Thursday, March 20th
2025 Prepared Meal Reviews
Dinnerly
- Starting at $4.99 per person
- Dinners only
- Select dietary preferences
- Over 100 recipes each week
- Flexible subscription plans
- Meals for 2 or 4
- Cheaper portions with more deliveries
- Pantry staple add-ons available
- Fresh, not frozen ingredients
- Positive customer reviews
Dinnerly boasts that they're the most affordable meal service on the market. They bring ingredients and recipes to your door for affordable, unfussy weeknight dinners. They deliver in most areas throughout the contiguous United States, so when you select a plan you can check if it's available in your area and see what delivery days you can choose from. Dinnerly has an expanded menu of over 100 recipes each week, so you shouldn't ever feel bored with a lack of exciting meals to try.
Explore the menu
Right away you can explore Dinnerly's weekly menus to see if anything strikes your fancy. They don't have breakfasts or lunch-specific items since this company caters to providing dinners only. There is a photo of each meal with highlighted features letting you know if it's dairy-free, gluten-free, kid-friendly, low calorie, takes under 30 minutes, is spicy, or other relevant things you might want to know. Some are veggie-based while others include meat or fish.
Select dietary preferences
All of Dinnerly's meals are prepared for either 2 or 4 people, whichever you select. When you're ready to customize your weekly plan, you'll be able to choose your preferences from a series of options:
- Gluten-free friendly
- Low calorie
- Picky eater approved (avoids spicy foods and uses familiar ingredients)
- Quick & easy (ready in 30 minutes or less)
- Vegetarian
- I like everything (mix it up by trying the whole menu)
More meals, more savings
Customers can opt for either 2, 3, 4, 5, or 6 meals per week, depending on their needs. The more meals per week you go with, the less expensive each one is. For example, the "I Like Everything” plan for 2 people is $8.49 per serving for 2 days, $7.49 per serving for 3 days, $6.99 for 4 days, $6.49 for 5 days, and $6.24 for 6 days. Shipping is a flat rate of $11.99.
Flexible schedule
You can pause, edit, or cancel your meal subscription at any time through your orders page with your account. You'll get email reminders every week before the cutoff date, so you know how long you have to make changes for your next delivery if you need to.
Fresh, not frozen
When your order arrives, it will be filled with insulation and ice packs to keep your ingredients chilled and fresh on their journey to your home. When stored according to Dinnerly's instructions, vegetables will last at least 4 days. This means that you aren't getting fully prepared meals that come frozen. Dinnerly takes on a more natural process where you prepare your meals with pre-portioned ingredients that are fresh.
Minimal ingredient information
Dinnerly never claims to have organic ingredients and they don't specify where they come from or what the quality is. They do have an "Ingredient Hub” where customers can view a particular meal and see what ingredients are included with it. It's not the most helpful information, but if for some reason you wanted to see what each meal comes with, you could look it up pretty quick.
Market add-ons
Dinnerly also has a market where you can add different items to your meal deliveries. This way you can get snacks, seasonal items, and other products you may have needed to go to the grocery store for without even having to leave your house. Some of these add-on items are extra meats and proteins, desserts, side vegetables, soups, breads, and pantry staples. Once you're ready to choose your meals at the end of the checkout process, you can see what market items are available to you and add whatever you want.
High customer reviews
Dinnerly has just about everything we look for in a prepared meal service. So, their "D-” rating from the Better Business Bureau threw us for a loop. This is due to their failure to respond to just 1 customer complaint, although there are nearly 100 on their profile. However, we found over 4,900 reviews for Dinnerly on other sites that were mostly very positive. People love the variety and taste of the meals, say the deliveries are on time, and the pricing is reasonable. Any time there is a complaint about Dinnerly, it usually has to do with delayed shipping to some areas where ingredients arrive less than fresh. This is always a challenge for companies like this, so we would hope that their customer service team is responsive and willing to rectify issues.
