Would You Try a Meal Delivery Service?

I like the idea of trying meal delivery services. The 3 meal plan of Blue Apron is really great. I once tried meal delivery service in Los Angeles by 80 Percent Kitchen by their website https://www.80percentkitchen.com . So having a busy schedule is definitely yes for meal delivery service. Will surely try Blue Apron in near future as i love eating and hate cooking myself.

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It’s hard to find knowledgeable people on this topic, but you sound like you know what you’re talking about! Thanks for sharing this with others.
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Interesting. I hope this delivery service lasts awhile. I imagine that once the Fall semester starts up again, a lot of students will be interested–I wonder if they’re advertising to them at all. There’s a lack of fast and cheap healthy food in the UC Berkeley campus area. Perhaps there should will be vegan and vegetarian options someday as well.
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I tried Blue Apron and loved it! I agree it’s a little pricey, but I don’t understand the hate some of the commenters left here–I’m a recent grad on a budget, and I address why I think it’s worthwhile in my blog post reviewing Blue Apron:

http://greenmountainglobetrotter.blogspot.com/2013/07/blue-apron-meals.html

If you’d like to read it, I’d be grateful!

I really wish there were more honest and not sponsored reviews of Blue Apron. My husband and I have been using the service on and off for the past few months. We do have a grocery budget, however the bulk of it has always been spent on antibiotic/hormone free meats and local/organic produce. We also eat limited processed carbs. $20 for a Blue Apron entree (for 2) fits into our existing budget. The portions are controlled (and for us, this is a good thing). Unlike other reviewers, we’ve never had leftovers (my husband is a big guy), but for all but 1 meal, we walked away satisfied and not too full. Has every meal been a winner? No. Out of the 14 meals we’ve made so far, we enjoyed 10 of them, were meh on 3, and seriously disliked 1.

Examples of things we liked:
1- Steak with Salsa Rossa (we learned you can make a salsa just out of red pepper and it was delicious). Incidentally, this is the only meal that we feel they skimped on the protein.
2- Chicken with Candied Pistachios & Snow Pea-Radish Saute. Cooked radishes? SO tasty. And something we never considered.
3- Chicken Banh Mi with Sesame Cabbage Salad – This was a bit out of my comfort zone, in fact, I didn’t even know what a Banhi Mi was. It was a baguette like sandwich with a bit of spice complimented by a peanut buttery/salty cabbage salad We both drooled over it.
4- Cod with Pickled Grapes and Summer Succotash – The fish was pan fried using a minimal amount of rice flour and it added such a nice crust. The salad had green beens and fresh corn and it was actually fun to pickle the grapes.

Things we didn’t like:
1- Cod with Szechuan Sauce over Cellophane Noodles – The sauce was way too thick, it didn’t have a lot of flavor, and the cellophane noodles were gelatinous and disgusting. This would of been OK over brown rice. Maybe.
2- Chili Rubbed Porgy with Lime Butter and Vegetable Quinoa – This was the only fish we got that came out of the packaged smelling very fishy and it also fell apart in the pan. We tossed it before eating it.

Is the packaging excessive, yes, so we have made the decision to only order when the recipes truly appeal to us. We have also been reusing the ziplock bags and yes, we recycle the other pieces. Having said that, the sheer amount of ice packs we have received from Blue Apron (24 actually) is ridiculous. I know they need to keep the food cold, and I know they are biodegradable and great to reuse, but 24 won’t fit in our freezer.

Do we think this is a great service for a brand new parents? Probably not. Unless someone else cooks it for them. And while Blue Apron states that the meals take 30-35 minutes, we have had a few that with prep took 45-50 minutes. In my house, we both enjoy cooking, but we have always been what I call “weekend cooks.” Our hectic work schedules simply don’t allow for anything but the most basic of meals on the weekdays. We had also fallen into a rut of grilled chicken, turkey meatloaf, and roasted salmon (all with steamed veggies). The variety and new ideas (cooking radishes? making salsa out of peppers) keep us going back to Blue Apron. Some nights my husband does the prep, then runs on the treadmill while I do the cooking. Also, we have had quite a bit of fun cooking the other meals together. Enough that we are considering giving my sister 6 weeks of Blue Apron as a wedding gift. As a busy nurse she doesn’t have time to cook, and she simply never learned how.

Also just as a note, after 3-4 orders, Blue Apron provides you with 3 free trials that you can send to whomever you want. We had no idea this was a perk. We sent them to family and friends. We did not get a free trial through Blue Apron, in fact, our first order was $20 off.

I hope this comes across as a more non-biased review of Blue Apron, something that none of the sponsored reviews seem to be.

I can understand if one finds this expensive but for me it is not and I’m loving this service. I hate shopping, I hate wasting food, I hate thinking about what to cook for dinner and I hate ordering fast food. The only negative thing about this service is the plastic bags but since they’re reusable I wouldn’t mind that much.

Of course it costs much more than the food you buy, what were you expecting? This could be a little luxury when you are busy & tired as hell. Looks lovely for final & midterm weeks for me.

