A Debt To Pleasure: Home Delivery from Casual Kitchen

CASUAL KITCHEN

Cuisine: A variety of frozen meals

Address: Matua, Tauranga

Phone: 021 299 0665

Drinks: Not currently

Reservations: Orders by Tues or Thurs - delivery Weds or Fri

Grant and Jo Mclellan are a husband and wife business team based in Matua. Their website says they have "a vision to revolutionise the frozen food market." I came across their new venture Casual Kitchen a week or so back and being the lazy bastard that I am, always on hunt of a new pre-prepared treat, I ordered three of the main meal options.

It's a simple and efficient idea - order by Tuesday 7pm for Wednesday afternoon delivery (Papamoa, Te Puke, Paengaroa, Pukehina etc), or Thursday 7pm for Friday afternoon delivery (Tauranga, Mt Maunganui, Te Puna, Katikati, Waihi etc). There are eleven main meals, some available in two sizes, one vegetarian, three more pescatarian. Here they are with pictures... They are in the process of adding desserts and sides and more.

Each of the meals I ordered were the larger portions, described as "2-4 people". Here we go...

Punch Me Kung Pao Chicken Marinated free range chicken thigh in a spicy Kung Pao sauce with roasted sesame kumara and ginger steamed Jasmine rice $19.50
Sticky Japanese Chicken with Egg Fried Rice Who doesn't like an Asian inspired sticky chicken dish? This one is perfect for the whole whanau.With just the right amount of sauce to soak in to the fried rice, you may need to order more!! $19.50
My Secret Saffron, Braised Chicken and Vege Pie with Truffle Oil Green Peas Cooked in its own juices with a secret saffron veloute and a flaky pastry top $22.50

Right up front I want to say they were all delicious. I want to stress this because there were lots of things not quite right and I'm going to point them all out. And I know it's a new business and I don't want to be too critical and just in case this comes across that way I wanted to stress right up front - these were all delicious!

OK. First thing, ordering and delivery were excellent and easy. The meals actually got delivered to a neighbour by mistake but there was an immediate phone call and follow up. Great service! And the heating/defrosting instructions were good. I did one of the two rice options in the microwave and one in the oven to be fair. Both cooked fine. I'm particularly impressed by the microwave-safe foil containers, a new one for me.

OK. Let's look at the food...

Sticky Japanese Chicken with Egg Fried Rice

First up was the Japanese Chicken. The chicken was good. The issue here was the rice. It didn't really work. Some was overcooked and mushy, some was still uncooked and chalky. But because it was so broken up it was still OK to eat. The flavours were rich with umami, the sauce very more-ish, but the veges - mainly red capsicum - had rather disintegrated into the rice, except the edamame beans which were fine. I guess two could share it but we all thought it probably better for one hungry person.

Punch Me Kung Pao Chicken

Next was the Kung Pao Chicken. And the first oddity was the description (which may well have been changed by now). Kumera? In Kung Pao Chicken? No idea how that got in. Thankfully we couldn't find it in the dish, and being a bit strict on Chinese descriptions I would actually question the "Kung Pao" tag. The sauce was lovely but not kung pao; the veges were very soft, often an issue with frozen food. The chicken was good but, again, the rice was more like a rice porridge - just mush unfortunately. And again, we thought it might do two small or one large meal.

My Secret Saffron, Braised Chicken and Vege Pie with Truffle Oil Green Peas

Most successful of them all was the pie. It was chock-full of big bits of chicken and vegetables, which were solid and not soft, and had a lovely sauce. And the pastry was crisp. I could be picky and say we were unable to detect any truffle on the peas but it didn't detract in any way. Again though it would really be pushing it to get four portions. Or three. There were two of us and that was a good size - we weren't exactly stuffed, though we did really enjoy it.

OK. That was our experience. I hate to be critical because I really admire Jo and Grant for creating this business and I'm sure the rough edges will be smoothed over time. I genuinely wish them every success.

Is it worth it? Well, that's really an individual decision. Local delivery was $15.50 (free with orders over $200) so the three meals came to $77. I do actually cook fairly competently and am not stuck in an office 25 hours a day so I don't think it's quite for me. I'm also not a user of any of the food bags or suchlike services so am probably not the target market. But I wouldn't mind another bit of that chicken pie....