavor that I tried had a smooth consistency and texture that didn’t make it obvious that it wasn’t made from real milk. 

Armored Fresh will enter the U.S. market with several different cheese products, including vegan cream cheese in 8 different flavors, vegan cube cheese (also available in 8 different flavors), sliced cheese, and shredded cheese. Armored Fresh also plans to use this vegan cheese on its other brands, Young Man dduk, and Spaceman Pizza. Spaceman Pizza will feature flavors such as margherita, meatball, and kimchi with vegan meatballs made from soy-based meat. The company is also developing almond milk-based yogurt and ice cream. 

Armored Fresh will be attending various food-centric shows in the coming months in Anaheim, Orlando, New York, and Chicago and plans to work with both national and local distributors to make their products available nationwide. 

As alternative dairy gains traction in global markets, it will be interesting to see how ethnic products embrace innovation without compromising their foods’ traditions and cultural significance. Armored Fresh’s dduk balances both forces well, creating a product that honors tradition while adapting to changing times to be more sustainable. Above all, it’s delicious.

Sausage Made from Jackfruit? It’s Delicious

Hailing from Asia, jackfruit is the largest tree fruit globally and is often likened to the flavor of Juicy Fruit gum. This massive spiky fruit seems like an unlikely fit as an ingredient in the plant-based space, but unripe jackfruit has a neutral flavor and a texture similar to shredded pork or chicken.

One company that makes plant-based meat alternatives using jackfruit is Boulder, Colorado-based Jack & Annie’s. Jackfruit serves as the main ingredient for its extensive portfolio of plant-based alternatives, ranging from meatballs to shredded pork.

Jack & Annie recently sent me samples of its plant-based maple breakfast sausages, savory breakfast sausages, and chicken nuggets to taste test.

I first tried the maple breakfast sausage and savory breakfast sausage, both of which are made from a base of jackfruit, water, soy flour, and canola oil. Using my cast iron pan, I cooked both types of sausages in a small amount of oil for about 8 minutes.

Photo of the jackfruit-based chicken nugget (left), savory sausage breakfast patty (right), and maple breakfast sausage link (top)

So how’d they taste? Both alternative sausages were the right amount of oily, and had a great, chewy texture like a animal-based breakfast sausage. The level of seasoning in each sausage was phenomenal, and my entire (small) house smelled liked maple syrup after cooking.

The chicken nuggets, made from a base of jackfruit, water, wheat flour, and soy flour, were next. I cooked them in my air fryer for about 8 minutes and plated them.

The verdict? Like the sausages, the texture was spot on. However, I felt like the nuggets lacked seasoning (at least compared to the sausages) and the breading was a bit thin. There are a lot of plant-based chicken nuggets on the market now, so it’s challenging to say which is the best (I personally really like Nowaday’s nuggets).

Pea protein, soy, fungi, and wheat are some of the most commonly used ingredients used to create plant-based meat alternatives. These ingredients are lauded for their affordability, high protein content, and ability to mimic the texture of different animal proteins. Although jackfruit is affordable and has a great natural texture, one downside to it is that it’s protein content is not as high as other ingredients. However, it does offer potassium and vitamin B.

A few other companies in the plant-based space besides Jack & Annie’s are using jackfruit as a base ingredient. Last year, Singapore-based Karana raised $1.7 million to develop plant-based pork made from the fruit. Upton’s Naturals offers a few different flavors of seasoned, ready-to-cook shredded jackfruit, and The Very Good Butchers produce a taco stuffing.

Overall, I found Jack & Annie’s products to be great alternatives. The company’s products range from $4.99-$6.50, and can be found in stores like Sprouts. Target, Wegmans, and Meijer.

Review: BEERMKR Makes it Easy to Make Beer

The fact that I hate beer either makes me the worst person to do a review of the BEERMKR countertop home brewing system or the best person to do such a review.

On the one hand, I can’t tell the difference between “good” beer and “bad” beer because IPAs, stouts, lagers, and what have you all taste gross. So I’m not the best judge of BEERMKR’s end product.

On the other hand, my particular dislike for beer means I know nothing about hops or grains. It also means I have never tried to make my own beer. So if a device promises to render that process idiot-proof, well, then I’m probably the right idiot.

Avid Spoon readers will know that I included the BEERMKR on my 2020 holiday gift guide. So you already know I like it. For the TL;DR set, despite some of its quirks, I actually had fun making beer with this, and that’s probably because I got all the benefits (beer) with hardly any work.

All the ingredients you need.

And brewing beer at home the old fashioned way takes lots of work. The traditional process involves buckets, hoses, bottles, bottles potentially exploding, babysitting, sterilizing… All that is to say that it’s complicated! And all those complications have turned a lot of people away from making their own beer.

BEERMKR solves this by putting everything in two pieces of hardware: a (big) countertop brewing/fermenting system and a slightly less big BEERTAP, which sits in your fridge and dispenses beer.

BEERMKR’s grain hopper. Just throw everything/anything in there.

One of the keys to BEERMKR’s ease is the fact that it replaces buckets and bottles with a one-gallon plastic bag/bladder (equivalent to 12, 12-oz bottles). Snap it into the brewer/fermenter to make the beer. Then once that’s done, transfer the bag to the dispenser.

We’ve actually written about how BEERMKR works (and shot videos of it) a few times over the years, so I don’t want to get too bogged down with the mechanics of the system. Like the machine itself suggests, let’s get to the fun part!

BEERMKR sent me a test unit along with the ingredients for two different beer recipes: A stout and an IPA. All of the ingredients are separated out in pre-portioned packets. In the accompanying BEERMKR app, you select either a BEERMKR’s recipe or you can DIY it if you’re a pro. Because I’m a n00b, I used the BEERMKR recipe for the Chubby Stout.

BEERMKR app

With my recipe selected, the BEERMKR app used a series of videos to guide me through the set up of the machine: how to install the bag, how much water to add, where to put the grains, what to expect in the first phase, etc.

After you do all that, you push the single, solitary button on the machine, and congratulations! You’re well on your way to making your own beer. From there BEERMKR takes over, keeping your beer at the right temperature, agitating it, and literally doing all the work. When it came time to pitch my yeast, BEERMKR sent me an alert and showed me some more videos on how to do that. Easy peasy.

The app fills you in at each step along the way, telling you what temperature the beer is at, the different stages of fermentation, and the resting (FWIW, I never knew beer had to rest). Once I pitched my yeast, I just sat back and watched on my app over the following nine days or so as the beer came together.

When it was done, the app sent me an alert. I removed the plastic bladder holding the beer, placed it into the BEERTAP, screwed in the CO2 cartridge and waited a day for the liquid to carbonate. Which… didn’t exactly happen the first go-round.

BEERMKR app

BEERMKR is still very much a new product. As such, there are several kinks the company is working out. My beer didn’t actually fizz up all that much because there were leaks in the CO2 lines. But the BEERMKR customer service team is super attentive, identified the problem quickly and sent me some clamps to tighten up the hoses. (A service rep even Zoomed with me to make sure I installed them correctly.)

