The short answerFor one person, one dinner: a home-cooked meal from a permitted local maker runs about $16–$22 all-in for pickup (no service, delivery, or small-order fees); a meal kit like HelloFresh or Blue Apron is $10–$13 per serving plus shipping and 30–45 minutes of your cooking; a delivery app order of a comparable restaurant plate is $28–$36 once service fees, delivery fee, markup, and tip are added; and takeout you pick up yourself is $18–$26. Home cooks win on food quality and price for a finished meal; meal kits win if you want to cook; delivery apps win only on convenience, and you pay 50–80% for it.
The same dinner, four ways
Take a chicken curry with rice for one person on a Tuesday. Bay Area prices, 2026, typical rather than cheapest:
Illustrative cost of one dinner for one person | Home cook (pickup) | Meal kit | Delivery app | Takeout (pickup) |
|---|
| Menu price | $18.00 | $11.50/serving | $19.00 (often marked up 10–20% vs. in-store) | $17.00 |
| Service fee | $0 | — | $3.00–$4.50 (15%, capped) | $0 |
| Delivery fee | $0 (pickup) or maker's own rate | $10.99 shipping per box (spread over ~6 servings: $1.85) | $1.99–$5.99 | $0 |
| Small-order fee | $0 | — | $2.00–$3.00 if under minimum | $0 |
| Tip | Optional | — | $3.00–$4.00 | Optional |
| Your time | 5 min pickup | 35–45 min cooking + cleanup | 0 min | 15 min round trip |
| Total | ≈ $18 | ≈ $13.35 + your labor | ≈ $29–$36 | ≈ $17–$19 |
What you're actually getting
Home cook
A person cooked this today, in a kitchen inspected by the county, from a recipe they've made a hundred times. Portions are generous because home cooks aren't optimizing food cost to the gram. You'll usually know the maker by name after a couple of orders. The trade-off: you pick up (or the maker delivers on their own terms), menus rotate, and popular makers sell out. On Makinson Street, every maker's permit is verified and posted, and every dish carries FDA top-9 allergen labels.
Meal kit
Pre-portioned ingredients and a recipe card. Cheapest per serving — but you're the cook, and the "$9.99/serving" headline usually requires the largest plan; smaller plans and premium recipes land at $12–$14. Boxes generate a lot of packaging, and the subscription model is designed to make skipping weeks a chore. Best for people who genuinely want to cook and want the planning done for them.
Delivery app
Restaurant food at a markup, delivered by a gig driver. The convenience is real. The cost is too: service fee, delivery fee, small-order fee, in-app menu markups (restaurants raise prices to cover the 15–30% commission), and a tip for the driver — all on a plate that's been in a bag for 25 minutes. Independent analyses regularly find delivery-app orders cost 50–90% more than the same order picked up.
Takeout
The honest benchmark. Restaurant quality, restaurant portion, restaurant price, no fees — if you drive. Home cooks compete with this on price and usually beat it on portion and freshness; they can't beat it on choice at 9 p.m.
When each one is the right call
- Order from a home cook when you want dinner handled, you want it to be good, and you can plan a day ahead or pick up on the way home. Also: family portions — a $48 tray that feeds four is the best value in this entire comparison.
- Use a meal kit when you like cooking on weeknights and the bottleneck is deciding what to make and shopping for it.
- Use a delivery app when you can't leave the house and the premium is worth it — and go in knowing the premium is about $12–$15 on a single plate.
- Get takeout when you're already out and know what you want.
the fee nobody talks about —Delivery-app fees don't just cost you; they cost the restaurant 15–30% of every order, which is why in-app prices are higher than the menu on the wall. Home cooks on Makinson Street pay 3% on card orders — so the price you see is the price they set, and almost all of it reaches the person who cooked.
hungry?See what's cooking near you this week.
Every maker on Makinson Street is registered the way their state requires. Browse by neighborhood, dish, or dietary need.