As Vegan Restaurants Close, Ghost Kitchens and Meal Kits See New Growth

Vegan dining is in flux: headline-making closures of brick-and-mortar spots are colliding with a surge in private chefs, curated meal drops, and delivery-first brands. The shift is visible from Miami to New York to Los Angeles, powered by two forces moving in opposite directions: costs rising for restaurants and demand rising for at-home convenience. The result is an ecosystem where a night of plant-based lasagna baked at home, a chef-catered dinner party, and a ghost-kitchen burger can all live in the same week for the same consumer.

The economics behind the pivot

Restaurants are paying more for everything from fryer oil to payroll, and consumers keep ordering off-premises in high numbers. The National Restaurant Association reports average menu prices are up roughly 31 percent since February 2020, while key wholesale food costs climbed about 37 percent—pressure that squeezes already thin margins. At the same time, three in four operators say off-premises—takeout and delivery—are a significant part of their business, a behavior they expect to stick.

Getty

The pressure shows at the neighborhood level, too. In Miami, former Planta Queen pastry and sushi chefs Erica Marie Denis and Gabriel Lopez told Miami New Times that the chain’s Coconut Grove location closed with little warning. “We received notice on July 30 that we were basically immediately terminated,” says Denis. She remembers diners arriving as usual: “A lot of people went to Planta Queen not knowing that it would be the last time they would be eating there,” she says. “Even we, as employees, there were people in the building working when we received notice.” 

Private chefs, meal drops, and a chef’s touch

What has replaced some of those lost dining rooms is not a one-to-one swap, but a patchwork of higher-touch, at-home offerings. In Los Angeles, private chef Aaron Elliott has turned the skills he honed for A-listers into Meal Ticket, a weekly, plant-based drop that reads like a chef’s tasting menu reimagined for your fridge. His service releases a new menu midweek with Monday evening delivery or pickup. Priced at $250, orders are capped at ten, and each order includes six mix-and-match dishes meant to carry a household through the week.

Elliott’s model mirrors a larger consumer pivot toward premium meal services. CookUnity, a chef-to-consumer platform, said it surpassed $500 million in annual recurring revenue this spring—evidence that diners will pay for restaurant-quality food at home. Meanwhile, the US meal kit category is hardly fading; IBISWorld pegs 2025 market size around $8.7 billion, and mainstream food media continue to rank prepared and kit services that foreground plant-forward options such as Purple Carrot and Green Chef.

Purple Carrot

The Miami chefs who lost their jobs at Planta are leaning into this direction. Denis says she and Lopez launched a private vegan service, 2TheRootss, to bring restaurant-quality meals straight to clients. “My boyfriend and I offer a private chef experience at clients’ homes. That’s been our way of providing high-quality vegan food to people who are interested,” Denis says. Her advice for locals hunting for good plant-based cooking: find the small operators that cook like a market cafeteria. “They actually have a rotating menu—think about it like hot prepared foods. You can go there and kind of build your own plate,” she explains.

RELATED: This Popular US Vacation Spot Aims to Be the Next Blue Zones City: ‘It Really Fits’

In New York, the take-and-bake category shows how chef craft is migrating home. Cucina Fantasma, a Brooklyn-based vegan lasagna brand that just debuted last week, sells a Classic-ish pan layered with fresh pasta, slow-simmered seitan bolognese, tofu ricotta, and koji-almond mozzarella, designed to bake at home or stash in the freezer. As founder Lindsey Masterman puts it: “Lasagna is supposed to feel indulgent, satisfying, and celebratory.
But I wanted to reimagine it for the New York lifestyle. These are lasagnas you can look forward to on a weeknight—or use as the centerpiece of your next dinner party, all just by turning on your oven.” Early drops include limited production, pickup in Downtown Brooklyn, and DoorDash delivery on Mondays and Tuesdays.

Ghost kitchens, hybrids, and the new distribution

So where do ghost kitchens fit in 2025? The pure delivery-only food hall has cooled from its pandemic-era hype, but the core idea—using lower-cost production space and virtual brands to expand reach—has not disappeared. Restaurant Business reports many virtual brands are “getting a little physical,” jumping onto in-store menus or opening limited-service counters, while industry experts point to an evolution toward hybrid footprints rather than a collapse. In practice, some operators use multi-brand platforms to monetize spare kitchen capacity while they rebuild dine-in.

Delivery demand continues to prop up these experiments. DoorDash’s 2025 survey finds that nearly half of consumers make delivery decisions in five to ten minutes, three-quarters placed a last-minute delivery order in the prior month, and almost half prefer ordering through third-party apps for ease—behavior that fuels fast-turn virtual brands, chef drops, and prepared vegan mains that bake off in a home oven.

There are bright spots on the traditional side, too. The Atlanta burger empire Slutty Vegan remains a cultural touchstone for plant-based comfort food, even as it restructures. Founder Pinky Cole re-acquired the brand in March and has described a tighter “Slutty Vegan 2.0” footprint; the website still lists open restaurants from Brooklyn to Baltimore. The through-line across vegan dining now is clear: more routes to the plate.

Madelynne Boykin

For diners, the takeaway is choice. Sit down at one of the surviving brick-and-mortar eateries. Order a nostalgia hit from a virtual brand. Book a chef for a night at home, or reserve a weekly slot on a drop like Meal Ticket. For professionals, the lesson is to design for an audience that loves plants and flexibility. As Denis puts it, “We don’t really have that many vegan restaurants in Miami,” Denis says. “Gabriel and I are passionate vegans and know there is a demand for vegan food here in Miami.”