Once the clamps were in, I waited another 24 hours, then I was able to enjoy a frosty, chocolatey stout. Or, at least my neighbors did (you know, because I hate beer).

One downside to the BEERMKR’s bag system is that it removes the need for bottling. That means that in order to share my beer, people had to come to me. This might be a bummer for hardcore brewers who like gifting their beer, but it was fine for me.

The biggest complaints I have are that during the fermentation phase, the machine gets loud twice a day as it does some kind of vibration something. I couldn’t control the timing of this vibrating, so it wound up waking me up in the middle of the night because it is loud. This is an issue the company said it is fixing in the app, so by the time you get yours, it might not be a problem. I fixed the issue by moving the machine into the garage.

Big BEERTAP

The app also had some other quirks about updates on different stages of my beer, but those didn’t impact the end product and they too are being addressed in updates.

But look. The point is, I had fun making beer! And I hate beer! If I loved beer and knew what I was doing, I would probably have had even more fun because BEERMKR lets you add whatever kind of flair you want to your beer. Want to throw in some raspberries or dandelions or cinnamon? Go crazy! Toss it in the grain bin and let that new/crazy flavor soak in.

At $499, the BEERMKR isn’t cheap, but what’s good is that unlike the now-defunct PicoBrew, it doesn’t rely on some proprietary pod system, so you’re free to go hog wild with your brews. But also homebrewers I know said that the price was good for what it does, given all the time and work it saves you.

BEERMKR didn’t make me love beer, but it made me love how easy it was to make beer.

We Tasted Brave Robot, The Ice Cream Made From Animal-Free Dairy

Last month when the founders of Perfect Day announced they’d launched a spinout called The Urgent Company to create science-forward food products that are earth-friendly, I got an email asking me if I’d like to try their first product: Brave Robot ice cream.

I figured why not? While I may not be a professional ice cream critic, the hundreds of gallons I’d logged in my life solidly place me in the ice cream enthusiast category.

In case you’re not familiar with the concept of animal-free dairy, here’s how Catherine Lamb described Perfect Day’s dairy, which is the same formula used in the new Brave Robot line up:

Perfect Day makes its dairy by genetically modifying microflora to produce the two main proteins in milk: casein and whey. They combine the dried proteins with plant fats, water, vitamins and minerals to make a lactose-free product that has the same properties — taste, consistency, and nutritional breakdown — of milk.

A few days later, the flavor lineup that landed on my doorstep was as follows: Vanilla, Buttery Pecan, PB ‘N Fudge, and Hazelnut Chocolate Chunk. I immediately got to “work”.

Any combo of peanut butter and chocolate usually can’t miss, so that’s where I started. It didn’t disappoint. The thick veins of fudge and peanut butter were as yummy as they sound, and maybe more importantly, the science-forward ice cream didn’t taste weird, or well, science-y, at all.

A scoop of Brave Robot vanilla

The other flavors were just as tasty. The nutty flavor of Hazelnut with big chocolate chunks was my son’s favorite, and my wife liked the crunchy Butter Pecan. Vanilla was vanilla, but in a good way.

After trying all four, I can say all were smooth and creamy, flavorful and, most importantly, tasted just like dairy-based ice cream. I’ve had lots of plant-based ice cream, and while most taste pretty good (if you’re ever in Seattle, I’d strongly recommend Frankie & Jo’s coconut milk ice cream), none had ever fooled my taste buds into thinking they weren’t made with dairy. Not so with Brave Robot.

My family all liked Brave Robot too, but unlike me, they didn’t care as much about the impressive science behind it. Sure, I tried to explain to them how it had the same proteins found in dairy but without the downsides of milk (like lactose), but they just nodded, said ‘huh’, and spooned more into their mouth. To them, it was just good ice cream.

And I suppose that’s the point.

Review: BLOOM is a Speedier Pourover Coffee Maker for Homes and Cafés

When I worked as a barista, my absolute least favorite drink to make was a pour over. Essentially a single-serving cup of coffee made individually, the process was fussy and usually took five minutes, which held up the line and stressed me out.

Coffee design company ESPRO has developed a new single-serve coffee brewer called BLOOM meant to improve on the traditional pour over method. BLOOM is currently wrapping up a successful Kickstarter campaign. This week I got to try it out myself to see what all the fuss is about.

Based in Vancouver, ESPRO had already made its own versions of several tried-and-true coffee brewers, including French Press and Cold Brewer. “Now we’re tackling the pour over,” ESPRO’s co-founder and President Bruce Constantine told me over the phone last week.

The main innovation by the BLOOM brewer is its flat bed — that is, the base of the brewer where the coffee comes out. BLOOM’s is larger than average and has 1,500 tiny holes, which means it can brew coffee faster than a traditional pour over device. According to Constantine, this shape also means that the coffee extracts more evenly, so the end result is more consistent. “It’s the first time the pour over has been reinvented in 30 years,” he told me.

Since the BLOOM has a non-traditional shape, it also requires specialized paper liners. ESPRO currently has patents out for both the paper and the BLOOM brewer itself. 

Photo: The parts of ESPRO’s BLOOM brewer [Photo: Catherine Lamb]

Constantine says he expects that the BLOOM will be a 50/50 product in terms of customers: 50 percent consumer, 50 percent foodservice in coffee shops and cafes. With COVID keeping more people at home, however, he said that they’re going to focus on the consumer market first. 

Home brewers certainly seem to be interested in the BLOOM brewer. ESPRO launched the Kickstarter for BLOOM on April 15 with a goal of $20,000. It was fully funded after eight hours. At the time of writing this, the Kickstarter had raised over $63,000 with eight days to go.

Kickstarter backers can get the BLOOM and 50 papers for $35. Constantine said when the device debuts in retail, it will cost $50 for the device and 10 papers. Packs of 100 papers will sell separately for $10 each. The company plans to sell the BLOOM directly through their website, and have already confirmed placements at retailers like Williams Sonoma, Sur La Table, and Nordstrom. 

Constantine said they expect to start shipping BLOOM to backers in July. As with any crowdfunded hardware product, there’s no guarantee that ESPRO will be able to hit that timeline — especially as COVID is disrupting manufacturing supply chains around the globe. But Constantine said that since they’re producing in China, which is over the worst of the virus, they actually aren’t experiencing any manufacturing slowdowns right now. 

In these uncertain times, things can change moment to moment. But it is comforting that ESPRO has already helmed four Kickstarter campaigns, all of which successfully shipped their products.

I got to give the BLOOM a try to get my caffeine fix this week. The process is extremely simple: put a filter into the brewing cone, place it over a coffee mug, add your ground coffee, then pour in the water. Coffee convention recommends that you “bloom” your coffee first (hence the name), which basically means pouring just a little bit of water into the grounds and letting it sit for thirty seconds to make space and let bitter carbon dioxide escape. After the bloom, I poured in the rest of the hot water and had a tasty cup of coffee in a minute and a half.

