On to week 2 of HelloFresh orders! First of all, apparently I'm an idiot and didn't save my meal selections, so I received a balsamic pork meal or some shit, and I don't like pork. So I did not fix that meal. Here are the meals received for week 2:
Packaging
This is the same as week 1. The meals are packed in a cardboard box with bio-degradable and recyclable cooling packs on top of the food and at the bottom of the box. The non-meat ingredients are packed in their own separately labeled bags. The meat is packed in vacuum-sealed packs below the other ingredients.
Along with the meals, the package includes marketing materials and nice instruction cards for each meal that you can keep for future use. I did get a bit of water on the cards this week, and they really don't do well with that.
Rating: 4/5
Cost
Without discounts and coupons, the meals are about $9.99/serving with the smallest option being 2 servings. Ten bucks per person for a dinner is comparable to a meal at a restaurant for two people, but how does it compare to buying the ingredients yourself to make the same meal?
Just like the first week, I'm going to look at buying the ingredients yourself at Wal-Mart. I'm sure if you live on one of the coasts, the price of ingredients will be higher, so HelloFresh might be a more affordable option.
I've looked up prices for the same items sent with the HelloFresh meal; the price can be higher or lower, of course, if you already have some ingredients on hand or find a cheaper option
Meal 1: Chicken Cheddar Fajitas
For the chicken cheddar fajitas, I think you could make this one cheaper yourself and get more servings out of what you purchase.
Meal 2: Beef Ragu Spaghetti
For the beef ragu spaghetti, I think you could also make this one cheaper yourself and get more servings out of what you purchase.
Meal 3: Figgy Balsamic Pork
Even though I didn't make this meal, I can still price out the ingredients.
For this one, I think it's pretty close in price depending on the fig jam that you can find. However, I think you could get more servings, maybe twice as many, out of what you purchase.
Overall, I think you could actually make these meals cheaper on your own and get more servings out of the ingredients. So, I think this week's meals weren't as cost effective as last week's meals.
Rating: 2/5
Meal Variety
Just like last week's assessment, there is a pretty good mix of meals available for selection with pork, chicken, beef, or vegetarian as options—about 20 meals available.
There are also add-ons available to add to your delivery each week for varying costs: quick lunches, sides like bread, desserts, or extra protein items.
If you want a specific diet, though, like low carb or keto, you're out of luck. Lots of the meals seem to be high in calories, too.
Rating: 3/5
Taste
Meal 1: Chicken Cheddar Fajitas
This one was actually really good. I would maybe have added some diced tomatoes, too, and maybe another bell pepper to give more pepper-to-onion ratio. The "pickled jalapenos" were okay, but I'm not sure if I was able to get enough lime juice out of the lime to actually do anything to the jalapeno. The seasoning that came with the meal gave a nice smoky and peppery flavor to the vegetables and chicken. Overall, this was pretty good and I would make i again on my own.
Meal 2: Beef Ragu Spaghetti
I really enjoyed this one, too, and would make it again. The Italian seasoning, garlic, and the finishing butter really gives the meal a nice flavor. I would maybe try a different shape of noodle, though, like shells or ziti, to really get a good noodle/sauce ratio in each bite. I would also maybe use a bit more zucchini if I were to use the whole onion (I only used half of the onion). Hell, I would probably use more zucchini regardless.
Meal 3: Figgy Balsamic Pork
I have no clue: I didn't make this meal since I do not like pork. I'm sure if you like pork, it would have been alright.
Rating: 4.5/5
Ease of Prep
Meal 1: Chicken Cheddar Fajitas
The prep of this one wasn't too terrible. All of the ingredients are provided:
The card lists the prep time as 10 minutes, and I think I was pretty close to that. I think my onion chopping skills are improving, which makes that portion go a bit faster, and I also didn't cut the chicken before cooking it. Since I really dislike cutting raw chicken, I cooked the chicken on my George Foreman grill and cut it into strips after cooling it and then added it to the onion and pepper. Instead of trying to squeeze the juice out of a lime, I would probably just get one of those little containers of lime juice to use instead if I were to make this again. I would also get a red pepper instead of the yellow one that was sent with my meal just to add a bit of color.
Cooking the chicken on the grill made the prep for this one much easier and made the total time pretty close to the 40 minutes listed on the card. Overall, this one wasn't too bad to do and tasted pretty good. I got two meals out of it, so the two servings divided across two meals. If you're eating this alone or with someone else, you could probably stretch it to three servings if you had some rice or chips and salsa along with it.
Meal 2: Beef Ragu Spaghetti
The prep of this one also wasn't too bad. All of the ingredients are provided:
The card lists the prep time as 10 minutes, and I think I was closer to 20 if you include the time to cook the meat. Just like with the fajitas, I think my onion chopping skills are improving, which makes that portion go a bit faster. Chopping the ingredients while you're waiting for your water to boil and cooking the beef and making the ragu while the spaghetti cooks helps things go a bit faster, but it's just going to take as long as it's going to take to cook. The total prep time is listed as 45 minutes, and I think I was pretty close to that.
Overall, this one wasn't too bad to do and was pretty tasty. I would maybe try to cut the zucchini into smaller pieces and use more zucchini if I were to make it again. I got three meals out of this one's two servings, so not too shabby on the cost per meal for it. If you're eating this alone or with someone else, you could probably stretch it to another serving or two if you had some garlic bread with it.
Meal 3: Figgy Balsamic Pork
Beats me...
So, these meals still require you to chop and prep everything, so I, once again, wouldn't say HelloFresh is the easiest when it comes to prep work. However, the meals I selected this week definitely had easier prep work involved than my week 1 meals.
Rating: 3.5/5
Overall Rating
So, week 2 of HelloFresh went mostly better than week 1 (other than the one meal that I didn't fix). Once again, the only thing that the HelloFresh kits really saved me was the time at the grocery store and picking up the ingredients. The food tasted good and I got two or three meals out of each of them with the 2 servings plan. I did learn how to make a ragu, so that's a bonus from this week. The cost for these meals is probably higher compared to the cost of the ingredients at the grocery store. However, I still don't think I would continue using HelloFresh past my initial orders.
Week 2 Overall Rating: 3/5
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