With global travel being heavily decreased due to the COVID-19 pandemic you can still get a taste of other countries’ cuisine from your own house. Companies such as Universal Yums make this possible.
Universal Yums is a subscription-based service that sends you a box filled with various foods from different countries around the world. There are three different size boxes you can purchase. The smaller size is called the yum box which contains five to seven snacks from the selected country for $14.67. The next size up is called the Yum Yum Box which contains 10 to 12 snacks for $24.75. Finally, the largest box is called the Super Yum Box which contains 18 to 20 snacks for $37.58 per box.
Boxes are delivered every month by the U.S. postal service for American customers or your local government postal service of the country you live in. What country the next box is from is selected via a vote by customers. In the box, you are given a card to rate the food out of 10 as a little game to play with others and on that card, there are three countries and a link to vote for which of those three you want to be the next box. The most recent box that came out was from Germany and it was filled with many interesting things including of course chocolates along
with some very interestingly flavored chips which were ketchup flavored and pulled pork flavored. Also in the box were dark chocolate-covered marzipan bar and cherry tarts.
Inside each box, you get various food items from the selected country along with a map of the country that tells you a little bit about all of the items. You also get a large card that serves as a scoreboard if you’re sharing the box with other people in your house or friends you can all rate the food and see what’s the best food in the box. You also get recommendations for other items based on some items in your box. On the scoreboard card, you also get links to vote for the next box along with a link to vote for your top three favorite items from that box. The top three items from the last box were dark chocolate-covered marzipan bar, spring onion rings and finally ketchup potato sticks. On most of the food in the boxes, the labels are in that country’s language so in the back of most items you can find a nutrition label sticker that tells you the name of the item and all its nutrition facts in English so you know what you are eating.
Many times companies just pick boxes from eastern European countries but Universal Yums picks from all over the world. On the
website, you can go in and look at all of the previous boxes and see what has been done in the past. Some of the previous locations chosen for boxes include Italy, Columbia, Egypt, Thailand and Poland. Along with each month’s box, you also get a special holiday box that is filled with festive treats from 10 different countries.