Good option
We appreciate the flexibility that Dinnerly offers their customers with choosing how many deliveries they want each week. Being able to specify the types of dinners you want is a huge perk, their delivery price is reasonable, and the market add-on feature is pretty great. We wish we knew more about the ingredients they made their meals with, that Dinnerly offered more than 4 servings for bigger families, and that we could find some sort of satisfaction guarantee that reassured us they would refund or redeliver orders that have gone bad before arrival. Otherwise, this is a good, affordable option for prepared meal delivery and has earned a good rating.
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Where is the Best Place to Purchase Prepared Meals?
There are so many reasons you might find a prepared meal delivery service a huge benefit to your life. Maybe you're facing an illness or had a major life event that has left you feeling like cooking is the last thing you want to do. Or maybe you're trying to eat healthier, but you love the convenience of eating out and want to bridge the gap.
Prepared meals are the perfect solution for busy parents who still want the benefit of home cooked meals around the table with their family or for those who just can't get the hang of cooking and have decided they're sick of burning all their food (we aren't judging!). No matter your situation or reasons, prepared meals are a modern convenience that should be taken advantage of.
Prepared Meal FAQ
Continued from above...
If you're concerned about a prepared meal delivery service because you're a picky eater, have allergies or serious food intolerances, fear not. One reason prepared meals have become so popular is because they can cater to anyone's preferences and needs. If you need to avoid gluten, dairy, eggs, nuts, or any other specific ingredient, many companies will let you specify this and will adjust your meal options accordingly. You can choose vegetarian meals, paleo meals, calorie-conscious meals, or mostly order meals from your favorite cuisine.
Depending on the prepared meal service, some meal selections may cost more than others. If you want gourmet meals that give you a high-end restaurant experience for your taste buds at home, you might pay a bit more (worth it!) but if you're on a budget, there are still mouth-watering, nutritious options that shouldn't stretch the amount of money you've allotted yourself for meals. Whether or not the ingredients in your prepared meal are organic, locally sourced, or come with other specialty labels may affect the overall cost, so pay attention to this as well.
Some companies will deliver meals to your door that are practically ready to open up and eat on the spot, while others require a little prep on your part. Even the meals you have to assemble yourself are made to be as simple as can be. Ingredients come perfectly measured out with step-by-step instructions that can give confidence to even the most inept home chef. Useful tip: you could save the instructions and ingredient information if you want to make the meal again in the future and give it a go on your own!
We've made ourselves very hungry with all the research we've done about the top prepared meal services available to customers. In the end, we've narrowed down a few things that are important to look at when you're considering signing up with one of these companies:
- Menu options. Everyone has specific food preferences and needs. Identify what yours are and quickly identify whether or not the prepared meals offered by the company will cater to them. Ideally you'll want as many menu options as possible so that if you continue using the service long-term, you won't have to keep repeating the same type of meals over and over. You may also want to see if there is a variety as far as preparation complexity. Some nights you may have 5 minutes to prepare a meal and other nights you might have hours. Are you able to order a mix of meals that will work when you're in a pinch or if you want something more fancy and closer to homemade?
- Cost. You'll usually get the most bang for your buck if you sign up for a subscription with a prepared meal service. Sometimes this includes free delivery, other times it means you may save 10-15% on repeat orders rather than one-offs. Are you able to set your delivery schedule however you want? Is it easy to cancel or reschedule if you need to?
- Ingredient quality. Have you ever ordered a meal with meat that turns out to be rubbery? Or gotten a salad with wilted lettuce? Real, quality ingredients are important and make all the difference. Some people prioritize eating organic or buying fresh food from local farms. Services that offer non-GMO, organic food with sustainable sourcing practices are usually going to provide some of the highest-quality meals.
- Reputation. What do other customers say about their experience with the prepared meals from a company? Are deliveries fresh, on time, and tasty? If you have to work with customer service, hopefully they're accommodating and swift in their communication. Listening to what others have to say will give you key insights into this before you have to deal with it yourself.
To give you the best, most convenient experience with ordering prepared meals, the experts at Top Consumer Reviews have pored over all the details of popular companies available to you. We hope this information helps you find simple, enjoyable meals that you'll look forward to eating every day.
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