For anyone out there that is training, a busy mom, office warrior, etc – cooking and meal prep can be a daunting task. At least it can for me, my significant other is willing to try anything once and doesn’t hate healthy foods which makes the job of cooking for us quite a bit easier. The real issues boils down to lack of TIME. Up at 4:15 most days of the week to run or write, working, evening strength training, a pup that needs to be walked, cycling, swimming, a house to maintain, continue to grow my relationship (and myself) and, oh yea, maintain a social life.
I decided to go on a quest to simplify my weekly meal prep and general food routine. Now, I know I haven’t done product/service reviews on here before but I plan to keep this 100% honest with you all so this is #NotSponsored in anyways. So here we go…
I decided to start with Hello Fresh.
What is Hello Fresh?
Per their website, Hello Fresh offers “delicious, pre-measured ingredients and simple, chef-made recipes that we deliver to your doorstep every week. Extra flexible for your busy lifestyle.”
What is Hello Fresh in my opinion?
Hello Fresh is a service that offers buyers meals that have pre-portioned ingredients to make one of the 15-20 different weekly recipes. Delivered on the day of your choice and essentially ready to go.
Why did I pick to start with Hello Fresh?
They had a great coupon ($80 off your first four boxes) and then eBates also had $12.50 cash back (referral link below). This made each box, including shipping, right around $40 and included two servings of three different meals. Average cost per serving was $6-7; without the coupon this would be around $10.
The Pros
Let’s start with the positives:
- Dinner meal prep for three days a week is zippy…nothing…easy. I just have to grab my HF box off the front porch every Sunday and decide when I’m going to make the meals.
- Essentially no waste. There are a few times where you don’t use all of the products they give you. For example, I made a ragu that required 2 tsps of thyme but they gave you close to double that amount. Other than that, you use all of what is provided to you.
- Most of the meals take less tan 45 minutes to prep and cook so you aren’t in the kitchen until 10PM just cooking.
- Plenty of options. HF offers about 15-20 different meals each week that range from meatloaf to sirloin to tacos. So if your house has a peaky eater, no worries – they likely will have a good option for you.
- Their new customer coupons are awesome. $80 off your first four boxes is a great deal.
- You can skip weeks. We had a week where we weren’t going to be home much, so we just hit skip week and kept on trucking. Your coupon doesn’t expire either!
- You can pick essentially any day of the week to get your delivery – they will deliver Sunday, Tuesday, Friday – which ever day works best for you. I went with Sunday so I could plan out which days we would cook certain recipes.
- Lastly, most of the recipes are pretty good. They are easy, so if you’re new to cooking you could still make it. There were a few where I was not a fan of certain components (carrot apple slaw, for example) and ended up tossing it (so much for waste free!)
The Cons
Of course everything can’t be all rainbows and butterflies.
- You must pick your meals by EOD Tuesday. Even though my box isn’t delivered until Sunday, I still must pick my recipes. If you don’t, you are locked out and your recipes are auto picked.
- There is a lot of recipe repeat. Tacos, spaghetti, fiesta bowls…repeat. For some this may be perfectly fine, but I really like to switch things up and HF can be limiting from that POV.
- The portions are very small. With training and having a man that has a man’s appetite, the portions are almost too small. I would say 80% of the time we weren’t left hungry or were hungry two hours later.
- Cheap proteins (I didn’t say bad quality). Now let me explain this one, almost all of their recipes include chicken, pork, ground beef, or just veggies. These in general are cheaper proteins to buy in bulk. While they do offer “gourmet” options which include duck breast, sirloin, scallops, etc – you must pay an up charge for that ranging from $6-$8 per person. No thanks.
- Missing Ingredients or damaged products. We had a couple of occasions where there was either a hole in the meat packaging or ingredients were missing (tomatoes with our fiesta bowls). Each meal has a sealed paper bag that includes your veggies and other spices so you don’t necessarily realize that you missing things until you get to that meal.
- Watch your bank account. I mentioned above getting a great coupon. Well, that great coupon didn’t get applied to my first box. They don’t have (or I couldn’t find) a number you could call so you need to sit in an online chat while they resolve the issue. Now I will say their customer service was great, I got a $20 refund plus had my coupon reapplied for four more boxes. Just be careful.
- Still have to meal prep 4 other dinners, 7 lunches, and 7 breakfasts. Like I mentioned above, for three nights of the week, you don’t need to meal prep but there are still 18 other meals you need to plan for. I feel as though the two serving meals are best for a single person (cook one today, save one for lunch or dinner tomorrow). For a couple, you are still looking a hefty weekly dinner bill.
So is the cost worth the it?
To get as close to apples to….oranges…as I could I took a recipe we really liked and looked up the cost of the ingredients on Amazon Fresh. Why Amazon Fresh? They can be delivered whenever I want (similar concept) and are good quality (thank you Whole Foods!). As I mentioned above with the new customer coupon, you are looking at $6-7 per serving or about $10 on a normal week. I have broken down the numbers to show how many nights I could make a meal for 2 with the ingredients purchased.
| Ingredient | Cost |
| Zucchini | 2.99 / 4 meals |
| Garlic | 3.49 / assume 4 meals |
| Ground Beef | 4.99 / 1.5 meals |
| Soy Sauce | 2.79 / 20 meals |
| Crushed Tomatoes | 1.69 / 2 meals |
| Onion | 0.49 |
| Thyme | 1.66 |
| Spaghetti | 0.99 / 2 meals |
| Italian Seasoning | 1.69 / 5 meals |
| Parmesan Cheese | 2.49 / 6 meals |
| TOTAL | $23.27 | Cost per meal $9.17ish |
Based on the above, if you were to get a coupon on your first four boxes, each MEAL would be $12-$14 – you still would be better off buying everything from the grocery store and being able to make it multiple times. I will say this, if convenience is important to you then you need to decide the price you are willing to pay for the convenience.
What’s my overall review?
Hello Fresh was fun to try. But I don’t think I’ll be returning right now. It didn’t have to do with the quality or still having to prep but really was exclusively due to lack of variety and feeling like I didn’t get my moneys worth. I didn’t love the “rinse & repeat” feel of their recipes, they state it is chef-made recipes so tell that chef to come up with some new stuff! As for not getting my moneys worth, I would prefer not to be limited to chicken, pork, and ground beef (for the most part) – spice it up and offer more options that feel more luxurious and chef-inspired. If you are crazy busy and don’t want to worry about meals at all, then this is a great option. There are also tons of other services like this on the market – I’ll be trying Home Chef next so stay tuned for that review! Do you have a favorite? If so, let me know!
Ebates referral code:
https://go.ebat.es/6v2FaEcmbV
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