X-MAS gift of meal delivery for new parents?

December 21, 2010 1:28 AM

x-mas gift idea for parents of toddler, who are having twins next month: "relaxing night in". Gift card for meal delivery service (anyone know a yummier version of omaha steaks?), some great new movie on dvd, CDs of soothing sounds for the babies (white noise, womb sounds, ocean sounds, etc). Trying to keep it under $150. I've heard omaha steaks are gross, so I'm looking for an alternative. Unless I should scrap the whole thing and get them...?

they live in a socal suburb, I live too far to babysit. I don't want to get them a gift basket or other food that would be delivered now. I'd rather give them the option of having food delivered once the babies arrive and they're way too exhausted to cook.

posted by wannaknow to shopping (14 answers total)

(oh, and socal= southern california)

Has anyone tried DineWise.com? Wondering how the food tastes...
posted by wannaknow at 1:42 AM on December 21, 2010

I was once a taxi call-taker (cab call-answerer, or however you want to put it) and we had a number of older customers whose family had made a deal with a local restaurant, paid for the meals in advance, and the oldies got a restaurant-quality meal delivered to them by taxi.

Why not ring a restaurant local to the new parents and make an arrangement like that? When I was a new parent, a nice meal delivered once a month for 3 months would have meant a lot more to me than a baby-soothing CD, or a meal voucher (which meant I had to shower, do my hair, get dressed in a civilised fashion, arrange child-minding, etc, which was impossible... and I didn't have twins).

I don't personally know DineWise and never will, but the food on their home page scares me.
posted by malibustacey9999 at 2:08 AM on December 21, 2010 [1 favorite]

When I was working in a big office in LA, we used to get food delivered from local restaurants by LA Bite. The exact pricing is in the FAQ, but the minimum order is $20 and they charge a service fee ($6 + 4%).
posted by ikaruga at 2:47 AM on December 21, 2010

No movies on DVD. Netflix streaming and/or OnDemand on cable are probably fine. That is if they can watch a movie with current toddler around.

No CDs of sounds. The internet has tons of white noise free sites. They probably already have a system from previous baby anyway.

Re: food, they probably have TJs already, so why get food delivery that is meal-based?

What I'd want:
- house cleaning

and distant seconds:

- a night paid with regular sitter (she might be feeling too big to go out)
posted by k8t at 3:24 AM on December 21, 2010 [1 favorite]

"relaxing night in"

This just doesn't sound realistic under the circumstances. 2nd k8t's notes...

Does Pink Dot (which I liked 10 years ago, can't comment on current quality) serve their suburb?

My other idea would be a pair of nice bathrobes.
posted by kmennie at 4:20 AM on December 21, 2010

I won a box of steaks from grandwesternsteaks.com a few weeks ago.

Though I've never had anything from omahasteaks, the ones from grand western were the most delicious flat irons I've ever had. There are two more in the freezer and I'm seriously considering having a box sent to our Christmas hosts.
posted by bilabial at 5:14 AM on December 21, 2010

What a nice idea! A gift card to a service like foodler.com (or local equivalent) would be great because then they can order whatever take-out they want, whenever they happen to feel like it. It might seem less classy than the Omaha steaks, but honestly, I would consider it a dream gift!

Also, if they don't have it, an annual Netflix subscription is pretty cheap, and that's another way to give them more flexibility but still stay true to the spirit of your idea.

Finally, instead of the white noise CDs, and actual white noise machine would probably be better. This one is fugly but is supposed to be the best.
posted by tetralix at 5:48 AM on December 21, 2010

k8t is right: Help your friends clean all the things. Give a cleaning service gift certificate as a "redeem it when you want" so that they can use it, say, before they host a big family event.

I have many movies I simply can't watch because the content is too advanced/mature for two little ones who only see "Mama and Daddy cuddled up in bed? What an awesome time to get in with them! I'm old enough for movies, I can watch this..." and so on. By the time your friends get to that recent movie, the sequel(s) will already be out.

Don't give any gift that creates logisitical pressures (space in 'fridge, time devoted to prep and cooking, spoilage, etc.). However, coffee and chocolate and Nutella (or guilty indulgence of their choice) or anything else that's no/low-prep, easy to store and keep, and which can be consumed at any time, would be fine.

What a thoughtful friend you are!
posted by MonkeyToes at 6:03 AM on December 21, 2010

logistical, argh
posted by MonkeyToes at 6:04 AM on December 21, 2010

Nthing cleaning+babysitting, but food is still a good idea. I'm biased by local pride, but you can't beat Zingermans for silly expensive edible treats. They have gift cards and a huge mail order business.

$125 will cover Reubens for five that are at least as good as anything in NYC, but everything is good. I like the chocolate cherry bread toasted with some good butter, and their stollen probably adds a couple pounds to my frame every year.
posted by pjaust at 6:21 AM on December 21, 2010

we've been really happy with what we've ordered from Hearst Ranch. But I think I would love even more to receive an entire dinner from a restaurant, so I didn't have to think about what I wanted to eat with the steak.
posted by snowymorninblues at 8:59 AM on December 21, 2010

My mom sent me a giant box of meals from Home Bistro a few years ago when I was a poor graduate student. They were utterly amazing, and really easy to prep, because all you had to do was boil some water and drop the meals (sealed in a bag) in to heat up. Apparently, since then they've been taken over by another company, but if the food is the same, it's really excellent--definitely higher-end restaurant quality. You can get them a gift certificate and they can choose what they'd like and keep the meals in the freezer until their romantic night in.
posted by Fuego at 10:21 AM on December 21, 2010

Frozen meals. I don't know from where, but when we had our triplets, it was all the only way we ate anything.

Honestly, everything else paled in comparison.

The only movie I watched when they were tiny was The Happiest Baby on the Block, but that's depressing.
posted by pyjammy at 11:13 AM on December 21, 2010

Schwans.

The food is good, the ice cream is amazing, everything comes frozen, and there are lots of options for things that can just be popped in the microwave.
posted by TooFewShoes at 12:22 PM on December 21, 2010