Handpicked personal chef service, for pickup or delivery

Hard on the heels of our story about London chef Frank Hannon’s Friday Night Takeout service — we recently learned of Gobble, a like-minded initiative that’s launched in the San Francisco Bay area. Gobble is an online marketplace for fresh meals from neighborhood chefs with an emphasis on creative, fresh, healthy and ethnic food. Local chefs apply to work with Gobble and are selected based on their character, cooking knowledge and food preparation, the company says; each specializes in one or more cuisines, and some are nutritionists as well, with a focus on health. Either way, consumers can order one or more meals at a time from the chef or chefs of their choice through Gobble and then pick them up or arrange for delivery, which costs a flat USD 10. All payments are handled through PayPal. Besides all the many compelling benefits for consumers, of course, services like these offer a nice way for aspiring or experienced chefs to gain a devoted clientele and/or the ability to set their own schedules. Plenty of reasons to keep the culinary innovations coming! (Related: Homemade meals delivered directly to students’ doors — German food store offers recipe kits for individual meals — Marketplace for home-cooked meals.) Spotted by: Jackie Ashton