We tried HelloFresh for the past two months - Here's our review

Please note, we have an updated review on our HelloFresh experience after more than 2 years of using the service.

Hi everyone! This post is written by my husband. Some of you may know he does all the cooking around here. 😅 We noticed we were spending a lot of money on food and eating out every month and wanted to see if a meal kit service would save us money and time. After looking at a few meal kit services we settled on HelloFresh. Without further ado, here's Jared's review. (Original post date Aug 2022).

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As you may have seen from Leslie's Instagram stories for the past 2 months, we've been using HelloFresh for most of our meals. The main drivers for this were to better track what we eat and because on the advice of my doctor, I should be eating more home cooked meals. Before I go any further, it should be noted that my original career path was in culinary arts, but twists and turns in life changed that. So I do have formal cooking experience.

A little background story.

Over the years, I've developed a love/hate relationship with cooking. The main thing I dislike about cooking is menu planning. I hate trying to come up with a vision of what to make each day for a week and then creating a grocery plan.

There are a few reasons why I hate it. First, it you want to be economical with both your time and finances, then you should look to find items that can carry over between multiple meals. For example, buy whole chicken, a few potatoes, and some broccoli. Roast the chicken and one night you have the breast meat with mashed potatoes and some steamed broccoli and the next night, you have the leftover leg and thigh with roasted potatoes and roasted broccoli. That's great, but that's 2 nights of having almost the same thing. Sure, you save time and money but you introduce a bit of monotony.

Now if you want variety in your meals, then you typically end up spending more than you want and any time savings you would've gotten by eating similar meals each night no longer applies.

Lastly, and this is more of a me thing, I don't adapt well when plans change. I can spend a bunch of time making out a list of meals we're going to have for a week but if one ingredient is sold out or doesn't look appealing, it kills my plan and I'm not easily able to pivot mentally.

This is where I thought a meal kit service could come alleviate some of that.

We went with HelloFresh because we actually did try Blue Apron when we first moved here and I just wasn't impressed. The dishes took too much time and involved way more pots and pans than I felt was needed. We may try Blue Apron again to see if much has changed but HelloFresh seemed to have overtaken Blue Apron in the popularity department.

Now some of the promises of a meal kit service are saving money, saving time, reducing waste, healthier meals, and potentially some weight loss because they're giving you real serving sizes rather than the more gluttonous approach to food we take in this country.

So first, are we saving money?

Yes. Not even a question. Eating at home more has steadily lowered our food bill. What we spent in July for both groceries and restaurants was almost half of what we had spent in May. Could we save more money if we just did our own grocery shopping? Probably, but then that would mean I'd need to do menu planning and as you've read above, I'm just not a fan of that.

How much time does it take to cook a meal?

The time HelloFresh says a meal should take has been pretty accurate. I can get our dinner on the table usually in under 30 minutes. Of the 20 or so meals they offer each week, I purposely look for weeknight meals to be around 30 minutes and weekend meals up to 40 minutes.

How sustainable and eco-friendly is it?

Reducing waste is a bit trickier. We're definitely not wasting food the way we were because there are no leftovers and you're not throwing out unused ingredients really. There are some meals that come with more items than you need. The biggest culprit are lettuce wrapped tacos. You get a whole head of lettuce and they're like “take 8 leaves to make your tacos”. I solved this by not making them tacos and treating the dish more like a salad.

I'd also say there is less material waste. Every meal is placed in a paper bag and at most, you'll have a few small plastic bags holding ingredients. Maybe it's just me, but when I look at what I put in the trash can, it feels like a lot less than when I bought my own ingredients.

Healthier meals and weight loss?

For the most part. Earlier in our using HelloFresh, I didn't see the calories when choosing the meals, so when we got them, some of the meals were nearly 1,000 calories a serving. When you look at the offerings for the week, you actually have to dig into the meal to find the calories. At a quick glance, they'll tell you how long something takes, if the meal meets any guidelines (such as vegetarian, carb smart, Mediterranean), but you have to actually open the recipe to see the calorie count and the complexity. I wish those stats were part of the quick glance stats. Leslie recently had her yearly physical and her blood work did show improvement. Not that it was bad to begin with, it was just better than it was prior to the kits.

Lastly on the overall positive side, I do like the variety of the meals we're eating each week. It definitely doesn't feel as monotonous as it would if I had to plan the meals myself.

So what are the things that I'm not a fan of?

The vegetables. Not the quality of the veggies so much but more of the quantity. I feel like they really skimp on this. Sure, you'll get plenty of carbs and a decent amount of protein but what they give you for green beans for two people really feels like a single serving. What I've taken to is looking at what's coming for the week and then just buying a little extra while we're at Target or something.

The other thing I'm not a fan of is the lack of fish options. Fish isn't offered regularly and when it is, it's usually an up-charge (what HelloFresh called Premium Picks). We did that a few times and for the most part, we don't think the up-charge is worth it. One meal was a surf and turf (lobster tails and steak) and the steak was chewy as all hell and the lobster tails were insanely small and rubbery. Stick with the regularly offered meals and don't do the premium picks. We're going to try other meal kit services and the one that offers more fish options will be the one we go with.

Lastly this isn't much of a complaint, just an observation that you should know about. Almost every meal will use the following items; lemon, sour cream (or cream cheese), and scallions. I understand why; the sour cream adds fat and fat adds flavor to a meal. Thinly sliced scallion tops that you sprinkle on top of a finished meal gives the meal an air of “ooo, fancy”, and zesting a lemon makes a novice feel like they're really doing something special. I don't bother zesting.

Verdict?

Overall, I've been happy with the service. The saving money part is nice but I more enjoy the fact that we're eating home cooked meals regularly without feeling like it's a huge time sink into prep and clean up. I personally have better things to do with my time than menu plan, grocery shop, spend a ton of time doing mise en place, and then having a slew of things to clean after the meal. If you already have a routine that works for you, that's great. But if you've been looking for a way to save money and eat more responsibly, I would recommend a meal kit service.

If you would like to give HelloFresh a try, you can receive your first box ships free with Jared's referral link.

Do you use a meal kit service? Let me know which one! We would love to try another company.

Bonus if they offer more fish and vegetables. 😋

That's it for me! Hope you enjoyed Jared's review and I wish you all a great Monday!

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