Cooking is complicated. Even when you are a good cook! I had the luxury of trying meal kit subscriptions and Hello cool It’s one of the most popular (which is why it gets its own review). I would consider HelloFresh and Blue Apron to be the two “models” for other meal kit services. In general, both are complete and accessible. HelloFresh’s instructions are detailed and the resulting dishes are delicious. It’s a very solid service, as long as you’re the type of person who would like meal kits in the first place.
HelloFresh plans start at $10 per serving. Plans start at $57 per week for two meals with two servings each and go up to $240 for six meals with four servings each. As with most meal kit services, there are almost always introductory promotions, so you can try it out for a cheaper price if you want. You can skip, adjust, pause or cancel at any time. HelloFresh’s pricing is squarely in the middle of similarly priced meal kits.
Each week, you can choose your meals from a menu with more than 20 recipes to choose from. There are options for vegetarians, vegans, low-carb and low-calorie diets, and family-friendly meals. When choosing your meals, some recipes allow you to swap out ingredients, like asparagus for carrots, a feature you won’t find on most other meal kit subscriptions. Meals arrive in an insulated box with ingredients packed together in paper bags (not including protein). HelloFresh uses less packaging than some of its competitors; For example, the products are not wrapped in plastic. When it’s time to cook, you can grab your recipe card, your paper bag, and your proteins and get started.
most of The packaging is recyclable.and HelloFresh has committed to offsetting 100 percent of its carbon emissions. The brand also uses 100 percent renewable electricity.
get cooking
HelloFresh recipe cards are packed with information. I highly recommend reading them cover to cover, multiple times, so you don’t run the risk of having to mash potatoes while also making a sauce, or needing room temperature butter when all the butter is cold. The time estimates on the card are overly optimistic. I’m a very experienced home chef and I usually spend at least 10 minutes on what the recipe estimates.
For this round of testing, I did Prosciutto Wrapped Chicken, Meat Pies with Creamy Thyme Sauceand Grilled steak with parsley butter. Each recipe was delicious and easy to make. I’ve had bad experiences with meal kit steak before, but this time, the steaks were tasty, albeit oddly shaped. And although I’ve cooked millions of meals in my life, somehow I’ve never wrapped chicken in prosciutto. I’ll do it again!
I appreciate that the recipe cards have tips, like when you might want to use compound butter or that you should place vegetables cut side down on a baking sheet to ensure they get crispy. These types of tricks usually come from trial and error. Having them on your recipe card is like having an expert chef looking over your shoulder (without being called a sandwich idiot).
HelloFresh sends you everything you need for each recipe, with a few exceptions. You will have to get your own butter, oil, salt and pepper. Another thing to keep in mind is that sometimes you will need special tools, such as a grater or potato masher. And depending on your comfort in the kitchen, you may have to look up a few things on YouTube, like how to zest a lemon or what temperature to cook a steak if you want it medium rare.
Staging
Generally you will want to have some specific tools. I always use my confidence kiwi blade, featured in our guide to the best chef knives. It’s also helpful to have a kitchen timer on hand – I use my Apple Watch or my Google Home. That makes it easier to keep track of what you’re doing, since you’ll often be cooking multiple dishes simultaneously.
And speaking of multiple dishes, I never knew how plate-averse I was when cooking until I started using meal kits. When it comes to meal kits, if you don’t wash your dishes every day, you’re going to be in trouble. There are so many dishes for each recipe! (Note to my future self: next time make sure your dishwasher is running before calling for a round of these to try.)
I have one complaint with meal kits in general, and that is that you lose the ability to choose the ingredients yourself. It’s a blessing and a curse. For one thing, I don’t have to go to the supermarket. But on the other hand, I have to cook whatever service sends me, even if my steak is strangely triangular or my lemons are wilting, which happened during this test. The ingredients were still usable, but it is a factor to take into account.
All told, I think HelloFresh can be profitable, especially considering the cost of food these days. And although you lose the ability to choose your own ingredients, meal kits are a great way to make cooking less daunting. If you’re cooking for a large family or are a mega-couponer who wants to buy things in bulk, HelloFresh may not be the best option. But you might love HelloFresh if you regularly stress over what to make for dinner, want to order less takeout, or if, like me, you grew up learning to cook for six people and now always make too much food.
HelloFresh doesn’t have a big one Wow factor that differentiates it. It is very common and ordinary. And that can be a good thing! If you don’t need all the bells and whistles that come with more specialty meal kits, HelloFresh is a super easy (and tasty) way to take the stress out of cooking.
