I got a Too Good To Go box delivered – and what I received in the ‘Magic Parcel’ really surprised me
Food waste prevention app Too Good To Go has gone mainstream in recent years with its noble cause to stop restaurants, takeaways and supermarkets throwing away unsold meals and snacks at the end of the working day.
Via the app, consumers can scroll local restaurants with surplus dishes still fine to eat and pick them up for a fraction of the price – with everyone from major high street brands such as Starbucks and M&S onboard alongside local restaurants and even university canteens.
Environmental campaign group Friends of the Earth says about a third of all food made for human consumption – around 10 million tonnes of food – isn’t actually eaten despite hours of labour, water and land use going into making it.
Late last year, Too Good to Go launched its latest way of saving food – parcels of ambient goods, such as tins, jars and bottles, delivered directly to your door.
In the past, many keen to use the app have been frustrated by the lack of options outside major towns and cities – the new delivery boxes are more readily available because they’re sent direct to customers in the way any other parcel would be.
What’s in them? Essentially anything and everything – but many of the items carry expired (or nearing expiry) best before dates.
The brand explains that ‘best before’ is a guide to food quality, saying the products included ‘should still be great to consume for at least three months beyond the date’.
Others are within date but have ‘outdated packaging’ so haven’t made it to the stores they were bound for, or there’s been a ‘supply and demand’ issue meaning they can’t be sold in the conventional way.
Food waste prevention app Too Good to Go launched its latest initiative last year – selling ambient goods (such as tins, bottles and jars) from major suppliers that include Heinz, Tony’s Chocolonely and Organix
The boxes are delivered to UK home addresses within three to five working days of ordering and promise big discounts – if you don’t mind an expired best before date
Companies currently selling their products in the boxes are a diverse mix, with products on offer falling under headers such as ‘drinks’, ‘kids’, ‘pantry’ and ‘special offers’.
Packages this week, for example, include products from Tony’s Chocolonely, Heinz, Italian sauce brand Mutti and drinks giant Prime.
An Organix Kids Snacks Parcel that would retail at £36 is up for grabs for £20, and includes 33 products – including 15 Wavy Apple Snackers and 18 Mango and Apple Smash Pouches.
Sophie Trueman, Country Director at Too Good To Go UK and Ireland, said when the boxes launched last year they aimed to make ‘saving food both easy and fun.’
Trueman said: ‘We’re all about finding innovative, exciting ways to help our communities save perfectly good food across the world.
‘Perfectly good food from some of the UK’s favourite brands that would otherwise have gone to waste can now be delivered straight to your doors.’
So, what do you actually get – and can you eat it all? MailOnline took delivery of two boxes and here’s our verdict on each:
THE MAGIC PARCEL – worth £32, bought for £18.99
The enigmatic-sounding Magic Parcel is described on the app as 14 carefully selected products from a wide variety of retailers – including overnights oats from Grain Up and organic biscuits from Plants, a Deliciously Ella brand.
There was a minor blip with the delivery – the first box was ‘damaged beyond repair in transit’ and had to be re-ordered. The new one arrived three days after re-ordering.
All the Too Good to Go delivery boxes arrive with a ‘trust your senses’ note, warning those who buy to check their products appear safe to consume before they begin tucking in.
The unboxing is definitely part of the fun; each item came well wrapped and it was like 14 mini surprises as they were revealed.
Safety first: The box arrived with a ‘trust your senses’ note on the box, warning those who buy to check their products appear safe to consume before they use them
The ‘Magic Parcel’ we received included a diverse range of products that were both in and out of their best before date
Two months after its best before date, how did the LoveCocoa bar taste? In a word, delicious
The best before dates were a mixed affair, with the longest dates expiring in December 2024 – that was the three 65g bags of overnight oats.
Other products won’t expire for months, with a Sichuan style hot and spicy stir fry sauce by Lee Kum Kee good until October.
There were definite oohs at some of the products; the LoveCocoa Billionaire milk chocolate is pricey when shop bought – around £5.95 for a 75g bar – so that felt like a real treat and was the first thing to be consumed.
And there were some less exciting moments: the single can of Candy Can Rocket Ice Lolly drink might float others’ boats, but it wasn’t really a hit with us.
Ditto the Skinny Sauce South West tomato sauce with sweetener, the only product that I suspect won’t actually be consumed – the colour of caramel, it’s a veritable crime against ketchup.
In the spirit of the assignment, I’ll try and find a way to use it…but the zero calorie condiment really doesn’t look like it’ll enhance the humble chip in any way – add in an expired best before date and the appeal is even less.
The rest we were pretty happy with though – the Lee Kum Kee products are good, and all well in date.
The Amoy noodles – expiry date January – helped make an easy week night dinner and the Italian brand Mutti pasta sauce, also best before January – was a hit too.
THE ‘WOULD WE BUY AGAIN’ VERDICT?
Yes, enough crowd-pleasers for everyone, a couple of duff products but generally definitely worth the money.
HEINZ KITCHEN ESSENTIALS, worth £32, bought for £13.97
Heinz has got on board with the delivery boxes and frequently appears in the offerings for Too Good to Go users; this ‘kitchen essentials’ box offered big savings at just under £14 on what the 24 products would retail at if sold in a supermarket
A can of spaghetti bearing a February best before date; each box comes with the warning ‘always remember to look, smell taste!’
A whole lotta salad cream: our box came with sizeable bottles of the retro sandwich sauce
Each of the Heinz sauce bottles included in the selection had a February 1st 2025 best before date on them
Heinz is one of the biggest brands to get on board with the Too Good to Go delivery boxes.
A quick browse this week sees their products featured in a ‘World Kitchen Parcel’ (priced at £20.99, but worth £46) and a ‘Heinz – All you favourites’ box (£14.99, worth £32).
The ‘kitchen essentials’ pack we snapped up for just under £14 contained a whopping 24 products, comprising tins, cup soup packets and sauces galore.
The obvious hit was the ketchup – a firm favourite (no other brand will do, right?) and we loved the pantry staples – vegetable soups, mini spaghetti tins and beans with sausages.
There was a small army of other sauces too, from Classic BBQ to Smokey Baconaise and salad cream – all with best before dates for earlier in the year.
The downside of such products in a box like this is that unless you have sauce with everything, it’s likely weeks, possibly months before such a stash will be gone from the fridge.
If we had a party planned tomorrow though, we’d have a sauce to please everyone, with a vegan salad cream and the brand’s Seriously Good mayo also in the mix.
There was a pasta sauce too, laced with ketchup, which I turned my nose up at…but it felt just like a regular sauce when served up under a decent sprinkling of parmesan.
THE ‘WOULD WE BUY AGAIN’ VERDICT?
Maybe. Way too many sauces that might take a while to consume…but if you’re planning a big summer BBQ, it’d definitely be worth it.
