Tasting Toronto on Wheels is featuring three popular meal kit companies. They are a good option not only for individuals with a busy lifestyle, but also for people with physical disabilities and seniors who may need assistance preparing meals or have difficulty grocery shopping. If you're looking to try one of the companies out, most of them offer discounts for the first week of delivery and have a straightforward cancellation policy if you want to end your subscription.
Meal kits have become all the rage the last little while, so when my brother-in-law gave me a week's worth of free meals from Hello Fresh I finally decided to try it out.
For those of you who have never tried meal kits before, the purpose of them is to eliminate the hassle of meal planning, grocery shopping and meal preparation. With Hello Fresh, you can choose between three meal plans. The Family Plan serves 4 people and allows you to choose between three or four recipes per week for a total cost of $10.83 per serving. The Pronto Plan serves two or four people and allows you to choose between three or four recipes per week for a total cost of $13.33 per serving. Lastly, the Veggie Plan serves two people with three recipes per week for $12.33 per serving. Each plan includes free shipping.
I chose to go with the two person, three recipe Pronto Plan because I was looking for quick weekday meals and the Pronto kit promised pre-cut, pre-measured meals in 30 minutes or less. Even though I love to cook, one of the things I don't like about cooking (especially on a weekday) is taking the time to cut and prepare all of my vegetables, so I thought this plan was the best option.
The meals I chose were Gnocchi Bolognese with Fresh Tomato Sauce, Carrots and Parmesan, Burrata Margherita Pizzettes with Golden Corn and Shallots, and Lemon Chicken and Goat Cheese with Crisp Pear, Arugula and Lemon Vinaigrette. While I thought every Hello Fresh meal was delicious and used excellent ingredients, the issues started when I opened up the my first meal - the Gnocchi Bolognese. I realized that although the ingredients were pre-measured, they were not pre-cut like I thought and the sauce for the gnocchi required me to cut two tomatoes, chop a shallot and grate two carrots. Even though it doesn't seem like I a lot of prep work, it took at least 10 minutes to do all of the cutting, not to mention browning the meat for the sauce, making the sauce and pan frying the gnocchi. When all was said and done it took me about an hour to make the dish.
My second meal, Burrata Margherita Pizzettes, was less time consuming, but it took longer than 30 minutes to make. With this dish I tried to be more organized. While the naan was in the oven for the first bake I cut and browned the corn and shallots. Once the naan was done browning, I assembled the pizzettes, put them back in the oven and made the salad. When it came to making the salad I veered off the instructions because I was supposed to cut the cucumbers when I cut the shallots but I thought it was easier to cut them when I was ready to make the salad. (As you can probably tell, I hate following recipes!)
My final meal from Hello Fresh was the Lemon Chicken and Goat Cheese and it was the best tasting of all of the dishes I received, but was also the most time consuming than the others. I found that the order the cooking directions were laid out made the dish more complex to make as I had to dice and roast potatoes, slice pears, zest a lemon, toast walnuts, fry the chicken, make the dressing and assemble the salad. The worst part of making this dish was trying to put everything together without cross-contaminating raw chicken with the rest of the ingredients. In the end, I loved the dish and consider it a victory that I didn't give us food poisoning.
The one thing that surprised me was the portion sizes. We had leftovers of the gnocchi bolognese and lemon chicken, which makes the meals feel slightly more economical. Even Hello Fresh takes the stress away of having to grocery shop and figuring out a meal plan, the amount of time it takes to prepare each meal is not worth the price of the plans. If you have difficulty or are unable to cut ingredients, or if you require assistance preparing your meals and have a limited time frame to cook, Hello Fresh is likely not a good option for you.
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