Favorite meal kit?

[Bernadine]

I don't think this has been asked in a while.  Please feel free to send me any discounts you have, lol.

[gerberdaisy]

Mar 4, 2021 8:27:07 GMT -5 Bernadine said:

I don't think this has been asked in a while.  Please feel free to send me any discounts you have, lol.

We use Hello Fresh and have been happy.  Lots of variety and doesn't take a ton of time. I have 4 free boxes if you want to PM me your email.

[expectantsteelerfan]

I do Home Chef and did Freshley (started both before Christmas). My experience with Home Chef is that the 'oven ready' options really are super easy and quick, but not necessarily stand out meals, more like stuff I could throw together myself if I had enough mental bandwidth to think about it ahead of time. The other recipes were more enjoyable, but sometimes the prep was still too much for what I want to do for a weeknight meal (especially anything with potatoes. I don't want to have to peel, chop, and then do other stuff to multiple potatoes for a quick and easy meal. I feel like if they sent potato chunks or something it would REALLY help. Also garlic. The garlic they send is already peeled, but if I'm just adding garlic to some green beans, I'm going to use jarred garlic to save myself the smelly fingers).
I've stopped getting it as much though because I'm eating super low carb right now, and it was tough to find recipes that both my dh and I would like that are also low carb and lowish calories and worth the effort. I still get it about once a month, but then I either get stuff I will just make for myself or for him.

Freshley is basically refrigerated 'tv dinner' type meals that are in a tray and you microwave. I did think they tasted better than the frozen meals from the grocery store I would occasionally eat, but they also had very few low calorie and low enough carbs, so after a few weeks of eating the same 4 meals, I cancelled. I have some frozen for those times when I need a super quick meal.

[TR]

We use Home Chef and I really like it. We’ve been getting 3 meals a week since September and I’d say we’ve had less than a handful that I was like “Eh, didn’t really like that.” And many that were REALLY good. I can check and see if I have free boxes to share.

[Bernadine]

Mar 4, 2021 8:32:15 GMT -5 gerberdaisy said:

Mar 4, 2021 8:27:07 GMT -5 Bernadine said:

I don't think this has been asked in a while.  Please feel free to send me any discounts you have, lol.

We use Hello Fresh and have been happy.  Lots of variety and doesn't take a ton of time. I have 4 free boxes if you want to PM me your email.

PM sent!

[TR]

Bernadine, I do! If you want one just PM me your email address.

[wildrice]

I like Hello Fresh too, but my favorite is probably Blue Apron. A lot of the Hello Fresh stuff I could make on my own with things I have on hand plus a few basic grocery store items. The Blue Apron boxes tend to use a little fancier or less common ingredients (or that I could buy a whole jar of for $7 at the store if I wanted to, but probably wouldn't when the recipe calls for 2 Tbsp). They have fewer options than Hello Fresh to choose from, though. I wouldn't say either are typically more difficult or time consuming than the other.

I have some free meals from both HF and BA so PM me if you still need any!

[gerberdaisy]

Mar 4, 2021 8:49:31 GMT -5 Bernadine said:

Mar 4, 2021 8:32:15 GMT -5 gerberdaisy said:

We use Hello Fresh and have been happy.  Lots of variety and doesn't take a ton of time. I have 4 free boxes if you want to PM me your email.

PM sent!

Box sent.  If anyone else wants one I have 3 more, just send me your email.

[Vespasia]

I have done two boxes of Martha & Marley Spoon recently and have been quite happy with them. There are a lot of options, the portion sizes aren't too small, and they taste good. The price is also comparable to the rest.

I've tried several others and the only one I have ordered consistently was Hello Fresh. I found Home Chef boring and Blue Apron way too fussy.

[silvercrayon]

We have been getting 3 meals a week from Hello Fresh for several months. We have been very pleased.

[thedutchgirl]

We have done both Hello Fresh and Blue Apron. Hello Fresh has more recipes each week, particularly a few to choose for low sodium, which we try to do. But after about 6 weeks, the recipes start to look repetitive, for instance stuffed peppers with ground beef, then stuffed peppers with ground turkey, then stuffed peppers with some sort of sausage.

