Bye Fresh, story of a subscriptionship

Now that I live in the heart of the city I feel like I can identify as a city-girl for real. As opposed to identifying as a city-girl like I did before, never having lived in a city, but safely excluding all other geographical options.

As a city-girl, I can finally do all those things that hip YouTubers from California are doing! Like ordering food delivered to my doorstep through contactless services, or better yet, ordering ingredients that I have to put together myself in a cooking scenario and make my own food.

Like IKEA, but for nourishment.

Yes, I am talking about a very well-known delivery service I won't name because I am not getting paid to sponsor their service.

And that's the issue I am having.

Let's take a step back. Up until a couple of weeks ago, I have been in full honeymoon phase with this food subscription service as it was cheap, handy, and timely. Granted, I have supermarkets three minutes away and a plethora of recipes at my fingertips, but why should I put together recipes and pick my own ingredients, when I can pay someone to do that for me and live the lifestyle of YouTubers?

So I ordered my first boxes, 40% off and free shipping for a grand total of $6 per portion.

What a steal!

Although the very thing they don't tell you is that each meal has two portions, that's already $12. And each box comes for three meals. That's $36 total.

Still, a pretty good deal, considering buying ingredients to cook in bulk costs us double that amount plus the effort. And I don't need to rush out during peak hour carrying heavy grocery bags, or to meal plan for the whole week.

By the way, expressing my dominance over commuters by carrying toilet paper around the city centre is priceless. Nobody goes grocery shopping in the city after work, they have supermarkets in the suburbs easily accessible by car, only city-people buy everyday essentials and carry them on foot from the supermarket to their homes a block away.

Back to my box. One week, rather unexpectedly, the price rose to $50. Another thing they don't tell you is that at some point you gotta pay for shipping. But I had some freebies and discount codes to hand out to curious friends, who can now join me in the Californian dream!

It's OK, I can handle this, for now. After all, this is pretty much the same price I would pay to cook in bulk and I still don't have to scout the interwebs for recipes. I am invested in the relationship but I am seeing some red flags. Let's see what the future brings before calling it quits so soon.

I truly like the concept of these boxes, learning a few easy cooking tricks without the hassle of planning anything is time-saving and much healthier than ordering takeaway several days a week. Not to mention the sense of fulfilment of producing a decent meal. Not that I can't put together some meat and veggies on my own without any help, but let's say my healthy meal game has reached a whole new level in the past weeks that doesn't involve the adjectives 'plain' and 'sad'.

But then, the future came, mild and slightly underwhelming like all futures are. The honeymoon is officially over and this service is treating me like I am just a regular person.

And we know I don't identify as a regular person.

I spied into my subscription's upcoming deliveries and found out my next box would cost a grand total of $70. I don't think any hip Californian YouTuber pays that much to cook their own food and have no leftover whatsoever. Mind you, I am using the term 'leftover' to indicate any sort of item remaining in the fridge or pantry after the meal, be it a fully cooked extra portion or a jar of capers.

You know the one. That half-empty jar with a hyperbolic expiration date that sits on the door shelf towards the side.

But I am a city-girl now, I may not have a jar of capers in my fridge but I have a plan!

My plan is to select my next box' recipes according to the similarity of ingredients and put my subscription on hold to make sure all the freebies are still available to give to my friends, because those initial butterflies felt real and they deserve to feel cared for, too.

Next, I will print out the recipe cards just like those that come in the box and put all the ingredients in a list. Many will be repeating ingredients or things I can buy in bulk and may even have leftovers to build a pantry.

I will make some time to go to the supermarket, pick the ingredients from my list plus toilet paper for my ego, separate them into portions as required, and chuck them into bags according to each recipe.

Thankfully I saved the useful paper bags containing the ingredients from my last box. Just to make it look and feel just like it was at the beginning of our relationship. I mean, subscriptionship.

Welcome to Bye Fresh, or Hello Barbs, and my motto is: 'We have food at home'.



Image: via