Hello Fresh is a company that sends you all of the ingredients to make a healthy and fresh recipe right at home. I was sent the ingredients to make 3 different dishes including a beef and broccoli rabe tostada, pecan crusted salmon and lentils dish and a turkey and pasta dish. Each meal makes enough for 2 servings. In my case, I had about half a serving of leftovers from each meal.
All of the ingredient portioned in their packages.
This was quite an exciting package to receive. It was filled with preportioned fresh foods ready to be cooked. For example, the salmon and lentils dish came with preportioned cashews, Parmesan cheese, panko breadcrumbs, basil, lentils, salmon, garlic clove and tomato sauce. They are wrapped in individual packaging for easy use.
On Friday night, I decided to cook up the salmon and lentils dish because as a Catholic, I cannot eat meat on a Friday during lent. I followed the directions that the package came with. The directions come on a card with pictures to make cooking the dish easier to understand. This dish turned out amazing. My husband was literally raving about it for two days. The salmon was crusted perfectly and the lentils were flavorful. Definitely a very fresh meal. I served this meal on a bed of cooked kale for some extra vegetables. The cherry tomatoes honestly tasted like homegrown ones!
On Sunday night, I made the beef and broccoli rabe tostada. This meal turned out well also. My main complaint would be that I thought it needed some kind of sauce and that it was kind of messy and hard to eat. I had not tried broccoli rabe before either. I like that this company includes unique kinds of vegetables instead of just the basics.
I think that the Hello Fresh program would be great for those learning how to cook or those who are too busy to think of meal ideas and purchase the ingredients themselves. The step-by-step cooking is a smart way to learn cooking techniques. Also, the preportioned ingredients save a lot of time in the kitchen which is great for people who work.
As a dietitian, I am critical of a meal's nutrition. There are a few things that I think could be improved upon to make Hello Fresh healthier. The dishes called for added sodium. This is something that I chose to omit because there was plenty of sodium in the other ingredients that the meal came with. The tortillas and pasta were both refined grains and I would recommend using whole grains for added fiber. The beef and broccoli rabe tostadas called for using 4 tablespoons of oil for the recipe. I completely omitted all oil as there was plenty of fat in the recipe from the walnuts, beef and cheese. Finally, my last recommendation is that these recipes required many dishes (sometimes up to 4 pots and pans) and I would recommend simplifying the recipes to use less dishes.
Overall, I had an excellent experience sampling Hello Fresh. The meals were all delicious and the way that they were to be portioned and presented was beautiful. I definitely took a few ideas from this company to use in my day to day cooking.
To see if Hello Fresh delivers to your area, check out their locator.
To get 30% off your Hello Fresh order, use this code: NUTRITIONIST30
Here is some information about Hello Fresh:
HelloFresh provides the convenience of serviced cooking at home. In less than 30 minutes, you can have meals designed by a nutritionist and discover new ingredients and dishes from around the globe.
Each week you can choose 3 out of 5 options, leaving out what you do not like. There is also a great variety in vegetarian meals every week, going well beyond just regular tofu. If you’re looking to eliminate the hassle of grocery shopping from your already packed schedule and experience quality time cooking together with your loved ones, then HelloFresh is for you.
Think of HelloFresh as your private sous chef! Visit http://www.hellofresh.com/ to join the 200M people in 20 eastern states in the U.S. (and beyond) receiving these meals.
This is a sponsored post written by me on behalf of HelloFresh. All opinions are my own.