Saturday, September 14th
2024 Meal Delivery Company Reviews
Home Chef
- Meal kit service
- Prices start at $6.99/serving
- $9.99 shipping
- Boxes for 2, 4, or 6 people
- Most recipes can be customized
- Can add on items like desserts, bagged salads, and more
- Discounts available for students and "heroes”
- "A+” rated and accredited by the BBB
- In business since 2013
Home Chef got its start in 2013 to bring people together for a home-cooked meal without the trip to the grocery store. This meal kit service delivers over 10 million meals each year.
Take the quiz to get a recommendation
Not sure how Home Chef might fit into your routines and preferences? Try taking the quiz on the main page. It'll ask you four questions, like "Do you enjoy cooking?” and "What's your go-to weeknight dinner?” Home Chef will tell you your kitchen style - ours was "Convenient Chef” - and make a suitable recommendation between their two meal plans: Home Chef and Fresh and Easy. Of course, you can just jump in and start creating your account, and you'll always be able to select any recipe from the menu.
Check out the menus and the grocery store extras
You can explore six weeks of Home Chef Menus right on the site without having to start the subscription process. Use the filters to show options that take less than 30 minutes to prepare or that are calorie- or carb-conscious. As you scroll through the menu, you'll notice at the bottom that Home Chef also has a supermarket-like feature where you can add a bagged salad, breakfast croissants, smoothies or even cold brew coffee to your order.
Expand your options with customizations
You'll also notice that most of the recipes on the menu have "Customize It” options. For example:
- The Creamy Pesto Chicken Flautas can be made with shrimp, steak strips, Italian pork sausage links, or opt for the antibiotic-free chicken breasts instead of the regular ones.
- The Salmon Bearnaise could be modified to use mahi-mahi filets or NY strip steak.
You get the idea. These customizations really expand your menu options with Home Chef. As you set up your meal delivery subscription, you'll also have the option to indicate any foods you'd like to avoid. Those include pork, beef, poultry, fish, shellfish, mushrooms, tree nuts, and peanuts.
2, 4, or 6 servings per recipe
We're also happy to see that Home Chef has a 6-person serving size option. Most meal delivery companies only let you choose between two or four people, making this a great choice for bigger families. You can also get anywhere from 2-6 recipes per week. It's pretty impressive that for a box with a total of 36 servings (six people, six recipes), the total cost was just under $360 plus $9.99 shipping.
Discounts for students and "heroes”
If you're a student or a "hero” (doctor, nurse, teacher, first responder, hospital employee), don't miss the links at the bottom of the site that correspond to you. You'll need to verify your identity with ID.me on the payment page of your Home Chef account, and then your discount will be displayed. At the time of this review, it was 50% off the first box (up to $60) and 10% off all future orders.
Abundant delivery times
In our area, the available delivery days were Monday, Wednesday, Thursday and Friday. It was nice to see that we could get our first box in less than a week - for example, placing our first order on Saturday, we could get it delivered as early as the following Thursday. It also let us schedule our first shipment for more than a month out: that's a super option if you know you've got a busy time coming up and you want to take care of that week's meals in advance.
Flawless rating from the BBB
Home Chef is one of very few meal delivery companies that receives both an "A+” and accreditation from the Better Business Bureau. Although there were just under 70 complaints filed there in the last three years, that rating means that Home Chef is doing a good job in responding every time.
Customer experience can be inconsistent
Subscribers don't always agree with that assessment, however. Approved refunds are often still missing after two weeks, and some customers have repeated issues with the meals: incorrect ingredients, wrong instructions, and spoilage after just a few days instead of staying usable for at least five days as promised.
Still a good option for meal kits
We still give Home Chef a 3.5-star rating, because we appreciate the lower-than-average pricing and customization options on meals, plus we don't want to completely overlook the 2,000+ five-star reviews they've received over the years. We suggest keeping a close eye on your deliveries and being proactive with contacting customer service if there's an issue in order to make the most out of your Home Chef subscription.
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The 17 Best Meal Delivery Companies
Which Meal Delivery Company is the Best?
Isn't it amazing how many ways we have to make our lives easier, from Instacart grocery deliveries to DoorDash dinners from our favorite restaurants? Meal delivery services fall in the middle of that spectrum: you save the time and hassle of planning a menu and buying the ingredients, while not spending tons of money on weekly (or nightly) take-out meals and the corresponding gratuities. These services include heat-and-eat meals that arrive either fresh or frozen, as well as kits that come with all the ingredients necessary to make a gourmet-style meal right at home.
You may have noticed that meal delivery recipe choices are abundant. From classic, hearty favorites like chicken parm and burgers to exotic dishes from around the world, there's something for everyone. Vegan? No problem. Following a special diet for health or medical reasons, like keto or diabetic-friendly? You've got possibilities!
Meal Delivery Company FAQ
Continued from above...
Many of these services are subscription-based: you choose the types of meals you prefer (or pick specific entrees), how many servings in each one, and how many meals you'd like in a week, and your deliveries will come like clockwork unless you pause your membership, skip a shipment, or cancel altogether. If that's not your preference, there are some meal delivery companies that let you place your orders whenever you like, with no ongoing commitment.
With almost every meal delivery service, you'll get big discounts on your first order (and sometimes several ones thereafter) - you could pay less than $2 per meal at the start. Just be aware that the regular pricing is higher, typically ranging from $6 to $20 per serving; you'll pay more for premium options with higher-quality proteins and ingredients (maybe for a special occasion?).
It's easy to get overwhelmed as you try to figure out which service to pick. Want some help? Here are a few factors to guide your decision:
- Preferred Meal Type. Do you want a meal kit or something that comes prepared and ready to heat (or reheat, if it is delivered frozen)? If you'd like a mixture of both, a few meal delivery services give you that flexibility.
- Menu Options. What types of recipes can you choose from? Does the variety fit what you and your household will actually eat? Will the menu accommodate your dietary needs, food sensitivities, or other preferences?
- Flexibility. How easy is it to start and stop your deliveries? Can you customize your meals by swapping one protein for another, changing the side dish, or adding extras like smoothies or coffee? What if you want just one or two meals one week and six the next?
- Value. What will you get for what you spend? Is it worth the money compared to how you usually shop and eat? What discounts are available, to make your first try more affordable?
- Reputation. Meal delivery companies are popping up all the time. What do other customers say about their experience? Have the deliveries arrived in good condition? And if not, how has the service handled the problem?
To help you simplify your life with regular meal deliveries, TopConsumerReviews.com has evaluated and ranked the most popular services available today. We're confident that this will make it a breeze to choose the one that's right for you. Bon appetit!
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