The BLOOM brewer ready for hot water. [Photo: Catherine Lamb]

A minute and a half is a speedy brew time for specialty coffee. My typical Chemex routine takes around six, and regular pour overs take four to five. The coffee itself was delicious, and cleanup was a snap thanks to the paper liner, which gives it a definite edge over the French Press for me.

There’s no question that the BLOOM is easy to use and looks beautiful. However, after trying it out I was left wondering: “Is it really worth it?”

Sure, a traditional pourover and Chemex both take a few extra minutes to brew. But the amount of required active time is essentially the same. A Chemex costs around $45, on par with BLOOM, while a regular ceramic pourover is roughly half that. I’m not sure if a slightly faster brew time justifies purchasing a BLOOM in addition to these other brewers.

I think that the bigger opportunity for BLOOM is in cafes — where time actually is of the essence. But since COVID-19 has basically nixed pour overs from the menu — and might shutter some coffee shops for good — that might not happen for a while.

Until then, if you’re looking to speed up your morning coffee routine, or just add a fun new gadget to your collection to spice up quarantine, BLOOM could be a good fix.

I Tried Burger King’s Impossible Whopper (and so Did a Lot of Other Customers)

I’m pretty sure I haven’t been in a Burger King since they were giving away The Empire Strikes Back commemorative glasses. But I, and it seems like a lot of other people, are now stopping by the BK Lounge to try the new plant-based Impossible Whopper.

We’ve been watching Burger King roll out its Impossible Whopper nationwide with great interest to see if and how consumers would take to the heme burger. Early results from BK’s market tests showed that Burger Kings serving the Impossible Whopper saw an 18 percent increase in foot traffic over those that did not carry it.

The Impossible Whopper was certainly enough to get me in the door. I honestly didn’t even know there was a Burger King near my suburban Washington home until I Googled it to see how far I’d have to drive to try one.

Thankfully it was only fifteen minutes away, but before leaving I actually called ahead of time to make sure that a) they carried the Impossible Whopper, and b) that they were in stock — Burger King had warned the Impossible Whopper would be available “while supplies last.” They didn’t pick up the phone so I drove up with a little trepidation.

Evidently, I overthought it because the people taking my order had no reaction when I asked for the plant-based burger. A little more than six bucks (the Impossible Whopper is $5.89 plus .50 for cheese) and it was mine. This was a popular order at the time: the customers before me in line ordered three Impossible Whoppers and the customers after me ordered two more.

I asked one of the managers how well the Impossible Whopper was doing and she replied “We sell a lot of them,” complete with a head roll gesture to emphasize the point. She could just be toeing the company line, but given the number of Impossible Whoppers I saw served up, I’m inclined to believe her.

I unwrapped my Whopper and disassembled it to take some pictures. Seeing the patty “naked,” I was surprised at how fake the Impossible patty looked. It was like a large coin with perfect edges. Like an MS Paint drawing of a burger patty.

I reassembled the Whopper and took my first highly-anticipated bite. It was… fine. I mean, it was good, but it’s missing some of the deep flavor complexity and texture of ground beef, and the Impossible patty was a little more dry. It definitely wouldn’t fool a meat eater. I much prefer the Impossible burger served at my local waterfront restaurant. Perhaps Burger King needs more training in the preparation of the patty, so it tastes less mass market.

My thoughts echoed Spoon reader Tom G‘s, who sent us his Impossible Whopper review awhile back. And a favorite food podcaster of mine, Dan Pashman of The Sporkful posted pretty much the same thoughts on Instagram:

I asked the customer next to me, an older gentleman, if he liked his. He said he did, but not in a particularly enthusiastic way. When I asked why he ordered it, he said it was for environmental reasons.

And that’s where I net out. I don’t think I’ll drive out of my way for an Impossible Whopper, but if I find myself in a Burger King, I’d get one again. Not because of the taste, but because I feel better about eating a burger that is better for the planet.

Anecdotally speaking, the Impossible Whopper seems to be drawing lapsed customers back into Burger King, so I’m sure the fast-food giant will see a spike in initial sales with the nationwide introduction of the Impossible Whopper. The question that remains now is how many people will come back for another.

Interested in more reviews and news about the Impossible Burger and other alternative protein stories? Subscribe to our Future Food newsletter!

A Taste of Omnipork, The First Meat Alternative Developed Specifically for Asia

Last week I visited Kind Kitchen in Hong Kong and got to taste a special type of pork gyoza that was juicy, tender, and delicious — and also happened to be made entirely of plants.

Kind Kitchen is part of Green Common, a group of plant-based retail shops and restaurants. In addition to the physical outlets in Hong Kong, Green Common also has a wholesale operation which distributes vegan products to thousands of grocery stores and restaurants throughout Asia. Its products are also available for consumers to purchase online.

Even as the number of flexitarians in Asia begins to rise and the Chinese government calls for a cut in meat consumption, vegan products can be hard to come by in Hong Kong. Asia is the world’s largest consumer of pork, and right now, there aren’t any good alternatives on the market — especially those that would appeal to the dietary preferences of an Asian audience.

According to David Yeung, founder of Green Common and its parent company Green Monday, it can be hard for Western people to understand Asia’s relationship with pork. “Pork is a foundation ingredient in everyday cooking,” Yeung told me over milk tea (made with Oatly) at Kind Kitchen. “Almost like salt and pepper.”

To address that shortage of pork alternatives while still respecting the dish’s cultural significance, Yeung launched Omnipork under his Right Treat brand last year in Hong Kong. The minced “pork” product is made of soy, pea protein, shiitake mushrooms, and rice. It has no cholesterol and higher amounts of calcium and iron than pork, but slightly less protein.

Omnipork display at Kind Kitchen in Hong Kong. [Photo: Catherine Lamb]

Yeung decided to develop Omnipork with a relatively neutral flavor to optimize versatility, so it can be used to make everything from dumplings to meat sauce.

In addition to Hong Kong, Omnipork is also sold at roughly 1,000 suppliers in Macau, Singapore, Taiwan and Thailand. Nearly two-thirds of its distribution points are restaurants, ranging in fanciness from hawker stalls in Singapore to 3 Michelin star dining establishments.

Yeung has aggressive expansion plans in mind: He told me that by the end of the year he expects to sell Omnipork at close to 5,000 outlets. The number will rise to roughly 10,000 outlets after their anticipated entrance into the Chinese market over the next few months. By the beginning of 2020, he hopes Omnipork will be available in up to 15 countries. His team is also developing new Omnipork products, such as dumplings and ready-to-eat meals.

A 230 gram pack sells for around $40 HKD ($5 USD) at Green Common. According to Yeung, that puts it on par with regular pork. In fact in some cases it’s a lot cheaper, since the African Swine Virus has recently depleted the Chinese pig population and made pork prices skyrocket in Asia.