We switched to Blue Apron, and I agree with someone above that it is a bit more creative. But their instructions and time estimate aren't nearly as good as Hello Fresh. Unless you really look at the whole recipe and plan it out yourself, it takes quite a bit longer than they estimate. Hello Fresh is way better at working the whole timing out for you, accurately.

I'd recommend both though. We tend to do it each winter, and then in the summer we just grill a ton.

[dancingirl21]

We had been doing Hello Fresh for about 9 months recently. I really liked it. A lot of variety in the meal choices and they tasted great. We only recently stopped because we are doing a kitchen renovation. I will continue when the kitchen is finished.

We are currently doing Freshly because you only have to heat it in the microwave. DH thinks the portions are small (but that guy can EAT), I think they are fine. They are decent for our purposes right now but if I had a functional kitchen, I wouldn’t be continuing. They are made with all real ingredients, but for the life of me I can’t figure out how there is so much fat/carbs in a lot of them.

[suzubell]

I have some Hello Fresh boxes to give away. Would love to trade for a trial of a different plan? Happy to give some away too.

[silva]

We've only done Home Chef so I can't compare. I was only once able to get my tilapia fish cakes to keep its shape, otherwise we end up with a tiliapa scramble. Tastes the same to me. I love the salads those are huge enough to be split into three and the oven ready ones are a huge hit. I LOVE to cook, so I don't mind if they take longer. I just appreciate that I can choose a few meals and don't have to worry about meal planning a full week.

[sandandsea]

We use Every Plate. It’s the same parent company as Hello fresh and there is a ton of overlap but it’s cheaper. We’ve been doing it for 6 months and like it but it’s not faster than cooking your own recipes. It is nice to not think about two meals a week from planning to grocery shopping.

ETA. Pm me your email if you want a free box.

[1yeartogo]

We like Hello Fresh but stop periodically because we get bored. We did not like Freshly (super gross) or Blue Apron. For the last two weeks my DH has been doing Marley Spoon. Overall they taste good but he thought one recipe was too challenging/time consuming.

Last year we did Sun Box on a promo and it was really good, just too expensive to keep up without a coupon.

[k3am]

We also use Every Plate. Not having to think is great. It's more prep than we were doing before, but it's pretty good. Even when we've messed up or missed steps, the food has always come out pretty good. We've been doing it for over a year and it saved our butts during the initial shelter in place when stores had nothing, we just increased the # of meals a week.

[Whitecaps]

We started Green Chef in January in an effort to eat less meat (we chose their vegetarian menu option) and have been very pleased with the available options, flavors (haven't disliked a single meal yet!) and portion sizes. We have chosen to get deliveries of 3-4 meals every other week and find that that's a good frequency for us. It reduces the amount of planning we have to do and I find that I am looking forward to trying all the new recipes! Plus, we haven't had any repeats yet, so I think there is plentiful variety. 

I have some codes for free boxes, if anyone's interested - PM me.

[imojoebunny]

We have tried Hello Fresh and Blue Apron. We much prefer Blue Apron for the flavors and learning new cooking styles. We have used Blue Apron for years. Hello Fresh, we liked more back in before times, when we had less time, but found it uninspired. We, also, use a local meal service that is a little more expensive ~100-115 for 3 meals for 3 people, plus leftovers, but comes cooked, and we can all pick our own thing, about every other week. For us, Blue Apron + our local service, saves us money, and is healthier than what I can come up with. The other meals we have in a week are simple, inexpensive, things, often without meat or very minimal meat, and we seldom get delivery or take out, since the meals are more restaurant quality. We get the 2 person Blue Apron, and it often serves 2 adults and our 14 year old girl (calories are available in the recipes, so we can gage if it is enough for her + us). She doesn't eat most meat, so we just give her the other things, and she has yogurt/milk with dinner.

[sonrisa]

Some one here mentioned that Hello Fresh recipes are on their website so I've done a few of them.

So far, they've been a  good source of inspiration. Each time, there is at least one change I make for our own preferences so I don't see ever ordering the kits. If I'm subbing a better cheese or adding a bell pepper, I might as well be buying the other few ingredients at the same time.

[msmerymac]

I love Blue Apron, but I really like Green Chef now too. It's faster to prepare because they do some of the chopping and mix some of the sauce for you, and I like that they offer a lower carb option. They've been really tasty and usually only take 20 minutes or so to make.