EAST VILLAGE — This subscription will give your mailbox a little more kick.
Spice to Meet You, a recently launched East Village-based subscription service, sends members a different and unusual spice or spice mix each month along with matching recipes and videos on how to cook with it.
"They are unique and funky spices, so it is not something that you can go to Whole Foods and get," said Spice to Meet You's founder, Jason Feirman, 28 an East Village foodie with a background in marketing.
"They are custom-made by spice purveyors around the county."
A month-to-month subscription costs $5.95 and allows members to cancel at any time, while yearly packages go for less than $60. Each postal package contains the spice and recipe cards, as well as a note from Feirman giving subscribers the rundown on where the flavor comes from and why it was chosen by the roundtable of food bloggers involved in the project.
The company began taking subscriptions in April with the first spice shipment — a "Don’t Mess with Texas" barbecue rub loaded with chili peppers, garlic and paprika — heating up mailboxes at the beginning of July.
"Everything we try to do is very seasonal, so in July it made sense to send people a BBQ rub," said Feirman, who is also behind the "I Dream of Pizza" blog and NYC Daily Deals.
Recipes are all created by Feirman's network of food bloggers. For example, McKenzie Mahoney from The MMMGuide created one for the rub from Texas — pork meatballs with pickled jalapeno pesto.
The upcoming August spice — a Californian summer blend with celery flakes, green bell pepper and lemon powder designed to enhance salads — is already en route to subscribers.
A how-to video for each recipe is also uploaded to the Spice to Meet You website.
"I think people are intimidated by spices or don't know where to get them, and if they do they are overwhelmed when they get there," Feirman said.
"We are really trying to enhance people’s at-home cooking experience."