But no matter how cost competitive it is, people won’t buy meat alternatives unless they taste good. After my taste test experience, I think that Omnipork measures up. Sure, its texture is slightly spongier than pork, and it has a slight pea protein aftertaste. But while it doesn’t have a ton of flavor on its own, it meshes super well into a variety of dishes, from ramen to dumplings.

Ramen and gyozas made with Omnipork from Kind Kitchen. [Photo: Catherine Lamb]

Realizing the unmet demand for plant-based foods, Western companies are also beginning to target Asia as an emerging market for plant-based products. JUST sells its animal-free egg scramble in Singapore, Hong Kong, and China, and Beyond Meat and Impossible Foods are also available in several Asian countries. Earlier this week Smithfield, the world’s largest pork producer (and interestingly owned by a Hong Kong-based company), announced the launch of its new line of plant-based protein, though hasn’t specified if it will sell its new products in Asia.

Hong Kong was actually the first area to carry Beyond Meat outside the U.S. — at Green Common. That isn’t exactly surprising, since Yeung was an early investor in Beyond through his Green Monday Ventures platform (yes, another branch of his plant-based empire).

There are also a few players beginning to make meat alternatives in Asia, mostly in the cell-based meat space. In Singapore Shiok Meats is developing cultured shrimp, and back in Hong Kong Avant Meats is developing lab-grown fish swim bladders.

When I asked Yeung if he was planning on selling Omnipork in Europe or the U.S., he seemed hesitant. He said that they were hoping to expand outside of Asia over the next year but will continue to keep their focus on that part of the world. “It’s a white space, a complete vacuum,” he said, indicating how few plant-based products are developed specifically for Asian palates and dining patterns.

The world’s meat consumption is projected to rise. Pair that with a growing population, climate change, and food safety issues, and Asia is primed to be a leading market for meat alternatives. “We built a platform a platform for the entire future food ecosystem,” Yeung said. “Now we want to catalyze it.”

I Went to Carl’s Jr. to Taste the Beyond Burger 2.0

It’s been quite the month for plant-based burgers. Last week at CES we watched (and tasted) as Impossible Foods unveiled their new ground “beef” recipe, and in the New Year Beyond Meat rolled out a new burger formula of their own right before they launched a partnership with Carl’s Jr.

In the spirit of journalism, I stopped by the Carl’s Jr. in downtown San Francisco today to sample Beyond Meat’s new “Burger 2.0.” The burger arrived in a fluffy sesame bun and was topped with cheese, mayo, ketchup, pickles, tomatoes, and a hefty slice of iceberg lettuce.

Photo: Catherine Lamb

So how did it taste? Pretty good. The burger itself was nicely pink and had the trademark tepid char evocative of fast food burgers everywhere (that’s actually a good thing). The “meat” was lightly packed and almost spongy, with the fatty juiciness that we expect from beef. However, there were some chewy ribbons throughout that almost reminded me of yuba, or tofu skin; a texture I like, but which doesn’t especially make me think I’m eating beef.

Sadly, most of the nuance of the burger got lost under the loud flavors of the pickles, condiments, and the bun, which dwarfed the patty. This isn’t necessarily bad; fast-food burgers aren’t just about the taste of the beef, they’re about the umami-bomb that comes from putting a bunch of savory, fatty ingredients — ketchup, pickles, cheese — together. In this way the Beyond Famous Star reminded me of a stereotypical fast-food burger more than any other plant-based option I’ve tried so far. And for a lot of consumers, that’s pretty appealing.

So how was the new recipe? Coincidentally, I’d eaten a Beyond burger three nights before while out at a local craft burger joint, who was still serving the original Beyond recipe. During the taste test I tried hard to compare the two, but no matter how hard I tried I couldn’t discern any noticeable difference. According to the Beyond website, the Burger 2.0 has less saturated fat than the original (a good thing), and apparently a “more meat-like texture.” I’d say the texture was maybe slightly chewier, which doesn’t exactly scream “meat-like” to me.

Photo: Catherine Lamb.

While I was chewing at the Beyond burger I couldn’t help but compare it to the Impossible Burger 2.0 I’d tried the previous week at CES in Vegas. Admittedly, the Impossible burgers at the unveiling event were prepared by a prestigious chef, not a fast-food line cook; they were also cooked into carefully curated dishes instead of slapped on a bun with some condiments and tasteless tomatoes. But the new Impossible burger’s texture just reminded me more of beef: its texture was looser and more natural, and it had the rich bloodiness of a medium-raw patty.

Though the Beyond burger at Carl’s Jr. might not taste 100 percent like beef, it can’t exactly call itself vegan, either, since the burger is prepared and charbroiled in the same spaces as beef patties. That eliminates quite a few potential customers (read: strict vegetarians and vegans), but according to the manager at the Carl’s Jr., the Beyond burger has been a popular addition to the menu. What’s more, she told me that once customers they try the Beyond Famous Star once they’ll often come back and order it again. “Even people who work here eat it,” she told me.

The Beyond Famous Star burger cost $9.49 at the downtown SF location I went to, $12.99 with fries and a drink. That’s more than the $6.29 that the Beyond Famous Star burger costs at my local Seattle location, but since Carl’s Jr. is a franchise pricing varies depending on location.

Plant-based meat options are becoming more and more accessible, popping up on fast food menus, online, and grocery aisles alongside beef and pork sausage. In addition to Carl’s Jr., Beyond also has partnerships with Del Taco and Canada’s A&W chain. Said accessibility is key as Beyond Meat marches towards an IPO in 2019, making it the first meat-like alterna-meat company to go public. We’ll no doubt see many more iterations of Beyond’s burger (and its kin) down the road, as plant-based meat companies continue to try and create a product so good, it disrupts the meat industry completely.

We Tried The Impossible Burger, And It Was…

On a rainy day in Seattle, Mike Wolf and I set off on a mission. We were going to sample the much-hyped Impossible burger. As a vegetarian who hasn’t tried a beef burger in 4 years or so, I was pretty psyched to sink my teeth into one of these look-alikes. But would it be everything I dreamed of?


Look at all of that excitement!

First off, a little background about Impossible Foods: the Silicon Valley-based millennial darling trying to make meat alternatives that are as good as the real thing. Their plant-based burgers are sweeping the country by storm, garnering a mega Instagram following and pretty favorable reviews. While the patties were originally available at only a few trendy restaurants, they’re now on menus in a lot of major cities.

Impossible patties contain wheat protein, coconut oil, potato protein and their ace in the hole: heme. An iron-containing compound found in blood, heme is what gives red meat that rich, umami taste. Impossible Foods’ scientists have found a way to extract heme from plants, which they hope will give their burgers a magic meatiness missing in so many veggie burgers.

Unlike plant-based burger competitor Beyond Meat, which is sold in grocery stores across the country and online, Impossible burgers are only available in restaurants. They premiered on the menu at celebrity chef’s restaurant Momofuku Nishi in 2016 and have since expanded to restaurants around the country. This business model might change, though, as their website hinted that they do have retail plans in the pipeline.

