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I tried MealPal, the monthly lunch subscription service — here’s what it was like

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Leanna Garfield/Tech Insider

One of my MealPal lunches.

MealPass, a monthly lunch subscription service, launched in New York City in March 2016, but rebranded as MealPal this week.

The service was founded by the team behind ClassPass, a startup that gives customers access to a variety of fitness classes in a particular city for a flat fee. The model is similar to Netflix, where a monthly rate lets you pick from a selection of movies.

With MealPal, you get an all-you-can-eat subscription  — you can pick up a daily (albeit not unlimited) lunch from participating restaurants. For the monthly price of $119 (without tax), MealPal gives subscribers lunch Monday through Friday — which means each meal costs less than $6. 

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Over 600 New York City restaurants have signed up to participate in the MealPal program. It’s also available in Boston, San Francisco, Miami, Chicago, and Washington DC. Now that the service has added so many restaurants for users to choose from, the options can get overwhelming. So on September 19, the program launched what they’re calling a “Tinder for food” function. Users can swipe right or left on up to 100 ingredients they like or dislike. Then the app’s bot will recommend meals based on those preferences.

I tried the service for a week when it launched. Here’s what happened.

I was instructed to log on between 7 pm and 9:30 am before each lunchtime to reserve my food and select a pick-up time.

The Sunday night before the first day, I filtered by location, which narrowed my options down to 10 restaurants within a three-block radius of the Business Insider office. I chose pulled pork sliders from The Hog Pit.

On Monday, I ventured outside to pick up my food, which felt strange since I usually bring my lunch.

I soon arrived at The Hog Pit, a dimly lit BBQ bar on 26th Street. Except for a few men at the bar, it was completely empty. Partnering with MealPal, which is guaranteed to bring lunch customers, probably sounds ideal to restaurants that don’t usually get big daytime crowds.

The three sliders came with a side of cole slaw and extra BBQ sauce. The bread was a tad soggy from sitting before I arrived, but otherwise, thumbs up.

On my second day, I decided to go with a healthier option: an Asian sesame grain salad from Just Salad. The best thing (besides the food) about MealPal is that I could skip the lines. All I had to do was tell the cashier my name.

My salad came with a chunk of bread and a tub of Asian sesame dressing.

On the third day, I chose pork shoulder tacos from Tres Carnes. Again, when I picked them up, I skipped the long line, grabbed my bag, and was out the door in under a minute. Unfortunately, the portions looked pretty wimpy.

But on the fourth day, my margherita pizza from Waldy’s Woodfire was huge. The delicious 10-inch pie was giant compared to my previous meals. I was stuffed.

Two evenings during the week, I forgot to reserve my lunches and scrambled at the last minute to choose a meal. (The most popular ones sell out if you wait too long to reserve). It sometimes felt weird to be constantly planning the next day’s lunch. On my last day, I reserved a chicken and roots bowl from Inday.

But the next day around 10 am, MealPal notified me that Inday was ‘unable to serve lunch.’ No reason was given.

I decided to go with Stinky Bklyn, an artisan cheese shop, instead. I bought a turkey and dry jack cheese sandwich on focaccia and a bag of BBQ chips. This was my favorite lunch of the week.

Overall, my food was great and the service was convenient. MealPal is a sweet deal if you already pay upwards of $10 for lunch in cities like New York. If you usually go out for lunch, want to explore new restaurants, and enjoy avoiding lines, it’s perfect. But there is a limited menu, and if you’re on a food budget like me, the price still doesn’t beat grocery shopping and bringing your own lunch.

The post I tried MealPal, the monthly lunch subscription service — here’s what it was like appeared first on Business Insider.