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| prepared meal delivery |
Want all the ingredients for dinner premeasured and delivered to your door? The best meal kit services will do just that.
If you are anything like me -- I want to cook without having to do the planning, prep and grocery shopping -- meal kits are the way to go. However, if you want good food without putting in all the efforts of chopping, mincing, sauteing and such, you'll want to peruse our list of the best prepared meal delivery services in 2022. Prepared meals are no longer just more salty, fatty, frozen TV dinners. Now, there are companies selling healthy premade meals with interesting recipes and diet-friendly menus for any eater.
Unlike the Swansons and Hungry Mans of decades past, modern meal delivery is prepared right before it is sent to you -- either fresh or frozen -- so there's no need for nasty preservatives. We've tasted some meal delivery so good it rivals restaurant takeout, but it's all delivered to your door in bulk to be eaten or popped in the freezer for later.
Testing (and tasting) to find the best meal subscriptions and compiling this list was no easy task, since there are dozens of services that'll keep you well-fed without having to cook. Since you won't want to waste time and money sorting out the duds, we've done the legwork for you. Whether it's vegan meal delivery, keto food, low-calorie meals or homestyle classics to give you time back during the week, there's a prepared meal delivery outfit to service you and your crew.
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| Best Meal Kit Delivery Service for 2022 |
What we love about meal delivery in 2022
Making dinner can be enjoyable, of course, but dinner burnout can catch up to you quickly. Since most restaurants charge a pretty premium for delivery, and meal prep can eat up precious hours of your work week, an easy meal plan from one of these services can help lighten your daily load without busting your budget. And if meal delivery elicits thoughts of overly salted instant mashed potatoes and mystery meat, know that prepared food -- both fresh and frozen -- has come a long way in the past few years. I've tested more than 20 of the top meal delivery services and many of them churn out healthy meals that take minutes to heat and will even help keep your nutrition goals on track.
For those who still want to cook but need a little helping hand, an oven-ready meal kit delivery service will cut out the prep, shopping and planning. But if it's a fully prepared meal you're after, there are services for that and we've tested some of the best-known meal delivery operations -- along with a few newbies -- to see which ones cut the mustard and which ones need a lot of ketchup just to be eaten.
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| Best Meal Kit Delivery Service for 2022 |
How expensive is meal delivery?
Meal delivery doesn't have to cost a ton either. We've uncovered cheap meal services with portions as low as $5 per serving but most are somewhere in the range of $9 to $11 per meal. Excluding unhealthy fast food, it's tough to find restaurants or takeout services that'll feed you nutritious and tasty food for so little dough. And some of these budget-friendly meal subscriptions delivered some pretty tasty fare, on par with the pricier operations.
Is meal delivery healthy?
The prepared meal subscription category has exploded with new chef-led brands offering ready-to-eat meals to fit every taste preference, diet plan, lifestyle and budget. You can find a healthy, preprepped meals for vegetarians, vegans, folks keeping to a keto diet, paleo plan or just about anything else. Finding the best healthy prepared meal service depends mostly on your own nutrition goals, but to help you narrow it down, we've been testing and tasting up a storm to bring you our top picks in a few popular prepared meal delivery categories and outlining which are healthiest. Another bonus is you can easily see all the nutritional information for every meal, which is not always the case when cooking from scratch or eating out.
Before we get to the which, let's go back to the why. Even if you're not trying to overhaul your entire diet, committing to eating healthier even a few times a week can have a huge impact on overall nutrition intake and help create good eating habits. It helps when that healthy food actually tastes good, too. But if you don't have the time to start meal-prepping and macro-counting, or learn a whole new set of healthy cooking skills, eating healthier probably feels daunting. Finding a convenient and healthy prepared meal delivery service for your healthy eating goals could be an easy way to make some strides in the right direction.
Prepared meal delivery
What exactly is a prepared meal delivery service? This breed of meal delivery will send fully cooked, often nutritious meals made with organic ingredients straight to your home. From there, it's as simple as simple gets: Just pull a delicious meal out of your fridge or freezer and warm it up -- no cooking required -- and you've got a satisfying lunch or dinner ready to go.
Menu options are endless and certain prepared meal delivery services such as Freshly and Veestro have taken note of modern healthful eating habits, offering prepared menus and healthy meals tailored for almost any dietary preference, including carnivores, vegetarians, flexitarians, vegan and other plant-based diets. They can also cater to those with dietary restrictions who are keeping to a keto, low-sodium, gluten-free, organic, low carb, low-sugar or paleo diet. Even picky eaters will find something they like with all these prepared meal options.
Now, you might be wondering how meal delivery recipes differ from the frozen meals or classic TV dinners you find in the grocery store -- and it's a fair question. For one: Most are made just before shipping to you, so each individual meal is significantly fresher -- which you can often taste. Because they don't sit on grocery store freezer shelves, most are free from unhealthy preservatives or mounds of salt, too. Lastly, these prepared meal delivery services use higher quality ingredients, in general, and get a bit more creative with their rotating recipes, although it does vary from brand to brand. Prepared meals range anywhere from $8 to $15 per meal, depending on the service and specific meal plan you choose.