Hello fresh / Gousto....talk to me!

[Decafflatteplease]

Hi I'm thinking about getting one of these meal kits can anyone who gets them answer a couple of questions?

I'm a busy mum (aren't we all!) And due to complex needs of my DC I'm currently cooking 2-3 meals a night and it's taking up so much headspace. I can't avoid this due to aforementioned complex needs but I was thinking if at least DH myself and 1 dc had one of these kits it would possibly take off some of the mental load? Maybe??!!

When I've looked online it seems that with Gousto you can look at the menu just by putting your post code in but with hello fresh you need to book first is that right?

How long do they last eg if I wanted it 3 days a week and say It got delivered on a Sunday ready for the week, would they have to be eaten Mon Tues weds or can they last all week if that makes sense

Do either / both/ none come in bags ready to go eg a bag with all the items for Monday then a bag with all the items for Tues or is it just loose in a box? Looking for something my teens can make a start on for dinner so the simpler the better.

How long do they take to cook? It is easy or am I need every pan and utensil we own 😂

How big are the portion sizes? Looking for 2 adults 1 teen so would that be a 2 portion or a 4 portion eg if they are small portion I'll need a 4 person one won't I? Also hoping for leftovers for lunches.

Can anyone recommend one over the other if you have tried both?

Lastly is it worth the money?

I've tried Gousto and Hello Fresh.

I really enjoy getting them but find that once the offers finish they are expensive compared to meal planning and grocery shopping. BUT. They are great at taking a bit of weight off the mental load.

Gousto seem to have more choice, but in my experience the recipes can be more faffy. You can look at the steps and suggested time and figure out which ones will be easier and which ones more faffy.

I've found the quality of both to be good. Once hello fresh missed a few ingredients out of my box but were very good and quick to offer credit.

We tried hello fresh once and found it very disappointing compared to gousto.
Gousto give you an indication (on each Meal choice online) expected use by dates.
I normally make sure I just add at least one meal that has a longer date on for the end of the week and eat the rest accordingly.
They (unfortunately) aren't bagged per meal - my one issue with them.
Some meals are easier to cook than others - some do require quite a bit of faffing but equally you can get some much easier.
Portions are good.

Oh and to add, I've found they just about last the week. Some things were on the turn but still edible.

Hello Fresh bag everything up separately but Gousto deliver in one bag if I remember correctly.

I loved Gousto but can't afford it when it's not on offer. The portions were huge. We could sometimes get 5-6 portions from the 4 person kit.

Now use "lollipop". It's not meal kits, but you pick recipes and it adds the ingredients to your sainsburys basket. They have meal planning functions and you can filter by dietary requirements.

www.lollipopai.com/
They have an app too.

Gousto bag all the small bits (of which there are many in one bag, then everything else is separate. There are lots of bags and packs of stuff.

Portion size is variable, but you're unlikely to get meals for 3 and leftovers out of a 2 person box, so you need a 4 person box (which works out better value) but even then you might not have leftovers if you are big eaters - I can see many people just serving the 4 person amount between 3 if there's men and teens involved.

I'm a confident cook and cook a wide variety of meals, but I found them quite fiddly and involved, with lots of different steps, but that could be the things I chose, I've had a couple of boxes on offers, but wouldn't get it routinely, because it is expensive, and I found we already had just about all the spices, sauces etc, and most of the meat/fish in the freezer and a good storecupboard of different types of grains etc.

I've read about a new app called Lollipop on here in the last few days, which I think works with BBC Good Food and Sainsburys to give you a selection of meals to choose from and then translate it automatically into a home delivery shopping order - but I think all the supermarket websites already do that - it probably adds something by showing you a limited selection of meals, possibly with some customisation - eg if you're vegetarian or can't eat dairy or whatever.

I just thought I’d try to avoid having to meal plan and shop and got a hello fresh box (having done it previously during the pandemic). When I received the box, I remembered why I’d stopped the first time. Missing bloody ingredients.

