This includes Persian yellow chicken and dill-currant rice that fits seamlessly into the Marley Spoon collection, accented with lemon juice instead of wine. The rice was cooked, then it was cooked with currants and spinach. It was simple, elegant, and kind of a treat. Among the pan-Asian dishes, this is the most successful.
Other international diets are less faithful interpretations.
The essence of Moroccan tagine is the hours spent baking and caramelizing in a clay pot. The challenge of the meal kit is to translate this into a 45-minute meal. Marley Spoon’s chefs achieved this by using a beef and avocado tagine largely by wanting the onions and carrots to be cooked quickly rather than slowly, and using minced meat instead of finely chopped meat which would have required a faster cook.
Video: Matthew Korfhage
The taste, a combination of almonds and dried apricots with the spices of north African baharat, was delicious. The chef was simple and intuitive, with minimal preparation. When the recipe called for 30 to 40 minutes of cooking, it was perfect. But the dish lacks the depth or sweetness of long-fried meat and onions. It was the Rachael Ray version of global cooking, where we understand ourselves and admit we don’t want to try too hard.
The Indian-origin keema matar was similarly a tired parent’s version, made with tomato paste and Cento’s tomato sauce: It was more like anything, a sloppy garam masala joe. This said, it promised to be a 20 minute recipe, and it almost achieved this.
A similar effect was achieved with raw rice and oven-braised beef, which involved boiling pre-cooked jasmine rice in an aluminum baking tray. Making my own ssamjang was a fun little exercise, and I’ll always love beef over light, crispy rice. But the meal didn’t replace grilled and fried beef and stone-dried rice.
Moving Forward
Photo: Matthew Korfhage
These curated recipes are not a problem, although the excellent cooking technique of traditional recipes remains the backbone and main strength of Marley Spoon. Most households will enjoy 15-minute meals as a weeknight option. Convenience is what the meal kit is designed to do. A meal kit gives you a road map to flavors you might not otherwise have access to, while optimizing effort. I enjoyed each of Marley’s 15-minute dishes on their own merits, the way you enjoy a leisurely ride on a short track.
Microwaveable meals are the easiest, although I don’t recommend them too much. And a pre-mixed market salad was served, kale and supermarket Ken’s Caesar, whose main flavor was soybean oil.
This new approach to ease of preparation is consistent with resetting the type of meal kit that Marley Spoon truly is. If Marley Spoon was once a meal kit that stood best in the basics, it now competes in what seems like HelloFresh’s field: variety, convenience, globetrotting flavors. What is not clear is whether it will succeed in doing so.
Marley Spoon still travels best when it comes to its best. Cook well. Good recipe development. Chefs making real meals.
