My Hello Fresh Experience (Not Sponsored)

Aubrey Barnes
Dec 7, 2017
4 min read

Hey there friends!! It's the crazy time of year when eating healthy can be a hard thing. I run several Etsy Shops, an Airbnb, and I'm starting to blog regularly and make youtube videos. With Cyber Week coming up I just knew that it was going to be a hard week for me to cook yummy, healthy meals and I didn't have time for meal planning.

I've been seeing advertisements on Youtube and Facebook for months about these meal planning services and everyone seems to give you a good deal on your first try so I thought what the heck it's worth a shot. I researched the one that I thought best fit my family meal style and "Hello Fresh" came out on top.

I wanted to start my first week a few weeks out rather then the week I signed up. When you sign up it automatically has your first week set for the next week and although you can skip any week you want it won't let you skip the first week on the website. I thought this may be a deal breaker that I couldn't skip the first week. I emailed customer service and they emailed me back after about 10 mins and fixed everything no questions asked. They moved it to start the week after thanksgiving and were super helpful and friendly.

Hello Fresh gives every first time buyer $30 off their first week of meals. Normally each meal is between 8 and 10 dollars per person depending on how many meals you order per week. You can order 3-4 meals each time. You can also order up to 4 serving per meal.

I choose the "2 person 4 meals plan" which is just about $9 per meal. It also comes with free shipping. This was plenty of food for my husband and I and we always had a bit of extra food to put in a small lunch for my husband the next day.

I really anticipated the week after telling my husband what I'd done. He is always up to try anything that I'm excited about but I still felt nervous about it. We stick to a pretty strict grocery budget because we are trying to pay off our house early. So spending extra money on something like this seemed like a bit of a gamble. However, I'm proud to say that I actually stayed under budget for the month since I didn't have to go grocery shopping at all the last week of the month. So paying for something extra like this did not break the bank and made my week so much easier.

When the day finally came I ended up not hearing the UPS guy drop the box off so it sat outside for a few hours before I brought it in and opened it up. It was packed very well with 2 big ice packs and the temp outside was in the 40s so it could have probably sat outside all day and been fine. They pack all the meat in the bottom of the box so they were pretty frosty next to the ice packs.

I won't go into too much detail about each day because I've made a vlog-style video with more information which you can check out below. But I will give my final review here.

I was so impressed. The ingredients were at least as good as the stuff I get from the store, maybe better. Especially the produce. It's December and one meal included asparagus that was to die for. It was so fresh and young. Even when it's in season here in Idaho I cannot find it that fresh in the stores. They always cut it too old or it sits for too long.

I think the best part about this was getting new ideas for easy, quick, and healthy recipes. They are concious about different diets that people follow and offer lots of options (Gluten-free, vegan, paleo, etc.). My husband and I don't follow a specific diet but we try to eat whole foods (fruit, veggies, grains, and proteins). Each meal was well-balanced. My husband is a very "meat-and-potatoes" kind of guy and he really liked every meal. I will be adding all four to my go-to list of recipes.

One meal I was particularly excited for was the buttery steak. I have always struggled learning how to cook a steak properly. This meal card gave great instructions on how to cook the steak and it seriously turned out flawless the first time. I didn't have to throw it back on the heat after cutting which was amazing!!

Final Thoughts

Is this something that I would do on a weekly basis? Probably not. It is much more expensive than meal planning yourself. And I love cooking and buying things in bulk to stock my pantry. However, I will totally be using this service every 6 weeks or maybe every other month. It's a great way to get new meal ideas. Every once in a while I get in a slump and just don't know what to cook. When I'm feeling this way I will defiantly be ordering Hello Fresh to get new ideas and to get me excited again to cook healthy balanced meals. It will also be great if I know I have a hectic week coming up. It will save us from easy pizza nights for sure. Its just as fast to pull a Hello Fresh bag from the fridge as it is to go grab a pizza and Hello fresh is a much healthier and fulfilling option.

Use the link below to get $40 off your first week of meals. Yes $40, not $30! When you use my link you get an extra $10 off!!! When you sign up through my link it also helps me because I get $20 off my next purchase. Win Win for both of us.