At the end of August I was approached to review and I was very happy for the chance as it’s been a service I’ve been wanting to try for a while but due to my location I haven’t been able to order. I was able to go a bit out of for this review as the kits were gifted so I could get a third party overnight courier to bring me my order.
Who is UCOOK?
If you aren’t familiar with UCOOK here is what and who they are. Launched in 2014 by David Torr and Chris Verster-Cohen, they wanted to find a more convenient way to help people make dinner. Now, UCOOK is all about bringing even more convenient solutions straight to your door, with new offerings like ready-made, flash-frozen Craft Meals, Baby Food and Wine being just one click away. They’re also revolutionising the way South Africans eat. How? By teaching you where your food comes from, showing you how you can support small businesses and farmers with every order, and making every meal as convenient – and wholesome – as they possibly can.
My Experience with UCOOK
Ordering from UCOOK is extremely easy, you create an account, verify it with your phone number and a bank card (they will take R1 but give it right back) and voila, you’re ready to order. They have a large variety of Meal Kits available that changes each week. To make it even easier to order they break them down into categories, aka Plans. Premium, Saver, Health Hut, Easy Peasy, Vegetarian, Global Eats, Gluten Conscious, Dairy Free and Pork Free. I do however miss a little “warning” on those meals that add flame – recipes that might burn.
I opted for the Saver Plan and added one meal from the Premium Plan, it came to just over R1000. For each plan you can choose between two to four recipes and how many people you will be cooking for. We found the portions a little small for 3 so if you are feeding a hungry man you might want to order for 4 when you’re 3 peeps. I also ordered some baby food for a friend and a lasagna from their new Frozen Craft Meals collection.
Menu selection and ordering needs to be done latest Wednesday morning before 9am for delivery the following Sunday or Monday, orders processed thereafter will only be delivered the following week.
Because I was using a third party shipper I had to have my order delivered to a friend who then packed it for me into a styrofoam box filled with ice. Here I ran into a little glitch. Due to some unforeseen circumstances I had to ask another friend to receive my order so I had to request an address change via email. UCOOK however only changed the address for the Meal Kits and not the rest of my order so unfortunately what I ordered over and above what I was gifted got left behind in Cape Town at the original address. So just take note that if you do change your address after payment to make sure it’s for the entire order and not only a portion of it.
UCOOK Recipes & Ingredients
All of the Meal Kit dishes arrived intact and super fresh (most of the ice wasn’t even melted!) and I was ready to get cooking. These are the dishes I tried: Chicken Dan Dan Noodles, Bourbon BBQ Chicken Tortillas, Chef Sipho’s Speedy Mac n’ Cheese and Fabulous Beef Fillet. The Bourbon BBQ Chicken Tortillas were my absolute favourite out of the four, followed by the Fabulous Beef Fillet. These Meal Kits definitely took me out of my cooking comfort zone and I tried flavour combinations and methods I wouldn’t normally have tried. The salads that came with the Mac &
Cheese and Beef Fillet were so delicious I will be making them again, which UCOOK makes easy by including easy-to-follow recipe cards with each of your chosen dishes.
Future Orders from UCOOK
I would definitely order from UCOOK again but I would order around visiting the area so I can bring my meal kits home myself, here is to holding thumbs that they will be serving the George area very soon because then I will be a regular If you’d like to check them out you can do so by following .
Special UCOOK Discount for my Readers
UCOOK kindly offered all of my readers a 20% discount code to use on your first UCOOK cart! Simply add “#ABSOLUTELIFE20” to the discount code box at checkout.
If you do order from them please don’t forget to share what you got with me on social media by tagging me – @bylizna on instagram.
