Welcome to Homemaking Tips Tuesdays where contributing writers share helpful homemaking tips so you can feel more successful caring for your home and family.

{This week, post by: Jessica}

A meal delivery service can be a great option for those struggling to regularly get to the grocery store or for those who want to get out of a cooking rut.  While it may be cheaper to purchase and make meals on your own, you are getting good value out of paying a company to take some of the prep work out of dinner time. It at least eliminates another round of take out.

Over several months, I subscribed and unsubscribed to seven different meal delivery services to try and answer some of these questions:

Are they a good value? 

What are the portion sizes like? 

Will the food actually taste good? 

The best ways to stay ahead of the dinner time crazies is with meal prepping, planning ahead with crock pot meals, and saving on groceries.

But what if all that prep is just not your thing?

Are you wanting to try a meal delivery service, but don’t know where to start? 

The services I compared (in no particular order) were Blue Apron, Gobble, Hello Fresh, Green Chef, Munchery, HomeChef and Dream Diners. (Dream Dinners is technically not a delivery service but it is worth a look for doing bulk meal prep). Each meal delivery service comparison resulted in pros and cons of each company. Some were better than others. I’ve broken it all down for you.

Detailed Meal Delivery Service Comparison

The price plans vary greatly. Each meal delivery service cost between $8-$12 per serving, depending on the chosen meal plan.

In this comparison, I purchased the meal plan available to feed two adults and two small children.  Most services advertise that each meal serves two.  In our case, the first serving went to my husband, and the second was split between me and the kids.  With each service I tested, we had plenty of food for the four of us, although there were some meals where I had to have something on standby for the kids.

Each meal delivery service had a unique but similar way of packaging their ingredients.  This could probably be used as the strongest argument as to why one should avoid such services.

Some used more reusable containers than others.  (I finally found a container to hold my daughter’s erasers that she brings home from school, but doesn’t want thrown away.)

Some containers were more recyclable (cardboard), and one used nothing but plastic bags.

Each box from the various meal delivery services arrived sufficiently insulated with “reusable” cold packs except the delivery from Home Chef. Their cold packs were all on the bottom of the box. Since the delivery was left on the porch in the sun (in southern California), it was not insulated enough to withstand sitting outside for more than an hour. (We luckily saw the FedEx truck turn into our neighborhood as we were leaving on a family outing for the day!)

If you decide to use one of these meal delivery services regularly, I recommend inquiring about some type of recycling program for their boxes and ice packs.

Meal Delivery Service Comparison by Company

The graphics below provide my experience with each service. Pictures of the ingredients and packaging for most of the meal delivery services are included as well to give you a sneak preview. (Clicking on each image will take you to that company’s home page.)

Overall Ranking of Meal Delivery Service Companies:

Best Flavor: Green Chef followed by Munchery

Best Packaging: Green Chef

Best Variety of Meals: Blue Apron followed by Green Chef

Easiest to Prep/Cook: Hello Fresh followed by Munchery

Least Flavor: Gobble

Least Prep Work: Gobble

Longest Prep/Cook Time: Green Chef

Top Pick: Green Chef – Although these meals took the longest to prepare, this was the only service in which I could choose a low carb option (my family doesn’t eat a lot of potatoes or pasta).  The recipes were very easy to follow and tasted fantastic.

Worst Pick: Gobble – Although this service advertises your meals are ready in 10 minutes or less (mostly because everything is prepped for you), my meals took twice as long to prep.  The recipes require everything to be cooked at very high temperatures, with multiple steps going on at once.  The flavors were very disappointing.

Have you every tried a meal delivery service to help cut down the stress of dinner time prep? What company do you prefer?

Jessica is a stay at home mom of two lovely little girls.  She is also a military spouse and an entrepreneur.  Jessica enjoys staying active and spending time outdoors with her family, cooking, and reading.  In addition, Jessica is hard at work growing her company Five O’Clock Jelly.