Anonymous
07/31/2024 13:37
Subject: Feelings on meal-prep boxes? Personally, I've never understood the appeal...
Anonymous wrote:Anonymous wrote:For me, deciding what I want to eat isn't hard—I have probably TOO MANY ideas of what I should cook. And grocery shopping isn't hard. I've got two kids, a full-time job and a very busy spouse, but I've always liked going to grocery stores—I used to go with my mom as a kid and that store had warm vibes and my mom knew everyone who worked there (because working in a grocery store used to be a career where you stayed for decades and knew everyone). But even on insane weeks, we just get groceries delivered.
For me, the problem is getting home in time to cook a nutritious meal that my family will eat, not choosing the meal or acquiring the ingredients. Most weeks, I wind up feeling very guilty over the various things I bought earlier in the week that didn't wind up getting used because I didnt' have time to get them on the stove and the table.
So, when we've tried meal prep boxes, I find myself facing recipes that someone in the family is going to complain about, and still require preparation. It might save me the grocery shopping time, but it takes away the flexibility and still requires me to cook and clean up.
I think if I'm going to replace my own cooking, I just want whole meals, that someone else cooks for me. A private chef that doesn't mind my kids' withering criticisms.
But they're popular--what do you guys think? I know everyone has tried them, but do you stick with them or are they occasional things, just to fill in gaps in the weekly menu?
Meal-prep boxes are designed more for people who don't have time and also don't find it so easy to plan for meals. Sounds like you would be better served by advanced meal-prepping, ie allocating Sunday afternoons to preparing foods for the week, including things like putting together casseroles and freezing them; getting recipes ready (put together) so you can just pop them in the oven or on the stove or whatever on the night you need them. And consider making your schedule less crazy. It's ok not to fill everyone's every minute with activities. Even the youngest of kids can be brought into meal prep.
Yeah, thanks, I don't need life advice—just asking what people think of meal prep boxes.
Anonymous
07/31/2024 13:24
Subject: Feelings on meal-prep boxes? Personally, I've never understood the appeal...
Anonymous wrote:For me, deciding what I want to eat isn't hard—I have probably TOO MANY ideas of what I should cook. And grocery shopping isn't hard. I've got two kids, a full-time job and a very busy spouse, but I've always liked going to grocery stores—I used to go with my mom as a kid and that store had warm vibes and my mom knew everyone who worked there (because working in a grocery store used to be a career where you stayed for decades and knew everyone). But even on insane weeks, we just get groceries delivered.
For me, the problem is getting home in time to cook a nutritious meal that my family will eat, not choosing the meal or acquiring the ingredients. Most weeks, I wind up feeling very guilty over the various things I bought earlier in the week that didn't wind up getting used because I didnt' have time to get them on the stove and the table.
So, when we've tried meal prep boxes, I find myself facing recipes that someone in the family is going to complain about, and still require preparation. It might save me the grocery shopping time, but it takes away the flexibility and still requires me to cook and clean up.
I think if I'm going to replace my own cooking, I just want whole meals, that someone else cooks for me. A private chef that doesn't mind my kids' withering criticisms.
But they're popular--what do you guys think? I know everyone has tried them, but do you stick with them or are they occasional things, just to fill in gaps in the weekly menu?
Meal-prep boxes are designed more for people who don't have time and also don't find it so easy to plan for meals. Sounds like you would be better served by advanced meal-prepping, ie allocating Sunday afternoons to preparing foods for the week, including things like putting together casseroles and freezing them; getting recipes ready (put together) so you can just pop them in the oven or on the stove or whatever on the night you need them. And consider making your schedule less crazy. It's ok not to fill everyone's every minute with activities. Even the youngest of kids can be brought into meal prep.
Anonymous
07/31/2024 13:18
Subject: Feelings on meal-prep boxes? Personally, I've never understood the appeal...
Anonymous wrote:We're a family of four and got a Hello Fresh as gift. The prep was reasonable (for a teen boy!) and we enjoyed the variety it brought to our stale menu. The quality was pretty good (trigger warning - I shop at Aldi) and the portions were small but adequate.
We looked at their offers for extending but decided against it. The cost an issue but the hard NO was the literally insane packaging waste. The freezer packs are bags of gelatinous goop that I could not dispose of responsibly:
Will they take them back? Heck no.
Do I need another 10 pounds of freezer packs every week? No.
Can I pour it down the drain? They warn that it will clog your drains and I believe them.
Can I pour it on the ground? It's labeled as "non-toxic" but Hello Fresh won't tell you what it is. My own test show that it does not break down or go anywhere for a month when poured on the soil. It kills the grass, if you consider that useful.
Do I send it out in the trash? That's what Hello Fresh says and I think this is irresponsible. Adding that thin bag of goop to the waste stream is a guaranteed mess from the my trash bin to the street to the truck.