An Impossible burger, ready to go on the flat top.

So did it live up to expectations? Mostly. The Impossible burger is definitely good: it’s savory, has a good texture, and even has that umami flavor that comes from red meat. I suppose that’s thanks to the heme, which is also what makes the Impossible burger “bleed” when cooked rare.


Don’t worry, we washed our hands first.

Sadly, ours was very well-done, so we couldn’t test the bleed. But that’s alright. The burger was still juicy, despite a seared, caramelized exterior. I was surprised by how much it reminded me of burgers of yore, and I even tasted a distinct animal-like funkiness (thanks, heme!). It wasn’t quite as chubby and rosy-tinted as the photos on their website, but it still beat my expectations. I didn’t even add ketchup, and I always add ketchup.

I also appreciated how fatty it was, chiefly thanks to coconut oil. Impossible isn’t trying to make a health-food burger—just one that tastes as good as meat. In fact, their patty has comparable levels of protein, iron and fat to an 80/20 beef burger, though it doesn’t contain cholesterol. This makes sense if they’re targeting a wide, flexitarian audience, instead of a health-conscious vegan one.

Of course, there’s the possibility that my perspective was skewed since I haven’t had beef in a few years. So Mike Wolf took a bite of each to compare and contrast.


The true taste test. 

We got cheese on our burgers and, according to Mike, there wasn’t a huge difference between the two patties. In fact, if you topped your burger with bold flavors like blue cheese, special sauce, and pickles, you might not even notice that you weren’t chomping into a quarter pound of cow flesh.

The Impossible burger also had a delicious taste of self-righteousness. We all know that meat isn’t exactly great for the environment and that we should probably be reducing our beef consumption. Impossible’s website claims that by replacing one meat burger with one of their wheat protein-based patties, you’ll spare 75 square feet of land for wildlife, save water equivalent to a 10-minute shower, and spare 18 driving-miles worth of greenhouse gases.

Now for the downsides: Most notably, the Impossible burger is expensive. It cost an extra $4 to replace a beef patty with an Impossible one, at least at the restaurant we went to. That put the beef burger at $5.99 plus tax, and the Impossible burger at $9.99. Customize it with cheese and a topping or two, and things start to add up. It’s not a huge difference, but if they’re aiming to nab flexitarians price could be a big deciding factor.

In the end, I really enjoyed my Impossible burger experience. In fact, if someone suggests a burger night, I would go out of my way to find a spot that serves their patties (they have a map for that). Now if they could get started on making plant-based pulled pork, it would be much appreciated.

A Kickstarter Backer’s Review of Tovala’s New Smart Oven and Meal Service

Some people buy the latest new kitchen gadgets because they’re into cooking and want to exploit new technology for a better culinary experience. Others because they’re into the technology itself. Still others don’t really enjoy cooking, and this is the camp I fall into. So last Spring, armed with a lack of interest and time for kitchen adventures, I found myself an early backer of the Tovala oven.

Tovala launched in early 2016 with a Kickstarter campaign. The “smart oven that makes home cooking easy” sounded perfect for me—not just because it might enable me to escape the unhealthy Lean Cuisine rut I’d been in for workday lunching but because part of the Tovala equation is a subscription service for fresh, prepared meals, shipped weekly. They had me at “prepared.”

Tovala’s campaign funded in under 24 hours. Following just a few months’ delay, the ovens shipped to early backers roughly a year after launch (not bad by Kickstarter standards), and now it’s available for the public to order.

Unpacking

After negotiating for counter space [“but I’m writing a review of it…”], I excitedly unpacked and set up my new magical cooking box. The oven arrived with no documentation other than a small card instructing me to download and install the Tovala app, which was at the time also devoid of anything even remotely resembling operating instructions beyond some onboarding panels. Tovala has since added a multi-page quick start guide to the package and significantly bolstered its knowledgebase content, optimized for mobile as an in-app “user guide.” Including a QR code that directs consumers to the app in Apple’s and Google’s respective stores would be a nice addition to the standard packaging.

The oven shipped with a rack that’s a little tricky to slide into place around an extrusion that’s designed to keep the rack from falling out, a tray (which I still don’t really know where to place in the oven, a detached water reservoir, and a branded pot holder as a gift for the Kickstarter backers.

A look inside the Tovala oven.

The water reservoir is a unique and important component of the oven, since this is technically a countertop combi-oven that can cook with heat, air, and steam. The reservoir lets you easily add water to produce steam by filling it at the sink then sliding it into your oven. Unfortunately, a number of the reservoirs shipped to early backers have leaky valve stops, so I discovered I was trailing water across the kitchen as I took mine over the oven. The flaw does not impede proper operations, since it doesn’t leak once it’s seated in the oven, and Tovala’s co-founder and CEO, David Rabie, indicates that new reservoirs will be sent to customers experiencing this issue.

A leaky valve.

The oven is sizable—it fits fine on a standard-depth kitchen counter, but it slides under my upper cabinets with just four inches to spare and sticks out beyond the 12” cabinets above it. Adding to this depth, the oven has a heavy cable that terminates at a standard 3-prong plug, sticking straight out from the wall outlet. A flat plug with a side-angled cord would allow you to push the oven closer to the backsplash and hide the plug.

The Tovala sitting on my counter

The design of the oven is fairly contemporary. Its sturdy door encompasses the entire front face of the oven, surfaced in black glass with a window into the oven. A curved stainless handle spans the front, and a plastic control panel is literally bolted onto the front surface of the door. This is a change introduced after the Kickstarter launch, both to address usability concerns and to protect the electronics from excessive heat exposure (original designs had the readout and touch controls built onto the top edge of the door). Extremely bright LEDs on this panel indicate connection status, mode, progress, and water level. Three buttons and a knob give you some limited control of the oven locally—anything else requires the app.

Connecting

Like many “smart” appliances, the Tovala oven connects to your Wi-Fi network, and getting it connected is easy enough. You need to set up an account, which, if you subscribed to Tovala’s food service, you’d have already done. Like some other Tovala customers, I either didn’t remember already setting up an account or didn’t realize they were the same until the app wouldn’t let me set up a new account with my email address.

The app easily found my wireless home network and connected with my oven after prompting for my wireless password and sending network info to the oven. A green LED network indicator on the front panel of the oven lets you know it’s connected.

The Tovala oven uses its connectivity for a few key functions—updates, recipe programming, control, and notifications among them. I’d argue that one of the greatest benefits of device connectivity is the ability for companies to improve or change product functionality over time. Already, Tovala has delivered two over-the-air updates to early customers to change the behavior of some of the front panel controls, indicators, and cook cycles.

One of the things that makes Tovala’s solution so simple is the ability to automatically program the oven for Tovala’s own meals by scanning a QR code on each meal pack using a scanner hidden under the front panel. A typical cook cycle might go through four or five bake/broil/steam phases, but all you have to do is scan the code to start it all. The oven gets the proper cooking program over the air and does the rest for you.

