This New Plant-Based Grocery Delivery Service Is a Virtual Playground for Snackers

I’m not a vegetarian, but I have a soft spot for plant-based foods. I’m one of vegetables’ biggest cheerleaders (hooray for broccoli!), and I really love plant-forward snacks and treats. So when I heard about a new grocery service that sells exclusively plant-based products for delivery, my interest was piqued. Would this be an easier way of sourcing all of my favorite pantry staples? Or was it just a novelty? I decided to try it and find out.

PlantBelly, which just launched in November 2021, aims to be a convenient place for entirely plant-based products. The collection, which touts itself as being “highly curated,” features tons of specialty ingredients and products, including eggs made from mung beans and, of course, a bevy of dairy-free milk options. (Or is it mylk? I can never keep up.)

After browsing around, I was impressed by PlantBelly’s site design and company ethics. You can shop by specialty diet (keto, vegan, etc.), category (fresh basics, pantry, snacks), or values (B-Corp, BIPOC-owned companies). How cool! Immediate gold star for a company that understands food choices are about more than calories and sustenance. Food is deeply personal and political, and PlantBelly seems to understand that. 

For my trial run, I gave myself a modest budget and began browsing. There are a lot of creative plant-based products that approximate meat and dairy. We’re talking shredded cheese, breaded nuggets, and vegan mayo. But because I eat the animal-based versions of all these products, I focused on pantry staples and snacks. 

The selection here was also exciting. That said, I was mostly just jazzed about getting my hands on hard-to-find ingredients, including preserved lemons and creamy walnut butter. I realized I was using PlantBelly less as a vegetarian’s paradise and more as a high-end food shop — the product list really is highly curated. 

My delivery arrived within a week, and was packaged beautifully. Perhaps a bit too beautifully, I pondered, after a few days of discovering shredded paper confetti stuck to my socks and in corners of my kitchen. 

I immediately opened about half of the groceries, eager to sample emmer grain crackers and specialty pasta shapes. Everything was delicious, and most of it represented products that are hard to find in my upstate New York town. One bummer: I did notice that every time I visited the site, a rather large amount of products were out of stock. Of course, the site did just launch, which means I should cut them some slack. For now, I’m going to consider PlantBelly a fun place to buy “treat” foods, rather than a place to stock up on staples. 

If you enjoy plant-based meat and dairy substitutes — such as veggie sausage — and you live in an area where they’re hard to find, I think you’ll really like PlantBelly. If you want your dollars to support Fair Trade and non-GMO companies, this is also a good fit. If, like me, you’re really in it for the snacks, you should know PlantBelly sells curated gift boxes. I think *that* is really the way to get the most out of this unique food seller and, in fact, I’ve already got my eye on their Chocolate Fix bundle.

Have you tried any new-to-you grocery delivery services recently? Did you love it or not?