In my digging around, I found that Hello Fresh uses water, just water, in the freezer packs in other countries. Those customers just empty it into the sink!
But if you want to skip the meal-prep boxes because you're a good cook, that's good enough reason for me.
100%
We were given a few weeks of hello fresh when we were new parents and I didn't hate the food but the packaging waste was super stressful and because we did it like three weeks in a row it just built up. I would do it again of the fixed the waste issue.
Actually, sometimes our Whole Foods has some ready made or low prep meals available in their deli that cost about the same and are less work. There are made fresh that day and pretty tasty, and they come in easy-to-recycle containers that we can also reuse for packed lunches. I don't get what the advantage of hello fresh is.
Anonymous
07/31/2024 13:12
Subject: Re:Feelings on meal-prep boxes? Personally, I've never understood the appeal...
Anonymous wrote:Anonymous wrote:Meal kits are for people who can't or don't like to cook. They create a ton of waste and aren't very good. They are to cooking what paint by numbers kits are to creating art.
OP here, and I disagree with the metaphor.
When you open the box, you've still got everything you would if you had planned or shopped yourself. You've still got to spend the time cooking—they don't make that part any easier! And all they really are is a recipe card that has the same instructions that anything you pull from the cookbook shelf or get out of a magazine. It's as paint by numbers as using any recipe is. The metaphor only really works if you'd ordinarily be cooking by feel, sizing up your ingredients and adding a bit of this and that to make something nice.
Agree that I've never found them particularly good.
The funny thing is that you can download meal kit recipes and make them yourself. We did meal kits for a while and found them superfluous bit did discover a few good recipes while doing them including a really tasty glaze for roasted vegetables that we use all the time. But we just buy the ingredients and make them. I don't really understand the point if paying twice as much so they can ship ingredients to our house in a mess of hard-to-recycle packaging. We can get the same stuff for less at the Whole Foods 5 minutes from our house.
Meal kits are for people who think a 20 minute shopping trip to pick up chicken breasts and vegetables is too much work, and who don't know how to stock a pantry with basic ingredients and spices.
Anonymous
07/31/2024 13:08
Subject: Feelings on meal-prep boxes? Personally, I've never understood the appeal...
I did them for a week at my in-law's when we were using their vacation house during the pandemic and they'd ordered them there by mistake.
Meh. They were novel and not bad, but I like to cook and am fairly specific about what I like (it is a wide range, but I like what I like). I wouldn't use it as a 40 yo adult who actually likes to be in the kitchen and am comfortable cooking (and I would order out or eat something very very simple if pressed for time). But as a 20 something learning how to cook more complicated things, I might have enjoyed it to help me grow in that regard.
Meh. They were novel and not bad, but I like to cook and am fairly specific about what I like (it is a wide range, but I like what I like). I wouldn't use it as a 40 yo adult who actually likes to be in the kitchen and am comfortable cooking (and I would order out or eat something very very simple if pressed for time). But as a 20 something learning how to cook more complicated things, I might have enjoyed it to help me grow in that regard.
Anonymous
07/31/2024 13:04
Subject: Feelings on meal-prep boxes? Personally, I've never understood the appeal...
I've done them several times, mostly with Hellofresh. I like that fact that it enables me to branch out to things that I wouldn't normally make, and that the meals usually come out tasty. But the amount of packaging gives me serious heartburn. And it's never, ever as quick as the recipe says. If it says it's a 20 min meal, count on it being 40.
Anonymous
07/31/2024 13:00
Subject: Feelings on meal-prep boxes? Personally, I've never understood the appeal...
I meal plan weekly. When we do a CSA, I do it right after getting the box. When I buy a new cookbook (I usually borrow from the library first and even try a couple recipes before shelling out) DH and I like to go through and make a list of what might be tasty. Then each week, I look at what’s in the chest freezer, what produce we have, and what our schedule looks like (are we eating early, are we in a fast) and flip through whichever book I feel like until I fill up my week with meals that use up whatever I have on hand.
Anonymous
07/31/2024 12:59
Subject: Feelings on meal-prep boxes? Personally, I've never understood the appeal...
We're a family of four and got a Hello Fresh as gift. The prep was reasonable (for a teen boy!) and we enjoyed the variety it brought to our stale menu. The quality was pretty good (trigger warning - I shop at Aldi) and the portions were small but adequate.
We looked at their offers for extending but decided against it. The cost an issue but the hard NO was the literally insane packaging waste. The freezer packs are bags of gelatinous goop that I could not dispose of responsibly:
Will they take them back? Heck no.
Do I need another 10 pounds of freezer packs every week? No.
Can I pour it down the drain? They warn that it will clog your drains and I believe them.
Can I pour it on the ground? It's labeled as "non-toxic" but Hello Fresh won't tell you what it is. My own test show that it does not break down or go anywhere for a month when poured on the soil. It kills the grass, if you consider that useful.