Tovala’s app also has some (few—very few) recipes built in and allows you to build and save your own. Co-founder Rabie says more pre-defined recipes are coming, and you’ll soon be able to share recipes with the Tovala community.

The app can also send notifications to your phone when cooking is complete and when the oven encounters any problems. In my testing, the notifications have been inconsistent. After encountering a bug in the initial app release, I uninstalled the app and re-installed, but I still don’t get most notifications when cooking is complete.

Eating

The gem in the Tovala solution is the prepared meal subscription plans. Tovala offers two meal plans—one that allows you to pick three meals a week and another that doubles your selected order so you can prepare meals for two. Each week, you make your meal selections online or in the Tovala app from around half a dozen offerings that are constantly changing (perhaps with the exception of Miso-glazed Salmon, which doesn’t ever seem to fall off the menu).

Most meals comprise a protein, or main dish, with vegetable and grain sides. The mains are commonly boneless chicken, fish, or tofu, while the sides are typically a vegetable or green paired with some sort of whole-grain rice. This past week’s ordering options included Teriyaki Chicken with Fried Rice Pilaf, Roasted Pineapple & Sesame Coleslaw and Sunflower Satay Tofu Steak with Sesame Ginger Brown Rice & Garlic Green Beans; and this week’s Miso-glazed Salmon sides are Edamame Brown Rice and Charred Citrus Broccoli. You’re not going to find traditional starches like white rice and mashed potatoes (although they’ve occasionally offered fingerlings).

Tovala’s food is fresh—not frozen—and meals are shipped out to customers each Tuesday, arriving the next day. They’re bundled together in packets that are then packed in foam-and-mylar-lined boxes containing ice packs. It’s a lot of packaging, intended (but not always succeeding) to keep the meals protected and adequately chilled until you can properly refrigerate them.

A look inside the Tovala shipment

A Tovala meal pack

An unpacked Tovala meal pack

Meal preparation is quite simple. Each pack contains one or two plastic-covered foil trays and a caddy containing garnishes and accompaniments clearly labeled to add before or after cooking. Tear off the plastic; sprinkle, spread, or pour the “before” items (often oils or Miso glaze) as directed on the meal pack, scan the QR code, put the trays in the oven, and push the knob to start. In 15-20 minutes you may or may not get a device notification to let you know that your meal is ready. You may want to ask Alexa to set a timer for you, because you likely won’t hear the nearly-inaudible electronic chirps the oven makes when the cooking cycle completes.

Tovala mealpack ready to cook

The meals are delicious, and the portions are generous. I’ve ordered chicken, fish, turkey, pasta, and vegetable meals, and every single one of them has been flavorful and filling. Rabie says their intent is to provide clean ingredients with bold flavors and no preservatives. Meals are typically 400-800 calories and are high in protein. I’ve never been able to plate a meal to look anything like a professional chef would intend, but it typically looks colorful and appetizing. My plates don’t look as beautiful as in Tovala’s photos, but the food tastes as good as (often better than) I’d expect. Tovala plans to eventually expand the menu, offering plans to accommodate different palates and diets.

A plated meal cooked by Tovala

Meatballs cooked by Tovala

As with other food delivery services, Tovala’s early backers have reported a number of common shipping problems that the company is still working to resolve. Some packages have arrived damaged. Some customers have reported that the ice packs are fully melted on warmer days, and the delivered food is no longer cold. Some shipments have arrived after the FedEx delivery window for standard overnight service, which is already 8:00 p.m. And a combination of breached ice packs and condensation has caused many meal packs to arrive soaking wet. Unfortunately, I have experienced all of these issues. Happily, Tovala’s customer support, available by phone, email, and chat, is extremely friendly and helpful. They’ll promptly credit your account if your food arrives damaged or spoiled.

The company’s also had some packaging and labeling issues over these initial few months, including three separate labeling “mix-ups” on meal nutrition information, garnish instructions, and even one regarding an expiration date. They’ve followed each of these up with email correspondence to customers, but these problems suggest a highly manual process with quality review and control issues that are concerning when we’re talking about perishable food packaging.

Cooking

OK, so the Tovala oven does a great job cooking Tovala meals. Perhaps that’s not a surprise; arguably, it’s a necessity. But how is the Tovala oven at cooking other stuff? It turns out that’s a little more complicated—both figuratively and literally.

Tovala’s oven features two built-in cooking cycles—Toast and Heat—and they both have issues. Let’s look at Toast first. Since the Tovala product is a countertop oven, you might expect that this oven might take the place of your toaster or toaster oven. I did…that seems reasonable (and it was part of my argument for putting this thing on our kitchen counter). Not so fast.

Tovala offers a Toast cycle, but even after recent updates (again automatically delivered over the air), this oven doesn’t toast bread anywhere near as evenly, quickly, or consistently as pretty much any toaster I’ve ever used. I’ve spoken with David Rabie about making toast more than I’ve probably ever discussed toast with anyone. He’s explained the complexity of carmelization across bread types and temperatures, stepped through their multi-phase toasting cycle, and patiently listened to my complaints. I just want to make toast, and it strikes me that companies have made products that can do this successfully for years.

Initially, my Tovala oven overcooked (burned) the top side and undercooked the bottom of nearly any bread product I tried to toast. The recent update refines the toasting process, offering five toast settings (expanded from the original three). While I’m no longer burning toast, I’m no less disappointed with the results. The browning is still uneven between the top and bottom sides, with the bottom remaining undercooked. And now it all takes longer—anywhere from five to nearly ten minutes. My partner put our toaster back on the counter.

The toaster is back

Tovala’s other built-in function, Heat, is a timed cycle with a mixture of broil, steam, and convection bake, cooking at a range of temperatures between 400°–475° F. It seems specifically designed for reheating. You don’t need to adjust the temperature—it handles all that for you. Just press the Heat button, turn the front knob to select the desired cooking time, and press the knob to start. Tovala recommends 9:15 as a good starting point to reheat a meal and 15 minutes to cook something frozen. While it’s convenient and somewhat magical, the black-box nature of the cycle can be a bit frustrating. It’s all about experimenting to find the right cook time, but you can’t just add time to a heating cycle in progress, and you can’t pause the cycle if you open the oven to inspect your food.

For anything more specific or complicated than these slightly flawed Toast and Heat functions, you need to pull out your phone and use Tovala’s app.

…to use your oven.

If you want to, say, broil something for 6 minutes, you need to use the app. If someone in your household wants to heat something at 375° for 25 minutes, they’ll need to use the app. If your house-sitter or visiting in-laws want to cook someth—oh, let’s face it…they’re out of luck.