Two of the meals are missing the core bloody ingredient - chicken. Giving me a voucher to use on any undiscounted box does not help me to make a chicken curry and a chicken stir fry (both of which are mostly chicken served with rice). I could have worked around just about anything else missing (even the rice). But I have to go and buy some chicken just so I can cook the meals I’ve already paid for.

A voucher to reduce the price of a future box is not a reasonable customer service response to this. Especially when you can’t use it with any of the discounts that make it worth buying a box.

I remembered that missing ingredients were standard, and that you have to carefully check through everything to make sure it’s there when the box arrives. Which is annoying, and requires you to reference the recipe cards/sheets of paper.

I’ve done both and I think gousto have better recipes and choice. But missing ingredients (and overwhelming amounts of packaging to deal with) are an issue with them too.

In theory, picking meals and then having the right ingredients delivered to you should be really helpful. But only if the right ingredients actually arrive.

The other thing is that if you order a box for an odd number of people, you don’t necessarily get the right amount of ingredients. So you have to do a bit of measuring to try to figure out how to put 42g of stock in when you’ve got two 28g sachets.

obviously it’s not a massive problem, but the selling point of this stuff is that you are supposed to not have to do this. I can cook really well. If I want to procure and measure my own ingredients, I’ll do that. If I’m buying hello fresh it’s because I can’t be arsed.

I use Gousto when I'm in a cooking rut and there's an offer on. It's getting me through a boring January and my unadventurous teen does eat better when I involve her in choosing the recipes. I had Hello Fresh for a while but I think the Gousto recipes are far better, as is the quality of the raw ingredients. I avoid the fiddly recipes although I enjoy their 'world tour' ones with dishes from different countries. Give it a go!

Another one who has just discovered Lollipop app. Would recommend that over meal delivery kits. Is cheaper and so much more flexible..

Gousto bag all the small bits (of which there are many in one bag, then everything else is separate. There are lots of bags and packs of stuff.

Oh yes. So many small bits and sachets.

Hello fresh bag up most of each meal in a paper bag. But the meat and dairy comes in a chilled bag separately.

Still lots of small bits. Less than gousto though. Gousto will send you a sachet of paprika, two sachets of cumin, and so on, while hello fresh will tend to send you a mixed seasoning bag containing all the herbs and spices.

The other thing is that the recipes repeat common elements a lot. Small cubes of roasted potato features in many, many dishes.

I think these sorts of things are more helpful if you don't keep much of a storecupboard and don't have much imagination/interest in food, so need to be shown pictures of a nice meal in order to want to cook it.

Can you batch cook for the DC with complex needs so you can cook one main meal a day for everyone and then just heat up a portion of the food that is suitable for other DC?

Plus can you get some of the others in the house to do some of the cooking? If your DH and teen(s) did one or two nights of cooking each, each week, then it would spread the load and not all be on you?

I use gousto and have done for nearly 5 years, I find it really helps with meal planning especially with working and studying and when im on placement it’s easy for the DH to make something. It works out roughly
the same as what I was spending on groceries once a fortnight as not buying all the stuff to make meals now and only odd things to keep the freezer stocked

Hello Fresh bag the ingredients for each meal up separately, with the exception of chilled stuff, with is all together in an insulated bag. I found that if I froze the meat when it arrived, and put the bags in the fridge, I could make a five meal box last two weeks (some meals are big enough for three portions).

If you would like to try HF, here's a discount code for your first orders -

Hi, you’ve been invited to experience cooking with HelloFresh. To get started, claim this £47 promotion towards your first box of fresh ingredients and delicious recipes. Start your cooking adventure today. and use the following promo code: HS-F4Q0042YZ. Happy Cooking! https://www.hellofresh.co.uk/pages/raflp11?c=HS-F4Q0042YZ&utmmcampaign=native-share-panel&utmcouponvalue=47&utmmmedium=iOSReferral&utmsource=raf-share&utmm_invitername=Helen

If you look at the recipes section in Gousto (I like the food so sometimes cook their recipes without buying the ingredients from them) you will see that there is a lot of repetition/themes - eg chicken and cubed potato, with different spices/seasonings to be 'Indian', 'Mexican' or 'French'.

