Amazon is already shipping its newly discovered home-delivery kits to a few lucky AmazonFresh customers.
Amazon Meal Kit first came to light Monday when a trademark application was discovered that describes a Blue Apron knock-off, “prepared food kits ready for cooking and assembly as a meal.” The company claims its service will offer “easy-to-follow, chef designed recipes” that “includes perfectly portioned fresh ingredients.” The “frozen, prepared, and packaged meals and food kits” will primarily consist of grains, rice, noodles, pasta, or bakery products. Reports of the mysterious service caused the stock price of newly IPO’d Blue Apron to plummet by about 11 percent.
We now know Amazon’s plans to ship food kits to homes across the U.S. are much more likely than its patented drone blimp. In fact, it’s already testing them out in its hometown of Seattle. Seattle resident Josh Chadd told GeekWire that the meal kits started appearing on Amazon about a week or two ago. Reviews indicate the service has been around since late June, but a few folks on Twitter posted about it in February—one person even found the kit at an Amazon Go store.
https://twitter.com/jsmnchn/status/828851051994320896
https://twitter.com/Poll_Fab/status/831705169083539457
Chadd described whipping up some Steak Au Poivre, a more appetizing French term for peppered steak.
“The steak was an 8-oz. serving packaged by Corfini and was at least of USDA choice quality,” Chadd told GeekWire. “It was not an odd or awkward cut which is often the case with other services. The peas were very fresh with no blotches and tasted very sweet. The onion came pre-diced. It also came with fresh green peppercorns which I’ve never seen in another service even with a similarly named recipe. Overall the finished meal was a 9 out of 10 for any meal I’ve made at home even with my own ingredients.”
The fancy meal is Amazon’s most expensive offering, costing Chadd $19 for two servings. Other meals start as low as $15. That may seem like a lot, but it’s right in line with what Blue Apron charges: $10 per serving for a 2-person plan or $9 per serving for a family plan. It is just one of 17 different dishes on the menu including “Tacos al Pastor with Pork” and “Roasted Cod with Cannellini Bean Ragout and Pesto.” It appears you’ll have to be an AmazonFresh ($15/month) customer to use the service, but you’ll first need to subscribe to Amazon Prime ($11/month) to become an AmazonFresh customer.
Amazon did not immediately respond to a request for comment.
H/T Business Insider