This is where it all falls apart for me. And to make matters worse, the app doesn’t just let you set the temp/time and go. To start cooking at a particular temperature, you need to select an existing or create a new cook cycle…or meal…or recipe—the same thing has different names depending what screen you’re on. Adding time or increasing the temperature while the oven is already in use is equally cumbersome. You can’t just change it from the cooking status screen. Instead, you have to find the recipe in use and edit the appropriate steps, which changes your saved recipe, too. And like the Heat function, you can’t pause the cycle if you open the oven to check on things.

Tovala app “cook cycle”

Tovala app recipes/my meals

Tovala app “Bake” cook step

 

There are also some preset recipes you can choose from in the app that give you pre-programmed cook cycles for a select few proteins and vegetables (five when it first shipped; eight at the time of this writing). Tovala plans to expand this library over time, but this feels like a huge missed opportunity and gap, particularly considering this type of combination cooking is likely new to most consumers and how otherwise tedious it is to just set it like a plain, old oven.

How do you cook baked potatoes, tater tots, or other foods you might heat in a traditional oven? What’s the best way to reheat pizza, rolls, or croissants? I find it hard to imagine that the folks working at Tovala don’t already have some of these cycles pre-programmed for their own ovens. Even Tovala’s Kickstarter campaign featured example cook cycles for some popular foods, but most of them aren’t yet in the app.

I’d also like to see some assistance with cooking packaged foods. Imagine if the scanner could read the bar code on select packaged products and set the oven accordingly. Now that would be useful.

If you’ve never cooked with steam before, there are some aspects of the Tovala oven that may surprise you. For example, I wasn’t expecting the water drippings that form in the oven during and after cooking. I’m also constantly forgetting to keep my hands and face away when I open the oven door after cooking, as a waft of hot steam usually needs to escape before you can grab your food. I’m forgetful enough about it that I kind of wish the device had CAUTION: Hot Steam! permanently printed on the top edge of the door frame. I’m also concerned about the long-term effects the steam may have on the finish of the cabinets above my oven.

Finally, while this isn’t an issue that appears to affect functionality, the oven seems to have some engineering or manufacturing flaws that cause it to make occasional unsettling noises. Several Tovala customers, including me, have reported that as the oven is heating, it occasionally makes a loud bang as the interior oven wall buckles. As the oven cools, it bangs itself back into place. Additionally, there’s an occasional whistle inside the oven when it’s heating—usually on longer cook cycles. Rabie acknowledges these as known issues but notes that they don’t impact the oven performance or pose any danger (short of, perhaps, startling you). Still…how did that get through testing?

A slightly warped oven wall

Cleaning

Like all ovens, this thing is going to get dirty. Crumbs from bread products and splatter from meals create a soupy mess on the bottom as it mixes with residual water condensation. But unlike a toaster with a removable bottom panel or a microwave oven with smooth surfaces, this box has permanently attached top-and-bottom heating coils that you need to clean around. It’s kind of a pain. I’ve sadly given up on maintaining an always-shiny oven interior.

Inside the Tovala, pre-cleaning

Tovala recommends wiping down the interior of the oven when it’s cool with soapy water and traditional oven cleaner. The oven has a clean cycle you can run it through after the cleaner has been sitting for a while. You run that using the app, of course.

Reflecting

So how much does all of this cost? Meals are $12 apiece, including shipping, and you can subscribe to receive either 3 meals a week for $36 or 6 meals a week (two each of the 3 selected meals) for $72. That’s a lot—slightly more than other food delivery services, but Tovala has the added benefit of the meals being already prepared for you (if, like me, you want that added convenience). And if you like Miso-glazed Salmon as part of your weekly diet, that regular offering alone may be worth it to you.

The oven itself costs $399. That’s $70 higher than the estimated retail price projected during the Kickstarter campaign. For now, you can only order it online, but Rabie says they’ll be considering retail channels in the future.

As a stand-alone countertop oven, Tovala promises a lot but doesn’t yet live up to its full potential. Toasting bread is still problematic, even after recent updates, so it’s not going to replace your toaster yet. Heating food is more reliable, but in that mode your oven is literally a black box that you just have to trust. If you want more control, you’re relegated to using the app, which only supports iOS and Android phones, isn’t optimized yet for tablets, and can’t be controlled through voice assistants like the Echo or Google Home (all of which, according to Rabie, are under consideration for Tovala’s roadmap).

The Tovala app has not been optimized for tablets yet

Tovala makes no bones about the fact that the company’s focus has been on using the oven to cook Tovala meals—and clearly they’ve spent significant time and effort making that convenient and reliable. In my opinion, the Tovala meals are the best part of the offering, but that’s marred somewhat by a still imperfect fulfillment process. The company needs to further improve the reliability of its meal packaging and delivery, perhaps even offering an “express” option for customers in warmer climates who can receive packages earlier in the day.

That focus on the meal subscription service is also the likely reason Tovala’s industrial designers ultimately felt they could delegate basic function and temperature control to an app, but that’s a potential liability for both Tovala and its customers. Tovala oven owners are taking a bet on this company, trusting it to maintain and update the apps and services that control the oven long after purchase.

What happens if smartphones no longer rule our lives in 5 years? What happens if Tovala abandons or degrades support for this first-generation oven when its focus moves to newer models. What happens if Tovala isn’t successful, or gets acquired, or pivots? Well…then you could be left with a large, not-so-great-at-toasting toaster oven. This clearly isn’t an issue specific to Tovala, but it’s one that we, as consumers, will need to consider as more products abandon physical controls and rely on third-party devices and cloud services.

As an early backer on Kickstarter, I paid about half the current retail price, and I’m happy with that price. I don’t know that I would have gone in at $399. I’m also very pleased with the meals and the convenience—I’m eating better now. I recognize that my oven is likely one of the first batch produced and shipped, and Tovala will refine the hardware and experience over time. But in its current form, I’m frustrated by the product’s quirks like the toasting, the banging and whistling, and the heavy app dependency.

Bottom line: this product is about convenience. If you’re interested in eating good, prepared meals at a premium price, then Tovala is worth your consideration. If you consider yourself an amateur chef, and you’re more interested in control and precision, then you’re in luck because this space is heating up [sorry…it was really unavoidable]. If you’re in that group, though, you may be better served by June’s or Anova’s anticipated offering. Either way, get out your wallets. This convenience and control doesn’t come cheap.

About the Author: Richard Gunther is the Director of Client Experience at Universal Mind, a digital agency in Denver, CO. He’s also the Editor of the Digital Media Zone and hosts Home: On, a podcast about DIY home automation products and technology.

I Made Dinner With An Amazon Meal Kit. Here’s My Review

Amazon can be kinda cruel.

Think about it: Blue Apron, arguably the biggest name in meal kit delivery, works for years to create a new way for consumers to make dinner, eventually becoming the most successful meal kit company in a crowded field and, just after they have an initial public offering to pay back investors and employees for all their hard work, Amazon waltzes in with a meal kit service of their own the same exact month to send Blue Apron’s stock tumbling downward.

Brutal. But hey, this is Jeff Bezos we’re talking about.

