This Company Is Re-Branding the Boiled Egg—And the Result Is Delicious

Let’s be honest: that boiled egg you pack in your lunch as a quick, easy protein is not the most exciting meal of your week. But that may change this spring, thanks to the efforts of a new food startup, Peckish. The Sonoma, California-based company just launched a product they call the  “Peck Pack,” a box containing two boiled eggs (peeled and individually wrapped) and a small container of dry, crunchy “dip” in flavors like maple waffle, salt and pepitas, and fried rice. Each box is meant to serve as a quick, portable snack or light meal.

“We believe that eggs are nature’s perfect food,” says Lauren Egan, the company’s VP of Brand. “They’re a nutrient-dense, clean source of protein.” The company sources organic, free-range, certified-humane eggs which are then “perfectly boiled” (in a proprietary cooking process) until the yolks are firm but still tender and bright, peeled and dipped in a citric acid wash to keep them fresh, and packaged individually.

The dips are made from a variety of crunchy ingredients: the “Everything,” which tastes like a really good everything bagel, is made from sesame seeds, dried garlic and onion, poppy seeds, and salt, while flavors that aren’t naturally made of crunchy ingredients, like a “Kimchi” flavor, are made with seasoned puffed quinoa. (The company’s marketing materials make sure to promote the fact that the dips are gluten and dairy-free, paleo-friendly, and non-gmo.)

Though the eggs are designed to be dipped into the flavorings, early adopters have come up with other uses like slicing the eggs and putting them on avocado toast with the flavoring sprinkled on top, or using the eggs and flavorings as toppings for salad or ramen. (Judging from the company’s social media, they seem to be working with some wellness influencers who have developed some particularly colorful, photo-friendly uses, all of which show off the eggs’ velvety golden yolks.)

The company’s marketing seems aimed directly at a millennial crowd with graphic, saturated illustrations on the boxes and a very colorful, Boomerang-filled Instagram campaign, but Egan says that while the product is ideal for “that millennial on-the-go, or that mom on-the-go,” they’re also excited about the idea of seeing parents put the packs into lunch boxes as a convenient protein for kids.

The company reports that since their launch in January they’ve been happily surprised by a very high demand for their product. Most of their product is sold through a mail-order subscription service that delivers ten Peck Packs at a time straight to the consumer’s door every two or four weeks.

Some shoppers can find them on supermarket shelves as well; the company is doing trial runs in some Whole Foods 365 markets in California, New York, Texas, Oregon, Ohio, and Georgia, as well as in Erewhon markets in the Los Angeles area and some Equinox gyms in Connecticut, Massachusetts, New Jersey, New York, and Virginia. They plan to be in stores nationwide by the end of the year.

Though only a month into business, the Peckish team is already thinking up ways to expand the brand. “A lot of people have been asking us if we’re going to be selling the dips separately as salad toppers or to put on top of pasta or ramen, and we would love to do something like that,” says Egan. “We love that people are embracing all parts of the product, the eggs as well as the dip, and being super creative with them.…there’s a lot of innovation in the pipeline for the future.”