Hello fresh - why?

[Montymorency]

Just wanting to understand why people go to the expense of these food boxes when they could just choose a recipe and buy the ingredients themselves

Because I’m currently 7 months pregnant, work full time and my husband is away for 3 weeks and my motivation to think and meal plan doesn’t extend much more than toast.

I only get it on deals and normally a couple of meals a week so it doesn’t feel very expensive and I cook the rest of the time.

The advantage of the meal boxes is you don’t have to work out what ingredients are needed or whether you have them. Look at the picture of the meal and select - job done

That’s so rude and unnecessary, it seems to me only stupid people would make such a sweeping and scathing statement.

I’ve used them in the past and I wouldn’t consider bringing up children single handed and holding down a job Mon-Fri to be lazy or stupid. They were really handy for me. I don’t use them now as I don’t need to (older kids, more independent and I’m no longer working Mon-Fri). I still meal plan for the week but HF and Gousto were just what I needed at the time.

I don't think it is that expensive in comparison to supermarket shopping especially when you bear in mind that you'd have to buy a whole pot of whatever seasoning rather than a spoonful.

Might be different if you're feeding a family of four but for me as a solo adult it's definitely not. I also got an Amazon Prime offer for a year's free delivery.

It is easy and you don't have to think about what to eat as much or do shopping -that's really the only benefits.

I thought the quality was very poor and even though there's no food waste there's a lot more packaging waste so I think if that's what you care about then you're doing the wrong thing. The range you can get on the basic plan is pretty boring too and are all easy recipes that mostly rely on packet sauces.

It is definitely more expensive than supermarket shopping if you invested the money in all the spices and stuff upfront like the cost of a box then the rest of the ingredients are much cheaper than paying the subscription.

For people who don’t use them or like them I can’t understand why you’d care (so much so that snarky comments are made) if other people use them. It has absolutely no impact on you whatsoever.

I use it because I am very lazy, I like nice food and I hate cooking.
I just pick some meals every week. It isn’t difficult to add a bit to it in order to feed all of us. I don’t have to think, I follow the recipe card instructions whilst watching netflix or something.
There’s no wastage either. We don’t have a lot of storage in our kitchen, and can’t store random bottles of things. Hello fresh only deliver what you need

This.

As someone who lives alone and has a chronic illness, it's nice to offload a bit of the mental load to a service like this so I don't have to plan a meal, shop for the stuff, put it away, buy jars and bottles I might only use once which means they get wasted...

Just had a look at Gousto. 5 meals, 4 portions costs £60. We shop in ALDI and honestly, that is less money than our ALDI shop (we go twice a week).
I'm seriously considering it now.

I know how to buy in bulk I just don't have any storage space. Not everyone has vast amounts of cupboard space!

I've got a friend who is in a terrible situation moneywise who only uses HelloFresh. I suggested, when she said she didn't know where to cut back, that a food shop at Aldi/Lidl/Basics from bigger Supermarkets might cut back on her spending but she explained it was a non-negotiable.

She struggles with PND and brain fog and finds the convenience of not having to plan and do a shop, or do a meal plan makes the cost worth it for her. She's also not a confident cook and finds working out how much she needs to buy really hard so that's another reason. She knew her and the kids wouldn't get decent meals without HF and she didn't have the energy to change things at that point. It really is the best option for her at this stage in her life.

It was interesting for me to hear that perspective, and I can see why she prioritises it.

Tried them for a few weeks but eventually cancelled the subscription. The recipes were dumbed down to a Fisher Price level, the amount of waste packaging was ludicrous, portion sizes miserable and just too expensive.

Quite ! No one is forcing anyone else to use them.

It's also quite a snobby, rude assumption that everyone who uses them is an idiot who could burn a pot noodle. If you do use them because you can't cook / never learned and are building skills and confidence then good for you ! If you use them because you've decided there are other things that you want or need to speed your time or energy on (like me) then good for you !

We’ve tried them all & Gousto is our favourite. I’m actually a brilliant cook but meal boxes mean:

I don’t have to decide 5 dinners a week and source ingredients;

We eat fresh, home cooked food pretty much every night whereas if we didn’t get them, I’d definitely resort to freezer food more often;

I like spending my weekends not batch cooking;

As a family of four, meals for four give us enough leftovers for my husband’s lunch the next day = saves us money;

They’re varied. This week we’ve got Spanish, Chinese, Mexican & Italian;

They’re easy to adapt to your family (spice, extra veg etc etc) and no one gets bored

Honestly I could go on and on. We get 3/4 meals a week by them

Time poor, cash rich.

It creates an enormous amout of waste.

I've got ADHD, dyslexia and dyscalculia. I absolutely can't cook any other way, I've tried for years but I always miss an ingredient or something goes out of date before I use it

Honestly do it. The portions are decent too. Ours feeds my husband, me, an 8 year old and an 11 year old. The 11 year old eats more than any of us and nobody is ever hungry. We usually have leftovers for lunch the next day. I do often add extra salad sides though but that’s mainly because we all like salad / raw veg. Sometimes I’ll add extra naan or garlic bread, but that’s personal preference really!

We used to get them sometimes when we were younger (no kids) as we'd eat out a fair bit so doing a 'big' shop often used to lead to waste. We'd get back late from work and it's easy to prepare. The best thing about it, for me, was the fact that they would send things I wouldn't normally cook so the variety was nice.

With all due respect a lot of cooking is by eye. Its pretty hard to get something like chilli wrong or soup.

I always mess up rice and pasta though because I'm too lazy to reach for the scales.

I feel that they've done that 'thing' (and I am sure that there's a name for it that I forget) where, when they first created the brand they were high quality and decent options, and now they've established a name for themselves and have subscribers they have let things slip. A lot of brands (fashion, electronics) have/do do the same thing.

With the 'no waste' thing, I wonder how much food waste there is during the production of these boxes.

Going through recipe books
Choosing new things to try
Finding and buying all the ingredients

All takes loads of time and thought!
Then you also have lots of ingredients that you might have only needed a tablespoon of but you're now stuck with a whole jar you're never going to use.

Whereas going through a website where you can filter recipes for under 30 minutes or veggie or gluten free for example is really quick. And the portioned ingredients and a recipe card turn up at your door.

We do now keep a few of the recipe cards for meals we liked and add to the normal food shop/meal plan, but still do a box every now and again to try new things.

Mental load. Got fed up of thinking of meals and ended up cooking the same thing over and over. This makes me cook things I wouldn’t normally. If I saw the recipe I probably wouldn’t bother but when I am forced to I end up really liking them. I now of course keep the recipes I like and do them. But still I order about 6 meals a month and it makes my life easier.

We dip in and out, I can cook, I’m also very busy, like PP’s have said, they remove the mental load, avoid takeaways & supermarket convenience foods. I think they are good value for money, been having them since DC were younger and fussy about eating. They now eat a more extensive range of foods and are no longer adverse to trying new food. Have a box coming 2mro and looking forward to it as haven’t had one for a few weeks.

Gousto has overhauled my life!! seriously
I have some minor talents but cooking isn't one of them- I absolutely loathe thinking about it, shopping and prepping food
I have a family of 4- 2 fussy treens- and started gousto about 2 years ago-
we each choose the recipes for a week (5!!)
for my family it means we eat together, we eat fresh food, in the main we all like it and I even quite enjoy the chopping etc,
We've saved lots of money because we were so useless at the alternative
And I've also lost 2 stone which was an unintentional side effect of the portion control that comes with meal kits- I'm the right weight for my height now
for me it's worth every penny- I dont buy many clothes or luxuries but i'd rather prioritise the meal-kits (which are my luxury, I guess)