We Tried Using A "Leftover Food" App And It Was Weird But Also Kind Of Great

    Too Good To Go is an app that's sort of like Seamless but for food that restaurants are going to toss out anyway — and if you can get past the concept, it's kind of wild.

    by
    Ryan Broderick
    by Ryan Broderick

    BuzzFeed News Reporter

    ,
    Kassy Cho
    by Kassy Cho

    BuzzFeed News Reporter

    We tried out a new app that's launched in London recently called Too Good To Go — it's being referred to as the leftover food app. Think of it as Seamless, but instead of getting regular food delivered, you use your phone to reserve leftover food at restaurants.

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    The way it works is you pick a restaurant in your neighborhood — if there are any that are participate with the app — reserve a spot, and then walk in at the time they tell you to, and pick up your food.

    toogoodtogo.co.uk

    Restaurants in our area usually asked people to come in sometime between 3:30 pm. and 5:30 pm.

    BuzzFeed

    The actual process of getting your food is a little awkward. It's a new app, so a lot of the exchange was spent explaining what the app was and then sort of figuring out what we were going to take home.

    BuzzFeed

    When you pick a restaurant it doesn't actually tell you what you've ordered. You sort of just show up, explain you ordered with Too Good To Go, and then the restaurant gives you whatever they have leftover from the lunch rush. They just fill up a to-go box with anything and everything they had.

    Think of it like a buffet of sort of lukewarm food. That is super cheap, obviously.

    BuzzFeed News reporters Ryan and Kassy tried out four restaurants near BuzzFeed's UK office and it was shockingly great.

    BuzzFeed

    Kassy tried out a sandwich place called Bijan's. They basically told her to grab whatever sandwich she wanted. She ended up getting a ham sandwich for £3 that normally would have cost somewhere between £5-£10. Not bad!

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    Ryan tried out a baked potato place called The Potato Project. He ended up with a baked potato full of bacon and cheese for £2.50, which is like £7 less than it normally would have cost. It was also still fairly warm which was a cool surprise.

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    Then Kassy hit up a market in central London and went to a Mediterranean salad bar called Miro. They just filled up a big box with everything they had left after lunch. It was too much food, but all super delicious.

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    And lastly, Ryan swung by Reynold's Cafe. They gave him a salad and the choice of a wrap or a quiche. He went with the quiche and it was all, once again, delicious.

    So, the food's good. But what about the other side of things?

    Like, for instance, one, how is this app making money? Isn't there something else that could be done with all this food? Do the founders of the app really think that this is the type of thing that could catch on?

    We actually had a chance to chat with the app's founders, Chris Wilson and Jamie Crummie. They helped clear up a few of our questions about this whole weird thing.

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    Their focus is on eliminating food waste. Most restaurants don't have the money to integrate a responsible and sustainable food disposal system. So basically, Too Good To Go is like a smartphone-powered garbage collector and it turns you into the landfill...so to speak.

    BuzzFeed

    They stressed to us that they want to eliminate food waste first — the fact that it's a pretty decent way to get cheap food is just an added bonus. We asked them if they cared if the app was successful overall, and they said they don't need to make a profit — just as long as it was helping change people's mentalities about food conservation.

    The company also provides free food for over 50 homeless shelters. And you have the option of using the app to donate food yourself, as well.

    So, final thoughts?

    BuzzFeed

    The app is cool. The concept is weird. The food — at least in our experience — was great. And the goal of the app seems pretty noble.

    One surprise added bonus, weirdly, was that it forces you to basically walk into a restaurant you may have never been to before and just have the person behind the counter give you something. All four restaurants we chose were ones we had never been to before, so that was definitely neat.

    Also, Ryan and Kassy both agreed that if they were back in college, this would probably have totally changed their lives.