It has been one month since my first HelloFresh box arrived, so let’s get into the details!

Delivery

The box was scheduled to arrive at my office on Tuesday, February 6 between 8 AM and 8 PM. I was a little worried it wouldn’t arrive before I left work, but it came between 9 AM and 10 AM.

Packaging

The food comes in a nice sized box and it was not too heavy for a pregnant woman to carry to the car. Only about 14 lbs. I placed all my food in the refrigerator once it arrived, but I loved that the ice pack stayed frozen until the next day (I let it sit out in my kitchen all night and checked on it in the morning). It was still half frozen the next morning which makes me feel confident that you will not get food poisoning if the box has to sit outside all day or if you have roommates who will just sit your box in your room without thinking about the perishables contained inside.

Meal #1 – Moo Shu Tacos

This meal plans for 4 tacos, but they gave me enough food for 6, which is awesome! I had 3 nights worth of dinner. I don’t need much at the end of the day and these tacos were so filling that I was ready to go to sleep afterward. I would change how I cooked the meat. I would add more seasoning and soy sauce. I also didn’t use as much salt and pepper as they say in the instructions. I only added salt and pepper when I added the meat to the pan. You already get salt in the soy sauce, so I would just add more of the Moo Shu spice to give it more flavor; and if you don’t care about calories, mix 1/4 cup brown sugar to the moo shu spice and soy sauce and you will definitely thank me later.

Meal #2 – Stuffed Peppers

Definitely needed some seasoning, but I didn’t mind it as a meal. It was lighter than the stuffed peppers I’ve had in the past that contained either all meat and cheese or meat and rice. This was also a meal my boyfriend did not really approve of because it wasn’t very filling for him.

Meal #3 – Fig Chicken

This was definitely a 2 meal kind of deal. There were no leftovers. It was pretty tasty though. The only thing is that I had to wrap the chicken in foil and bake it in the oven with the sweet potatoes to finish cooking it because it took more than 7 minutes on my stove to cook. I didn’t want to burn the meat, so putting it in the oven was my best bet.

HelloFresh Website:

When you subscribe to HelloFresh you are able to edit your profile settings for any food allergies you may have, but I would not suggest this for people with food allergies, especially to seafood. I do not eat seafood and my mother has a seafood allergy, so I always have my antenna up for anything that could be dangerous. In the profile settings, I changed my preferences so that HelloFresh would not suggest meals with seafood. This did not work for me. I tried refreshing the page, logging out and back in, but nothing worked. They still suggested meals with seafood for every menu well into next month. I do not feel comfortable recommending the classic plan to anyone with a seafood allergy. I did not choose the vegetarian plan, but since there are so many sauces that contain fish oil or other sea creature bits, I would suggest skipping HelloFresh until they fix the preferences function.

One thing I did like about the website, is that I can download the recipes of the meals to use for later. This is incredibly helpful for someone like me who would prefer to look at the recipes on my tablet than try to keep track of the papers.

What I plan to do next:

The great thing about this plan is the convenience factor. I loved not having to search through cookbooks, websites, and Pinterest for dinner recipes every week. Meal planning is the worst! It was so nice to just pick 3 meals from a menu and wait for all the ingredients to be shipped to me. Plus, with my pregnancy brain, I had no worries of forgetting to pick up something at the store.

I loved coming home and already knowing what I was having for dinner. I loved having leftovers, and I loved having healthier options without the hard work of planning. I never know what to serve with those yummy-looking meat dishes I see everywhere else. These meals already have sides! Do you know how great that is? I am getting a second box, but ordering other boxes will be iffier just because it is expensive and I still have to go to the grocery store for breakfast and lunch food.

 

My Boyfriend’s Review:

Not enough food for a working man. That was the biggest complaint he had. The stuffed peppers were too light. The chicken dinner was okay, but not heavy, and the amount of food was not as much as he would normally eat.

 

After One Month:

I got the second box then skipped the boxes for the rest of the month. I just accidentally ordered a third box, which spurred me to finally cancel my plan. $60 for a box of groceries is just not worth it to me no matter how convenient it is. Plus, I even wasted the last meal in my second box because I had gone out for dinner a couple times and I had plenty of leftover food I chose to eat instead. So, by the time I got around to making the last meal, I decided it would be safer to throw it out. Some of the produce had gone bad and I couldn’t bring myself to risk it with the meat.

So, no more meal plan delivery services for me. Now, a much cheaper meal plan recipe card thing is something I could go along with.

I even heard from my mom that her local grocery store was experimenting with something like this. They had prepackaged meals for sale, but that did not work out so well, so they started a buffet style situation. The recipe cards are set out and everything to make the meal is arranged in a salad bar fashion so people can take what they need. I really like this idea. Although I would go to the grocery store to pick up one of the prepackaged ones too. It would make the trip to the grocery store shorter and also eliminate the meal planning aspect. Now, if they had an app where I can preview the meals before I go to the store or feature them in the weekly sales papers (then I’d be more motivated to check my mailbox too) that would be great!

 

Did you try HelloFresh or any other meal plan delivery service? Tell me about your experience in the comments.