LOVE Gousto, especially their plant based recipes, most in our experience are outstanding.

LOVE Gousto, especially their plant based recipes, most in our experience are outstanding.

LOVE Gousto, especially their plant based recipes, most in our experience are outstanding.

I've tried both.

DH and I prefer hello fresh and kids prefer gusto

To answer your questions

Hello fresh you can look menus in advance and cancel right up to despatch
Try the app.

Both you are not committed to a box every week. We get them about once a month.

How long do they last - usually still fine after 5-7 days

Hello fresh has each meal in a paper bag that goes the fridge that you just take out when ready. Gusto you need to separate and organise.

How long do they take to cook? It is easy or am I need every pan and utensil we own 😂. 20-40 mins and it tells you in the recipe. Very easy to cook. With pictures. No weighing and measuring.

How big are the portion sizes? We find the portion sizes perfect but no leftovers.

Can anyone recommend one over the other if you have tried both?

I do prefer hello fresh but why don't you try one box of each. There's no long term commitment to either.

I've tried both.

DH and I prefer hello fresh and kids prefer gusto

To answer your questions

Hello fresh you can look menus in advance and cancel right up to despatch
Try the app.

Both you are not committed to a box every week. We get them about once a month.

How long do they last - usually still fine after 5-7 days

Hello fresh has each meal in a paper bag that goes the fridge that you just take out when ready. Gusto you need to separate and organise.

How long do they take to cook? It is easy or am I need every pan and utensil we own 😂. 20-40 mins and it tells you in the recipe. Very easy to cook. With pictures. No weighing and measuring.

How big are the portion sizes? We find the portion sizes perfect but no leftovers.

Can anyone recommend one over the other if you have tried both?

I do prefer hello fresh but why don't you try one box of each. There's no long term commitment to either.

I've tried both.

DH and I prefer hello fresh and kids prefer gusto

To answer your questions

Hello fresh you can look menus in advance and cancel right up to despatch
Try the app.

Both you are not committed to a box every week. We get them about once a month.

How long do they last - usually still fine after 5-7 days

Hello fresh has each meal in a paper bag that goes the fridge that you just take out when ready. Gusto you need to separate and organise.

How long do they take to cook? It is easy or am I need every pan and utensil we own 😂. 20-40 mins and it tells you in the recipe. Very easy to cook. With pictures. No weighing and measuring.

How big are the portion sizes? We find the portion sizes perfect but no leftovers.

Can anyone recommend one over the other if you have tried both?

I do prefer hello fresh but why don't you try one box of each. There's no long term commitment to either.

I find the hello fresh dates are short, some I get expire before the end of the same week it’s delivered. Some meals can take 30 mins + cause you’re cooking from scratch . Like Iv had some that can take an hour to cook , obv depends on what you order. Now the offer has ended it’s costing around £50 a week for 4 meals for two people . It’s hand for us as it’s just two of us and I don’t need to go to the shop as much and I don’t need to plan my meals but couldn’t afford it for more than two of us.

if you think a meal deal from M&S or Tesco is around £10-£12 it’s not expensive in comparison but if you just meal planned and bought stuff from supermarket it’s obv cheaper .

Goodness. No idea why you got all those duplicates

We tried both last summer, we did enjoy them but they took up a lot of space with bags of ingredients a lot of which we already had, some of the fresh salad ingredients weren’t very fresh at all and sometimes shelflives were short. It felt like a lot of packaging waste as well.

You have to keep on top of the ordering or they pick meals for you automatically. If you pause or cancel your subscription they do sent more offers to lure you back again. I wouldn’t want to do it long term but it was a nice thing to try for a few weeks

We've had gousto for at least 3 years now. For me it is cheaper than going to source the ingredients at the shop as I have a tendency to add random stuff to my basket and I almost always forget an important ingredient!
I prefer the meat quality and choice of meals that gousto offer (compared to hello fresh) Some recipes might be a bit 'faffy' but I think it's pretty obvious which ones they are. My DH can follow the recipe cards, which is saying a lot!
If you want a discount code then I'm happy to share, I think it's 55% off your first box.