Interesting conversation! My first thought was that the meals were expensive, but then when I thought about it more it seems reasonable for meat-containing meals that come with all the little ingredients that the target audience for this service might not have on hand. I find many of the clothing posts on the blog to be way more out of reach than this food, actually. Today we had a similar meal of fish, rice and salad for dinner, and I would guess that it cost a similar amount ($12 fish, $2 seasoned rice, $2 parsley, $1 lemon, $1 worth of lettuce). None of these ingredients were organic or fancy, so that is just the cost for that kind of meal where I live, and it would be more if we didn’t already have some spices and extras on hand. This is also definitely cheaper than eating out or getting takeout, although maybe something like Chipotle would be the same cost (actually lunch in my cafeteria at work is about 10 and it is not good). Most of my meals are cheaper than $10/person because they include a second meal’s worth of leftovers that we eat for lunch, but those are all vegetarian meals. While I probably wouldn’t get it, I can see the appeal for someone who wants to cook but doesn’t have all the base ingredients/wants to save time on planning and shopping.

Also, Joanna, I’m going to be so impressed with you if I see you posting about eating something like this that you two cook yourself after the baby comes! :)

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I live in Washington and we use a service similar to this. I LOVE it! It’s changed my stress level around the dressed “what are we having for dinner” question. I am a mother of a newborn and toddler and there is no way I can stop at the grocery store as much as I did before.

We receive a box with 5+ meals that feeds 3-4 people. We pay $79 per box. Aside from the meal planning The best thing is that everything is local, organic and sustainably produced.. We love supporting our local farmers and vendors in our area. Plus, picking up our box every week is a little but like Christmas. :) the service we use is Acme Farms and Kitchen.

this debate is the most authentic thing to happen on this blog in a long time. well done, readers.

i just did a couple rounds with plated.com
while the ingredients were good, the dishes were easy and the food was great, i do not like all the waste created by the cute baggies and other containers.
it was certainly fun to try but in the long run, not for us as it is less expensive and wasteful for us to buy our own groceries which we, fortunately, have the time to do.

I enjoy the vibrant comments section on this blog and this seems to be an especially polarizing topic. What’s interesting to me is the undercurrent of wealth disparity that is popping up… all over a meal service. I’d guess that most COJ readers have a food budget that supplies them with subsequent nutrition, but even here we see a microcosm of the status associated with access to food. It’s fascinating.

I really can’t see the benefit of this if you still have to do the prepping and cooking? Couldn’t you just send a friend or family member to the grocery store with your shopping list?

Too much money, waste of packaging, and you don’t get to pick out your own ingredients.

And I agree with others that I’d like to hear the nitty gritty details such as taste, portion size, did you have leftovers?

Hi Jo I live in Australia and obviously some nights you can eat more economically, but with two boys and a new business we are on the go one way or another all the time. I bought three pieces of fresh salmon tonight that alone was $23, I needed pasta and parmesan and made a sweet potato, onion, capsicum and fetta salad, two of those veges were out of the garden and it still cost me over $40. I do meal plan but some nights are later than others and plans change, sometimes everyone just wants dinner now. I think as an option this is great now and then. I also had two babies 17months apart, with little family and career friends no one had the time to drive out to our semirural area to drop off meals, once again it is nice to have options if you are fortunate enough to afford it. I get the packaging but there may be a viable solution here. All ideas need some massaging, thanks

Even if the packaging was recyclable I would never use it. We should be more concerned about reducing and reusing than we are about recycling. I am all about having friends and family bring over meals after the baby. It is a great opportunity to try new meals and for friends to see to new baby.

I agree with many here… I think there is a lot of packaging and that it is quite expensive !

As for new parents, if I am short on time the last thing I wanna do is cook and furthermore a new recipe. I stick to my set of tried and true fast recipes I can pull with my eyes closed or get take out if I am too tired. The effort would be less and the price the same or less in my opinion. It’d just make more sense to me, especially in a big city with many food options like NYC.

You have to pay all that and you still have to cook? Hmmm…. I think not. *Looks up Chinese delivery number*. Your pictures are GORGEOUS though. Love the pasta ones, especially. :)

I find this packaging CRAZY absurd!! Two pieces of herbs and one single carrot per package? Why on earth would you want that? You could buy all of these ingredients for a fraction of the price as a whole (meaning a whole cabbage etc.) and make these (or similar) meals a zillion times more (with some time in between obviously). I think this is so representative of why the ‘taking care of our planet’ discussion is going so slowly: the whole idea of ‘when it’s recyclable it’s ok’ is so wrong. Plastic is still plastic so if you can avoid it, do it! (in that way I would definitely not call it satisfying to look at all of these pre-packaged ingredients) I adore your blog, Joanna, but I am really surprised that you would recommend this since you are usually so pro honest/environment-friendly products.

What a waste!! all that plastic!!

It looks incredible! I would sign up, no doubt! It’s a pity taht I live in germany, umpf! ;)
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E.
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We do a similar service in Chicago and absolutely love it. It is a total lifesaver for lots of reasons: keeps us eating healthy (and not take out), we don’t have to think of something for dinner everynight, I don’t forget things at the grocery store because they bring everything chopped and ready to go. I’d say to definitely keep this up when the new little babe arrives! xo

In Zurich, Switzerland our grocery budget is 800-1000 per month. So, yes, I’d do this in a heartbeat and love every bite!!! ;)

I live in New Haven, CT and I easily spend more than $20 a meal for my husband and I, more if it’s not something basic. So, I don’t find to be a problem and honestly if the wrappers are recyclable or I can find another use for them, they don’t bother me much either.