Amazon and Discovery today officially launched Food Network Kitchen, a streaming video app that combines live cooking classes with hands-free controls.
At launch, Food Network Kitchen is offering a 90-day free trial period, along with a limited time discounted price of $4/month or $47.99/year; regular price is $6.99/month or $59.99/year. The app is available now on Amazon Alexa and Echo Show, Fire Tablets, Fire TV streaming media devices and Fire TV Edition smart TVs, as well as iOS and Android devices. The companies intend to introduce additional devices and platforms in 2020.
Discovery has a few promotions lined up to coincide with the launch. When customers purchase an annual subscription to Food Network Kitchen, the company will provide up to 100 meals to kids as part of its Turn Up: Fight Hunger initiative. Also, on Nov. 9, “Rachael Ray's 30 Minute Meals” returns to Food Network with new episodes and Food Network Kitchen subscribers will be able to access all 10 episodes of the new season, as well as take live classes with Ray on the app every day the week of Nov. 11.
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Food Network Kitchen will offer 25 weekly live classes with five daily live classes on weekends. The classes—which will be taught by Ray, Bobby Flay, Martha Stewart, Alton Brown, Giada De Laurentiis, Guy Fieri, Andrew Zimmern and others—will feature an interactive element that allows users to communicate in real time with hosts.
In addition to the live cooking classes, Food Network Kitchen will offer more than 800 on-demand cooking classes, 3,000 instructional videos, a library of Food Network series, and recipes.
The service will also include some e-commerce features. At launch, customers will be able to order ingredients through the Food Network Kitchen app using Amazon Fresh in select cities. In 2020, the service will let consumers directly purchase the equipment being used by the Food Network Kitchen chefs.
Next year, the service will also offer “Kitchen-on-Call,” a feature offering 24/7 access to live cooking advice and support.