We are living in an era where cooking or getting homemade food has become a daunting task. You cannot rely on restaurants for getting food which is equivalent to homemade food. But even if you want to go for daily tiffin services, the number of options is overwhelming.
There are several messes, cloud kitchens, eateries, home kitchens, etc. around you that offer tiffin services. But selecting the best tiffin service which caters to your need, such as good taste, healthy, cost, etc., is not easy. To start with, you may have to rule out places which are commercialized setups such as restaurants, cloud kitchens, messes, etc. There are other criteria as well.
Let’s delve further into this article as we will enable you to take an informed decision and choose the best tiffin service where you stay.
Choosing between healthy & unhealthy
When you are going ahead with daily meal service, such as tiffin service, you cannot compromise on the quality of food. People often get carried away with cheap meal options and offers. Messes, restaurants or any other commercialized kitchens can never serve you quality food which is healthy for your stomach.
You may get the taste but in the longer run, the food will affect your stomach big time. Commercialized kitchens hardly care for hygiene, quality of raw materials, etc. Usually, to meet the cost of food (after deducting offers), they cut down on –
Food preparation time
When you talk about commercial kitchens, everything is money in the chain of food preparation. Sometimes, they may even skip raw material washing or may prepare different curries and refrigerate them for days.
They use high flame cooking to prepare food fast for a larger customer base. High flame cooking takes away all kinds of nutrients from the prepared food.
Raw material quality
Restaurants and messes merely take care of food raw material quality. Everything is purchased in bulk and sometimes they even use cold storage to keep perishable items fresh for months. You cannot expect healthiness in tiffin or meals if they are made up of such kind of raw materials.
Another important factor in food preparation is the use of cooking oil. Small restaurants and messes use 10-20 times fried cooking oil which comes at a price point of Rs. 20-30/- per litre. Food prepared in such oil would be unhealthy.
Packaging quality
Sometimes you may end up getting tiffin in plastic bags, silver foil bags, thermocol containers, etc. Are they good when it comes to food containers? Absolutely NOT! Non-recyclable plastic containers, bags, etc. react with hot and cold food they alter the chemical composition of food. Even healthy food contained in plastic bags turns into unhealthy food for consumption.
On the other side, if you choose and order homemade tiffin from any home kitchen, then you can rest assured that you will get authentic homemade food. These home kitchens are nothing but families like yours and mine. There are several home kitchens around you in every city.
All these home kitchens mostly consume what they serve to people. They are not a typical commercial setup where they can compromise on quality. However, they might charge you Rs. 10/- to Rs. 20/- more than what messes or any restaurant or Dhaba may charge. But at the end of the day, you will get authentic, tasty, and healthy homemade food.
Regional taste and menu
There is no point in ordering tiffin from a Gujarati home kitchen if you belong to Maharashtra. Eating once from a cross-cultural region is fine, but eating daily such food would bore you.
Check home kitchen’s regional roots and style of cooking. If possible, you can also ask for a variety of menus that you would get on a day-to-day basis. Most of the good home kitchens can also provide you with all kinds of menu items that you will get in tiffin on a weekly basis.
You can go for a tiffin subscription once you are convinced with the style and region of cooking of that particular home kitchen.
Tiffin cost
In today’s world, everything boils down to money. But you have to remember that quality and tasty food won’t come at a cheap price. After all, it is about health! I do recommend you to spend a few rupees more on health.
Also, there are a variety of tiffin options available with home kitchens. If you are light on a budget then I would recommend you to stick to budget tiffins such as Roti/Chapati and Sabzi. It is wise to consume healthy combo as Roti and Sabzi (Vegetable) or Dal, Chawal, and Sabzi.
People get carried away with a variety of items offered in tiffins such as Roti, Dal, Chawal, Sabzi, Salad, and Sweet. This option is good but it will come at an additional cost. The typical price of tiffin would look as follow –
- Budget Veg Tiffin (3 Roti, Sabzi, Salad) – Rs. 70/- to Rs. 80/-
- Budget Non-Veg Tiffin (3 Roti, Non-Veg Curry, Salad) – Rs. 90/- to Rs. 110/-
- Deluxe Veg Tiffin (2 Roti, Rice, Dal, Sabzi, Salad) – Rs. 90/- to Rs. 120/-
- Deluxe Non-Veg Tiffin (2 Roti, Rice, Dal, Non-Veg Curry, Salad) – Rs. 120/- to Rs. 140/-
The above price point may again vary based on the type and quantity of food items. Please make a note that this is not a benchmark.
Delivery service
Gone are the days when you have to physically go to restaurants for takeaway orders. Once or twice is fine but when it comes to daily tiffin service, you have to look for options where home delivery of tiffin is possible.
Mealawe is a homemade food delivery service where you get a dedicated rider for delivering every tiffin to your doorstep. Again, delivery comes at a price, so do not negotiate with the home kitchen for adjusting delivery cost in tiffin cost.
Remember, they will compromise on food quality to serve you a cheap meal.
Number of tiffins in subscription
Once you narrow down to your favourite home kitchen, it is vital to try their meal or tiffin. The kitchen shall provide you with an option to order one tiffin for tasting purposes. Mealawe is a platform where there are a number of home kitchens that serve homemade tiffin subscriptions.
Once you like any home kitchen, you shall have an option to select a certain number of tiffins. It is not always for users to go for 30 tiffins on a monthly basis. Mealawe offers you options to go for 10, 20, and 30 meal subscriptions. We also have a provision to reschedule any day to some other day if you miss a tiffin in between.
Final words
It is not so difficult to choose the best tiffin service anywhere in the city. But it is important to keep restaurants, messes, restaurant delivery apps, cloud kitchens, etc. at bay as they cannot serve you healthy food in tiffin or meal subscription.
Go for home kitchens as they are family and mostly they serve what they eat. You cannot get more quality assurance other than this. Mealawe has a beautiful tagline which says “isme hai, maa kaa pyar”. Also, be ready to spend a few more bucks; after all it is your health. People eat outside unhealthy food for days and become ill in the longer run. So, be wise and choose home kitchens.
