Which meal delivery box thingy to try?

[JuneOsborne]

I'm behind the times with this. I fancy trying them/one out. I'm bored of my repertoire and bored of food shopping/meal planning.

We're a family of 5 adults and pre-teen. One meat eater and the rest are veggie. I'm thinking one a week/fortnight just to change things up.

Which one do I try? And how do I decide?

Do the ingredients come pre weighed? Do you get everything you need? Do I subscribe? There seems to be so many options.

Tell me all about them and tell me the pros and cons/what your favourite meals from them are/how often you get them and if you've tried more than one, which you think is the best and why. If you don't mind! Thanks

I've been doing Hello Fresh for two years and love it. We do it 5 nights a week. Eat at MIL's one night a week and probably eat out the last night of the week. Love it and couldn't go back to meal planning and buying all the ingredients at the shops again. I feel I eat a much more varied and healthy diet with HF.
Yes the ingredients are all pre weighed so very little chopping.
With HF I think the minimum delivery is two boxes/week. Also 5 adults and one pre teen-so six people? The max size on Hello Fresh is for 4 people so you'd maybe have to buy 2 boxes for 3 if that's possible.
The portion sizes are massive.

If you shop online then simply cook boxes are good as the ingredients are always really easy to find in the shop.

I do Hello Fresh for me and 3dcs who are 15, 13 and 9. I get a box for 3 people and find that's plenty of food. I only do one box a week and I skip them if I can't afford it. Every recipe has been delicious. I'm veggie, dcs are not but I usually order all veggie meals.

Ah, this is all very helpful.

So HF=every single thing you need to make the meal Vs simply cook where I would have to buy additional ingredients?

I'm a gusto fan. Have done gousto and hello fresh and find gousto slightly more adventurous recipe wise.

Both give you everything you need for the meal (except oil).

We have just started Hello Fresh (two weeks in) and we bloody love it! It’s so easy and it’s exciting to be cooking different stuff. It helps with portion size as we do tend to overeat or cook too much half of which goes to waste. Highly recommend

I'm a gousto fan too

Pm me if you want a code

Simply cook is literally just 3 pots of like spices or sauces and a recipe card. You would have to go to the shop. They provide a list of what you need and its normally really everyday stuff. It's not really what you want if you want all the ingredients delivered and portioned.

Gousto is our favourite for value and variety, we've tried HF and others and found gousto the most reliable.

Can I piggyback and ask what is the best one for a veggie family? I tried Hello Fresh but found all the little packages v annoying and not v eco friendly. But also fed up of cooking.

I've tried hello fresh and Gousto and we were really disappointed with both of them. The portion sizes were very small but far more importantly, the quality of the ingredients was very poor - meat and vegetables. It took ages to sort out all the little sachets and there were some missing. I've since used simply cook a few times, which I find far better. Yiu just get three pots of spices or sauce for each recipe and then add your own meat, vegetables etc.

I've literally just tried Hello Fresh this week, and I'm so so underwhelmed!

I'm not sure if I started on a bad week, or because it's the discounted first week so the options aren't that great. The "menu" to chose from was really meh.

The majority of meals were mince or bacon based. Granted a few chicken thighs and veggie options too.

Whilst I like the concept, I think I might try a few others to find one with better options.

I’ve used all of them.

Green Chef has been the best in terms of quality. If you want to make the meals more calorific or filling, I’d get in some bags of mini potatoes that can be microwaved or good bread- as they are lower in calories than the other offerings.

Mindful chef has been great for us for veggie meals (we do eat fish). Everything you need is provided…..the only thing you might need is oil/salt/pepper. They are generally low calorie too, every little helps!

I've tried Gousto, Hello Fresh and Simply Cook.

I found SC the worst, it's just pots of spice. I still had to cook good for all the ingredients and make sure I added them all. I found the recipes hit and miss.

Gousto was better than HF in terms of variety and quality. I've got some meals that I added to my regular meal plan.

But ultimately they are all expensive/ not worth the money.

I've found the lollipop app to be the best. It's done via Sainsburys, you add the meals you want to your basket and it adds all the ingredients to your shop. The recipe in then on the app.

Gousto fan here aswell

We love Mindful Chef. Just had some amazing Japanese salad and stir friend veg and rice. Really good food, great range. I like the treats and smoothies you can buy too!

It's possible to just opt for a week every month right? With Gousto or Mindful Chef?

Green chef !

Gousto love it used it for ages

Just make sure you get a discount code before signing up
can usually get a first box for next to nothing and cancel if you don’t like

I tried Hello Fresh for a while, but they are all really expensive. Something I have tried and like is Sorted Food's App. You sign up for 3 meals a week-there's a choice, then the app generates an online shopping list for you. Then there's really good recipe videos with inbuilt timers and stuff, and there's no food waste. It's like a meal box but you order the ingredients yourself. IYSWIM.

Gousto is far better for Veggies than Hello Fresh

I always found gousto better than hello fresh. But the game changer for me has been simply cook, so you just get the pastes (3 per meal), and you buy your own fresh ingredients. I always have chicken, fish and various veg in the fridge so it's been so easy. You often need things like coconut milk but that's it. I really like it

We tried gousto and I didn't really like it. It was so fiddly - for example, one of the recipes was a gnocchi Bolognese. I can easily whip up a Bolognese sauce with ingredients in my store cupboard plus fresh mince and veg. Because we had the family of 4 version, every single ingredient came in 2 fiddly packets: stock, worcestershire sauce, tomato puree, passata, herbs, seasoning, cheese, mince etc - so much unnecessary plastic.

I've got a Simply Cook code for a free box if you want:
https://www.simplycook.com/invite/6XQAMP?t=cp&pg=ref&via=mb

You can try then cancel if you're not a fan! Free delivery too!