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I always love to cook healthy meals and search online for new recipe ideas to vary my dishes. However, many of those recipes do not taste good or require so many ingredients that my grocery bill gets too expensive. I was interested in trying a meal delivery service to hopefully cut down my cooking time, my grocery cost, and vary my meals. I was especially interested in trying Blue Apron because of its variety of meal choices and customizations available, like its Weight Watchers selections.

I followed SELF’s meal-buying guide and based my review on the criteria selected by a team of dietitians. I decided to go with the four-day meal plan that serves two people. I chose it because I can get lunch and dinner for four days and switch up what days I could eat each meal. I wanted to have a range of options so I could choose among the chef’s favorites, wellness, and the fast and easy.

My menu: Cheesy Beef Enchiladas with Sweet Peppers & Rice, Tomato-Poached Tilapia with Pearl Couscous, Peppers & Olives, Italian Pork Sausage & Asparagus Pasta with Fried Sage, and Spicy Chicken Stir-Fry.

Once I created my account, it was up to Blue Apron to choose my meals. I wanted to see what they would give me to start before customizing. Beyond that, there weren’t many options to customize. Two of the four meals had the word spicy in them and I do not handle spice well, so I decided to switch them out. I wanted to see how Blue Apron would do with a fish dish so I substituted in the Tomato-Poached Tilapia. Note: You have to go through the process of signing up, adding in your delivery address, and putting in your credit card before you can see any of the recipes available. 

Another customization limit is that there is no real way to have the same recipe with a different protein substituted in. On the other hand, Blue Apron does have a cookbook where you can browse by ingredient, cuisine, and seasonal recipes. I think this is a great feature before you decide to sign up and commit to a meal kit. And for an additional cost, Blue Apron gave me the option to also add a wine pairing which I thought was a nice add-on.

As you go through the process of signing up, the site automates to show you exactly how much you will be spending (depending on if you get a meal that serves two or four). The cost for a two-person service is $10 and a four-person meal is $8. The total cost for the box that I chose was around $86 per week with delivery. The same delivery for four people would be around $138 per week.

That amount is comparable to how much I normally spend at Trader Joe’s—I recently went shopping for a week worth of groceries and it cost me $86. However, that included enough food (and breakfast) for seven days (versus the four-day meal kit). It did seem high when I took into consideration that I would still have to cook and prep all of the Blue Apron meals. The box was really just so that I didn’t have to go through the hassle of shopping or finding recipes to cook myself.

The ordering process for Blue Apron was pretty easy. Once I finished selecting my meals the order was ready to go. After confirmation, you can make changes until the date displayed on your plan settings page. (I had decided I wanted to switch out my fish recipe but the change cut-off date had already passed.)

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As for delivery, the process was a little rocky. I received a text message from the delivery person on Saturday night (the order was scheduled for Sunday morning) about any special instructions. I informed him that I lived in a building with an access code, gave him the code, and asked him to leave the delivery with reception.

Sunday morning came around and a text notification informed me it would be delivered between 10 a.m. and 2 p.m. Since I was going out at 10 a.m. I knew would have to get it later in the day. I figured it would be fine as long as it was with the receptionist. But at 9 a.m. I got an image of my package outside on the street with a note saying it was delivered. Thankfully I had not left yet and was able to retrieve it. I was a little disappointed that they didn’t attempt to bring it inside and instead left it out on the street where it most likely would have been stolen.

When I opened the box there were small bags with ingredients listed and the meats were stored separately. The ice packs kept it cool and came with instructions on how to dispose of them. After looking through all the ingredients, I realized that they had left out the chicken for my Spicy Chicken Stir-Fry dish. As I didn’t have any chicken in my fridge or freezer I was out of luck on making that meal for the week unless I went out to make a purchase.

The Blue Apron recipes were very easy to follow. Be warned that not all of the bags are labeled with the corresponding recipe. I didn’t realize I had two recipes that used peppers and I almost accidentally used all the peppers in one dish. I had to go back through all four recipes and make sure that I knew what ingredients went with each meal.

The recipe cards did a great job of laying out the ingredients, the time it would take each meal to be prepared, and an option to cook along with the Blue Apron app. I was very please that none of my meals took more than 30 minutes to make. The one downside I encountered was that I wasn’t prepared with all the necessary kitchen tools. I think my kitchen is pretty well prepped with many different kinds of tools but two of my meals came with cheese that called for a box grater. I had a small hand grater so I had to substitute that instead. I recommend checking the recipes ahead of time and noting if you’ll need anything specific. I do wish that would have been sent along with my recipe confirmation. 

When choosing my meals, I tried to get them in all of the main food groups that I enjoy: chicken, beef, fish, and pork. This is a pretty wide variety for me since it’s not normally what I eat every week. I typically try to stick with one protein option per week to save money and buy in bulk. So it was nice that I could have so many different options all at once for the same price I spend on a regular week of meals. I also liked that all of the meals seemed well balanced. They had a good mix of protein, vegetables, a grain or pasta, and lots of seasonings. I was satisfied with most of the meals but I opted to also add an additional vegetable side. My dinners tend to be heartier than my lunches so I only added the extra veggie side for dinner time.

The ingredients in the Blue Apron box were very fresh and the instructions were easy to follow. However, I found most of the recipes to be lacking in some areas. The enchiladas were dry and the pork sausage needed some extra seasoning. That being said, I plan on making these recipes again (with some modification) because they were overall tasty.

My final thoughts on Blue Apron are that it’s a good overall meal kit and it beats shopping for groceries. The recipes were tasty and the price stayed within my current budget. Though I had some issues with missing ingredients and a lackluster delivery experience, I would definitely try it again to see how another box experience would be.

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