Do I send it out in the trash? That's what Hello Fresh says and I think this is irresponsible. Adding that thin bag of goop to the waste stream is a guaranteed mess from the my trash bin to the street to the truck.
In my digging around, I found that Hello Fresh uses water, just water, in the freezer packs in other countries. Those customers just empty it into the sink!
But if you want to skip the meal-prep boxes because you're a good cook, that's good enough reason for me.
We looked at their offers for extending but decided against it. The cost an issue but the hard NO was the literally insane packaging waste. The freezer packs are bags of gelatinous goop that I could not dispose of responsibly:
Will they take them back? Heck no.
Do I need another 10 pounds of freezer packs every week? No.
Can I pour it down the drain? They warn that it will clog your drains and I believe them.
Can I pour it on the ground? It's labeled as "non-toxic" but Hello Fresh won't tell you what it is. My own test show that it does not break down or go anywhere for a month when poured on the soil. It kills the grass, if you consider that useful.
Do I send it out in the trash? That's what Hello Fresh says and I think this is irresponsible. Adding that thin bag of goop to the waste stream is a guaranteed mess from the my trash bin to the street to the truck.
In my digging around, I found that Hello Fresh uses water, just water, in the freezer packs in other countries. Those customers just empty it into the sink!
But if you want to skip the meal-prep boxes because you're a good cook, that's good enough reason for me.
Anonymous
07/31/2024 12:54
Subject: Re:Feelings on meal-prep boxes? Personally, I've never understood the appeal...
Anonymous wrote:Anonymous wrote:Meal kits are for people who can't or don't like to cook. They create a ton of waste and aren't very good. They are to cooking what paint by numbers kits are to creating art.
OP here, and I disagree with the metaphor.
When you open the box, you've still got everything you would if you had planned or shopped yourself. You've still got to spend the time cooking—they don't make that part any easier! And all they really are is a recipe card that has the same instructions that anything you pull from the cookbook shelf or get out of a magazine. It's as paint by numbers as using any recipe is. The metaphor only really works if you'd ordinarily be cooking by feel, sizing up your ingredients and adding a bit of this and that to make something nice.
Agree that I've never found them particularly good.
Well yes--if you're a halfway decent cook, you don't cook strictly to the recipe. I can't remember the last time I did that.
Anonymous
07/31/2024 12:51
Subject: Feelings on meal-prep boxes? Personally, I've never understood the appeal...
Anonymous wrote:Think of a meal, like meatloaf or par Thai. Google it. You will get 10000 different recipes, some terrible, some okay, but who has any idea? Ask ChatGPT, and they will give you a recipe that includes Elmer’s glue.
So many young adults are faced with this infinite landscape of options for even picking a recipe, let alone the dozens of options at a typical grocery store.
The meal services short circuit the paradox of choice. You get a selection of meals, pretty distinct and curated, and they do all the other “selecting” for you: recipe, ingredients. You act as a mindless automaton.
This is partly a factor of the “things your mom used to do for you” element of tech bro culture. But also the drop in SAHW, who used to get recipe ideas from magazines and trade them at PTA meetings — a much more curated choice.
A good recipe website like Epicurious or a mailing list would help a lot in curating recipes, but people aren’t going to spend real money on recipes, when there are so many “free” on the internet. Hence the move to additional services with hopefully more lock in and room for profit. But i think none of these services make money right?
I mean, get them a subscription to Cooks Illustrated and they'll be fine. If they can follow the instructions, as required by a meal prep box, they can make some bangers with ATK.
Anonymous
07/31/2024 12:50
Subject: Re:Feelings on meal-prep boxes? Personally, I've never understood the appeal...
Anonymous wrote:Meal kits are for people who can't or don't like to cook. They create a ton of waste and aren't very good. They are to cooking what paint by numbers kits are to creating art.
OP here, and I disagree with the metaphor.
When you open the box, you've still got everything you would if you had planned or shopped yourself. You've still got to spend the time cooking—they don't make that part any easier! And all they really are is a recipe card that has the same instructions that anything you pull from the cookbook shelf or get out of a magazine. It's as paint by numbers as using any recipe is. The metaphor only really works if you'd ordinarily be cooking by feel, sizing up your ingredients and adding a bit of this and that to make something nice.
Agree that I've never found them particularly good.
Anonymous
07/31/2024 12:50
Subject: Feelings on meal-prep boxes? Personally, I've never understood the appeal...
Think of a meal, like meatloaf or par Thai. Google it. You will get 10000 different recipes, some terrible, some okay, but who has any idea? Ask ChatGPT, and they will give you a recipe that includes Elmer’s glue.
So many young adults are faced with this infinite landscape of options for even picking a recipe, let alone the dozens of options at a typical grocery store.