Bezos Prime

Does that dude look like he means business? Yes. Yes he does.

But Blue Apron’s bad fortune is my luck since I live in the Seattle market, where Amazon tends to roll out new food initiatives first. When I read yesterday the company was already shipping its meal kits, I decided to order one.

So here is my review. Before I start, it’s worth noting I will be comparing my experience with Amazon’s meal kit to that of Blue Apron. Why? It’s what I know. I subscribed to Blue Apron for about seven months last year and, as a result, Blue Apron is my main point of reference when it comes to meal kits.

The Order Experience

When I learned that Amazon is already shipping their meal kits in the Seattle market, I went to the site and checked out the meals available. And while I didn’t expect to eat an Amazon meal kit for dinner last night, when I saw the company offered same day delivery on their meal kits, my dinner plans suddenly changed.

A few observations about the order experience. First, I counted a total of sixteen available meal kits. I liked having the choice of that many meals, something I didn’t get with Blue Apron in a specific week, which gave me the choice of four meals to choose from every week, two of which they would ship to my house.

Second, same day delivery is a big deal. With Blue Apron, I needed to pick my meals roughly a week in advance to give the company enough time buy, prepare and ship the meal to me by early the next week. With Amazon’s meal kits, I ordered that morning before 10 AM, and it was on my porch before 5 PM.

For those of us who often don’t plan that far in advance, this is a nice feature. It also gives me more flexibility since I can order one meal or five meals in a given week. Blue Apron subscriptions offered only two options: a two-person meal plan with three meals per week and the family plan, which is two meals a week.

One advantage of Blue Apron is they offer family meal kits (a serving of four). All of Amazon’s meal kits, at least currently, are portioned to serve two people. While this could be a problem if I want to cook for my family of four, I figure it’d also be easy enough to order two Amazon meal kits for one meal. But more packaging means more mess, so I suspect Amazon will offer more portion options in the future.

Pricing is similar to Blue Apron on a per-meal basis. Blue Apron advertises meals priced at less than ten bucks per person, and that in line with all of the Amazon meal kits, which came in at $8-9 per person.

The Unboxing

This is where things got exciting.

The meal kit arrived at my home in an Amazon Fresh bag, inside of which there was a package wrapped in an insulated bag.

The Amazon Fresh bag with insulated meal kit inside

When I opened the insulated bag, I saw a single box with multiple ice packs.

Inside the Amazon Meal Kit delivery bag

When I pulled the box out of the insulation bag, I was surprised at how small the package was. Granted, it was a serving for two, rather than the family meal four-person servings I would get from Blue Apron, but I was surprised nonetheless at the small size of food box.

Below is a video of my “unboxing” of the meal kit.

Let me emphasize that the packaging and presentation of the Amazon meal kit was probably the most impressive part of the whole experience. I liked that all the food was packed tightly in a well-designed box. Contrast this with Blue Apron, where ingredients are, for the most part, packed loose in the big insulation bags.

Another small observation, but possibly an important one. The chill packs in the insulated bag were fully recyclable. The plastic exterior of the chill packs had a giant recycle symbol. Verbiage below that said the contents inside is plain old water and that I could empty and recycle the bags. I like that idea because other meal kit services (not just Blue Apron) often have some chemical concoction inside that is not recyclable.

Amazon meal kit chill packs are filled with water and are recyclable

The Ingredients

Next, I assessed the ingredients. Much like Blue Apron, the number of ingredients I had to work with always surprises me. I guess this is in part because if left to my own devices, I often cook simple meals and when I do cook with recipes and a bigger meal plan, I find it it’s a lot of work to assemble everything I need. With a meal kit – whether it’s Amazon or Blue Apron – the hard work of shopping and assembling ingredients in the right portions is already done.

You can see below what my unpacked box looked like:

My meal kit ingredients

The main difference I noticed with my Amazon meal kit and a Blue Apron meal kit is Amazon has done more of the work by chopping the vegetables. Blue Apron kits come with whole vegetables, and you chop them according to the recipe instructions. Some meals had me chopping five or six vegetables to prepare a meal. For this meal, which included sweet potato fries, a bacon jam with onions and a cole slaw, all the vegetables with the exception of the pickle were already chopped.

Whether this is good or bad comes down to personal preference. If you prefer whole, fresh food or like doing more of the prep work for your meal, Blue Apron makes sense. If you want to save a little time or find chopping veggies tedious, then I would suggest Amazon’s meal kit service is better in this regard.

Time To Cook

With my ingredients ready to go, it was time to cook.

Much like Blue Apron, Amazon includes a good looking instructions and ingredient card with their kit. The card, with ingredients on one side and cooking instructions on the other, was smaller than the Blue Apron cards.

Here’s the Amazon instruction card for my Wagyu beef burger meal:

The Amazon meal kit recipe card

At first blush, the meal I chose looked really simple. After all, how hard can making a burger be?

And while it was straightforward, I found the extra flourishes Amazon put into the recipe to make this, as they put it, a “burger for a true gourmand,” enjoyable. They had me make a bacon jam with onions and maple balsamic, finish the burger in the oven, and toss the sweet potato fries in a delicious seasoning blend. In general, it wasn’t too much work, but enough to make me feel like I could say I cooked something.

Making bacon jam

And just like Blue Apron, I found the 30 minutes of promised cook time was action packed. Once I finished one thing, I was onto the next and, all along the way, I was using timers (Alexa, naturally) as I orchestrated the cook.

In 30 minutes or so, I had the meal ready to plate.

The Meal

Here’s the plated meal:

The finished meal

I was feeding my son, who isn’t a fan of onions or cole slaw, so his was more basic. Mine was, more or less, as pictured on the instruction card.

It was good. Wagyu is high-quality beef and, add in the artisanal bun, the bacon jam, and the premixed burger sauce, and it was one tasty burger.

It was also a very big burger. The meal kit included a full pound of ground beef for a two person meal. I normally don’t make half-pound burger patties, but I decided to go for it, and it resulted in a very fat burger that was hard to get my mouth around (that’s a good thing).

While I think one meal is too small a sample size to generalize about Amazon’s meal kit portion sizes, if my meal is any indication, Amazon is not scrimping. Blue Apron four-person portions sometimes felt a bit light when it came to the main course, but satisfying.  One thing I will be watching for as I sample other meal kits is if generous portions as part of Amazon’s overall strategy.

Despite the size of the meal, I will say it was good enough to finish the plate in its entirety.

Summary

Bottom line, I was happy with my Amazon meal kit and will be trying other meal combinations and recipes.

Last night’s experience tells me Amazon has put in a lot of time to fine-tune this product. The purchase experience, delivery time, packaging and presentation, cooking experience and quality of meal were all high-caliber.

Combine that with company’s strength in online commerce, customer loyalty, delivery infrastructure and – as of last month- their move into brick and mortar grocery delivery, and Amazon’s move into meal kits should be worrisome for Blue Apron and any other company in the meal kit space.

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