Looking to try your first meal delivery service but aren’t sure where to start? You’ve come to the right place!
There are currently dozens of meal delivery services out there, so picking the right one for you can be tricky. Below you’ll find our complete guide to the best meal delivery near you, to help keep your meals fun and fresh.
Here are the TOP FOUR meal delivery services
Best All-Around Option – Blue Apron
One of the biggest players in the space. You can read our full review of Blue Apron here. Blue Apron has a variety of meal options, allows you to pick from a wide range of meals, and has amazing customer service. They also offer discounts on your first order, so they’re definitely worth trying out.
Their meals are easy to cook, but also sophisticated enough that you will learn how to become a better chef in the kitchen. With an average prep time of around 30 minutes, you know you’ll be enjoying a delicious dinner in no time.
Best Healthy Option – Sun Basket
We can’t enough enough of Sun Basket. They’re a little more expensive than Blue Apron, but offer some of the finest ingredients we’ve ever seen. We also appreciate the extra effort they put into their compostable or recyclable packaging.
With a heavy focus on organic, Sun Basket is the foodie’s dream delivery service. Worth a few extra dollars for such a high quality product. Read our full Sun Basket review here.
Best Selection Option – Amazon Fresh
One of the biggest companies in the world, Amazon Fresh Meals are currently the best price-per-calorie meal delivery service, and their selection isn’t half-bad either! While they don’t offer the same experience as Blue Apron or Sun Basket, it’s hard to argue with the massive selection they offer.
Best Diet Option – Nutrisystem
Looking for a great deal on diet meal delivery? Nutrisystem is a great place to start. They offer a selection of great dietary options for those looking to shed a few pounds or start eating healthier. You can get three free meals with your first order, too, which should help make it easier to try them out before going in head first. It’s a little more expensive than a standard meal plan, but the diet options are a big plus!
A few things to keep in mind when picking a meal service:
- Cost – Prices vary by service, so you’ll want to explore plans that fit your budget. Keep in mind that with food, sometimes paying more means higher quality meals.
- Frequency of delivery – How many meals do you want delivered a week? Two? Four? Every night? Look for services that offer flexible meal delivery packages
- Ingredients – Care about organic? Vegetarian? Paleo? Most of the above options will have something that fits your dietary needs. Make sure you research the specifics of each plan in order to get the food you want delivered.
For those wondering about how meal delivery services work, it’s actually quite simple!
Pick one of the above services that best matches your needs when it comes to meal planning. While you’re signing up, they’ll ask you about a variety of your food preferences, and you’ll choose a few meals that look good to you. You’ll also pick how often you want meals delivered to your door. For example, some offer twice-a-week programs, others might cover every dinner all week. You get to choose how often meals get delivered.
As far as cooking the meals goes, most have prep times that vary between 30 minutes to one hour. You won’t need any crazy tools or ingredients, either. Each delivery will come with pre-packaged ingredients broken out into the exact size needed to cook. Most of the meals won’t require anything a common kitchen doesn’t already have. Maybe a few pots and pans, or a few spatulas or mixing spoons, but no rarely-used kitchen utensils.
And what about re-orders? Most of the services will allow you to rate meals, pick ones you loved, pick ones you didn’t like as much, and plan your next deliveries accordingly.
The flexibility to choose how many meals are delivered each week, the price of the meals, what meals are getting delivered, all of this and more, make it a lot of fun to try the above services.