The meal services short circuit the paradox of choice. You get a selection of meals, pretty distinct and curated, and they do all the other “selecting” for you: recipe, ingredients. You act as a mindless automaton.
This is partly a factor of the “things your mom used to do for you” element of tech bro culture. But also the drop in SAHW, who used to get recipe ideas from magazines and trade them at PTA meetings — a much more curated choice.
A good recipe website like Epicurious or a mailing list would help a lot in curating recipes, but people aren’t going to spend real money on recipes, when there are so many “free” on the internet. Hence the move to additional services with hopefully more lock in and room for profit. But i think none of these services make money right?
So many young adults are faced with this infinite landscape of options for even picking a recipe, let alone the dozens of options at a typical grocery store.
The meal services short circuit the paradox of choice. You get a selection of meals, pretty distinct and curated, and they do all the other “selecting” for you: recipe, ingredients. You act as a mindless automaton.
This is partly a factor of the “things your mom used to do for you” element of tech bro culture. But also the drop in SAHW, who used to get recipe ideas from magazines and trade them at PTA meetings — a much more curated choice.
A good recipe website like Epicurious or a mailing list would help a lot in curating recipes, but people aren’t going to spend real money on recipes, when there are so many “free” on the internet. Hence the move to additional services with hopefully more lock in and room for profit. But i think none of these services make money right?
Anonymous
07/31/2024 12:47
Subject: Feelings on meal-prep boxes? Personally, I've never understood the appeal...
Anonymous wrote:I do not enjoy grocery shopping at all. I enjoy cooking sometimes but the drudgery of cooking dinner every night, planned around activities to the extent possible, planned with some degree of health/nutrition/variety, all while not totally disregarding family members strongest dislikes though is not the cooking I enjoy.
We started doing a meal subscription because it alleviates some of that. My spouse enjoys cooking from explicit directions but normally was minimally involved in dinner (i.e. cook one portion hit never plan or cook a whole meal). With a meal kit, I do no cooking so I get a break. We don’t do them all the time - probably every other week - so it gives us some variety as well. My spouse cooks things he never would otherwise and gets ingredients he would shy away from.
We still cook plenty of meals. Actually since starting the meal kits we do less dining out or take out and cook from scratch (non-kit) dinners about the same frequency. So, it works for us and we find it fun.
I mean, nothing has inspired me to feel the drudgery of cooking than opening a box and going, "oh fudge, I've got to do what with the wonton wrappers?" when ordinarily if I got home and found myself too frazzled to deal with the planned recipe, I would just tell the kids it's breakfast for dinner. Instead I feel obligated to do whatever the eff they tell me with those stupid wonton wrappers.
I think one thing that I have embraced wholeheartedly is bagged salad kits. That's an area where I feel like I want better options, but don't feel like i can handle going to three grocery stores, because it turns out that two of them only sell buffalo-chicken flavored baseball-themed sunflower seeds, and I can just grab a bag that has the tiny mini-bag with all the weird little additions that make a salad interesting. So, probably same idea, but upscaled to a whole meal.
Anonymous
07/31/2024 12:47
Subject: Re:Feelings on meal-prep boxes? Personally, I've never understood the appeal...
Meal kits are for people who can't or don't like to cook. They create a ton of waste and aren't very good. They are to cooking what paint by numbers kits are to creating art.
Anonymous
07/31/2024 12:44
Subject: Feelings on meal-prep boxes? Personally, I've never understood the appeal...
I do not enjoy grocery shopping at all. I enjoy cooking sometimes but the drudgery of cooking dinner every night, planned around activities to the extent possible, planned with some degree of health/nutrition/variety, all while not totally disregarding family members strongest dislikes though is not the cooking I enjoy.
We started doing a meal subscription because it alleviates some of that. My spouse enjoys cooking from explicit directions but normally was minimally involved in dinner (i.e. cook one portion hit never plan or cook a whole meal). With a meal kit, I do no cooking so I get a break. We don’t do them all the time - probably every other week - so it gives us some variety as well. My spouse cooks things he never would otherwise and gets ingredients he would shy away from.
We still cook plenty of meals. Actually since starting the meal kits we do less dining out or take out and cook from scratch (non-kit) dinners about the same frequency. So, it works for us and we find it fun.
We started doing a meal subscription because it alleviates some of that. My spouse enjoys cooking from explicit directions but normally was minimally involved in dinner (i.e. cook one portion hit never plan or cook a whole meal). With a meal kit, I do no cooking so I get a break. We don’t do them all the time - probably every other week - so it gives us some variety as well. My spouse cooks things he never would otherwise and gets ingredients he would shy away from.
We still cook plenty of meals. Actually since starting the meal kits we do less dining out or take out and cook from scratch (non-kit) dinners about the same frequency. So, it works for us and we find it fun.