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Best DIY Recipe Kits

10 months ago

The perfect compromise between cooking from scratch and ordering takeout

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Date to impress? Dinner party host with no time to plan? Or perhaps you want a fakeaway for a Friday night without the fuss of all the choice… DIY recipe kits take the effort away from cooking restaurant quality nosh.

While this isn’t a totally new trend (Mindful Chef, for instance, launched in 2015), there’s now more choice than ever. Fancy fresh pasta? Pad Thai? Buttermilk pancakes? The world is your oyster with our pick of the best make-at-home recipe boxes.

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Best DIY Recipe Kits

PASSO To Go

Pizza has arguably been the most popular takeaway choice for many years, but DIY kits add a new element into the mix. The boxes from Old Street Italian restaurant Passo include freshly prepared pizzas, which can be cooked either in a frying pan or in the oven. Fan of unconventional flavour combinations? Opt for the Build Your Own, where you can select your favourite toppings. If you’d rather leave it to the professionals, give the Nancy Silverton special a whirl: white pizza with fennel sausage, mozzarella and spring onion.

From £15 for two pizzas. passotogo.com

Milly Fletcher

Where the pancakes are At Home

Make your own restaurant-quality brunch with these DIY kits from Southwark pancake mecca Where the pancakes are. The Big Brunch Box includes everything you need to make pancakes for six, including organic buttermilk pancake flour mix (or vegan and gluten-free), Canadian maple syrup, streaky bacon and blueberries. Saturday, sorted.

£60 including p&p. wherethepancakesare.com

Shoryu Ramen

There are few things as comforting as a bowl of ramen, but noodle soup can be a tricky dish to get right. Lucky Japanese restaurant Shoryu Ramen is here to help with its new DIY recipe kits, available for nationwide delivery. Each box contains 12-hour tonkotsu soup, ramen noodles, char sui BBQ pork belly and toppings, alongside a step-by-step guide. If you can handle heat, go for the extra spicy option – or if you want to go meat-free, opt for the tofu alternative.

£23 for two people. japancentre.com

Mindful Chef

Since its launch in 2015, Mindful Chef has become a market leader in healthy meal delivery. Each week there are 16 recipes to choose from, with meat, fish and plant-based options – everything being free from gluten, dairy and refined carbs. All ingredients are delivered to your door, along with an easy to follow recipe: perfect for those who want to make life a bit easier, but still enjoy cooking. You can choose between one, two and four person bundles, and as everything is measured out precisely there’s no waste. Portions are generous too, particularly the meat and fish, which are sourced sustainably.

One person portions from £8 per portion, two people from £5.50 per portion, four people from £5 per portion. mindfulchef.com

Dishoom’s Bacon Naan Roll Kits

Dishoom’s bacon naan roll is legendary – and now you can recreate it in your own kitchen, thanks to their new at-home cookery kits. Available to order nationwide, the kit contains everything you need to make the delicious dish: smoked streaky bacon, naan doughballs, tomato-chilli jam, fresh coriander and cream cheese. Cooking instructions are supplied – along with a handy video for first-timers – alongside loose-leaf Darjeeling tea, chai spices and fresh ginger slices for brewing Chef Naved’s much-loved Masala Chai.

£20 for two. dishoom.com

Nonna Tonda

A fresh pasta dish you can prepare in under five minutes? Yes please. Nonna Tonda’s DIY recipe kits include everything you need to create a sumptuous Italian-inspired dinner: fresh pasta made with St Ewe eggs from Cornwall, sauce, parmesan and garnish. Boxes can be ordered for two, four or six people, with recent dishes including a fusilli with rocket pesto, green beans and Cornish new potatoes, and a beef shin ravioli.

nonnatonda.co.uk

CERU’s Cook at Home

Bring Eastern Mediterranean flavours into your home with Levantine London restaurant CERU, which has just launched a new range of DIY recipe boxes. Options include chicken shish with polenta fries, slow roasted lamb shoulder with zucchini and feta fritters, and a vegan box featuring spiced cauliflower, an apple, mint and pomegranate salad, homemade hummus and freshly made Greek pitta bread. Not only are the meals very tasty, you can cook them in under half an hour and they come in eco-friendly packaging, wrapped in a beautiful cloth which can be reused as a tablecloth.

From £40 for two people. cerurestaurants.com

Occasions by Hakkasan

Create Michelin-starred style food in your kitchen with the DIY kit from famed Cantonese restaurant Hakkasan. The box features some of its most popular dishes, including grilled Chilean sea bass, smoked beef ribs with Jasmine tea and Hakka noodles, plus a delivery exclusive: the Hakkasan Chocolate Soufflé. You’ll also receive your own dim sum basket and Hakkasan chopsticks, plus sticks of the restaurant’s incense and a specially curated playlist so you can really feel like you’re dining out.

£200 for two people. hakkasan.com

OTTO

There’s nothing like getting home from a long day and sitting down to an unctuous plate of perfectly cooked pasta. And now you can make exceptional, next-level pasta in the comfort of your own kitchen thanks to OTTO. It’s the just-launched meal kit service from celebrated chef Phil Howard of Michelin-starred Elystan Street restaurant, offering world-class ingredients and unique recipes to make at home.

Pasta boxes from £8.50pp. ottopasta.com

Dishoom Home Feast

Nothing beats curry night – particularly when it’s from one of London’s top Indian restaurants, Dishoom. Their DIY kits allow fans to recreate some of the eatery’s best-loved dishes including the lamb sheekh kebab, the mattar paneer and the signature house black daal. The kits serve between two and four people (depending on how hungry your group is) with options for both vegetarians and meat-eaters, plus a bespoke tea towel for wrapping roti and plentiful kabab masala for future use. store.dishoom.com

Mooli

New food delivery service Mooli is bringing Indian cuisine to UK households through Thali-style tasting menus, which you can heat up quickly at home. Menus draw on the Indian practice of Ayurveda, combining six tastes on one plate: sweet, sour, salty, bitter, spicy and acidic, creating a balanced meal to aid digestion. Think hearty curries, dahls and zingy spiced slaw, plus Indian bread and fluffy rice – rounded off with a traditional dessert. All boxes and food trays are 100 per cent recyclable, with the Thali plates made from naturally fallen palm leaves. moolifood.com

Haar at Home

Luxury fine dining doesn’t require you to leave your bedroom. Haar At Home was launched by Chef Dean Banks, the Scottish restauranteur who made it to the finals of Masterchef: The Professionals. Each meal kit focuses on seasonable British and Scottish produce and brings easy to put together recipes which will wow guests (or become your Friday night staple). Our favourite? The luxury lobster and crab box, for true indulgent dining – you’ll feel impressive dressing the lobster with the rich mirin butter sauce, but not need to go through the fiddly part of actually preparing the lobster completely from scratch. Plus, you can add drinks pairings to any box order without needing to consult a sommelier. haarathome.co.uk

Mindful Chef x LEON

Don’t have a LEON close to home? Cook it up yourself in your kitchen. The Mindful Chef x LEON collaboration returns with six iconic recipes and new flavours for a limited edition spring menu, available only on Mindful Chef from March 10-23. This partnership focuses on healthy, diverse, and sustainable eating, featuring dishes like Honey Halloumi with Herbed Rice and Gochujang Tiger Prawns with Korean Fried Spicy Rice.

mindfulchef.com

Featured image: Bocca di Lupo BBQ Grill Box