Head Tale

Shea and I recently decided to give Hello Fresh a try.

If you haven’t heard of it, it’s one of a few competing companies that have sprung up over the past decade or so that sends pre-packed supplies for making a single meal.

Many of my friends swear by meal delivery services, referring to them as complete game-changers that ultimately expanded their recipe repertoires and drastically cut down the amount of time spent sweating over the stovetop. Perhaps this was the solution I was looking for, even if only on weeknights when time was short and my patience was thin.

Shea did most of the work to set it up but here’s how I understand it – you pick how many different meals you want to receive, which recipes, and how many servings (enough for 2 people or 4 people.)

ADVANTAGES
– simplifies meal preparation (useful on weeknights when it’s often easier to default to fast food on the way home or convenience foods)

– saves time shopping (doubly helpful in Covid times if you don’t like going to grocery stores)

– provides recipe cards you could save and re-use if you did decide to buy your own supplies in future

DISADVANTAGES
– obviously you pay a premium for any service like this over buying individual ingredients and preparing everything yourself

– lot of waste as most items in the package are individually wrapped/packaged  (I guess the flip side is it might help prevent food waste as you’re not buying bigger amounts of items you might only need for one recipe or use a small amount of or whatever.)

– you still have to do prep and cook so still not as convenient as ordering restaurant meals.

INTANGIBLES
– would be interesting to see the cost analysis versus prepping everything completely yourself versus ordering in a restaurant meal.  I would imagine Hello Fresh comes in somewhere between those two

– I think you have flexibility for ordering your meals so you don’t have to “subscribe” to a weekly delivery unless you want to which gives you more control of your financial commitment

– for the most part, the kits supply a main course and a salad (I think) so you still have to prepare a side dish.  (We didn’t order any but they also include vegetarian selections.)

– And obviously, you can also add/improvise away from the provided recipe if you want too.

Anyhow, our first meal (lamb burgers) pictured above, was *really* good but I’m not convinced this is something we’ll order regularly either.