Last Thursday I started my Fresh Meal Plan 3 day trial. I woke up Thursday morning to a cooler bag full of food by the front door. But don’t worry, the cooler bag had ice packs to keep the food cold. You can schedule your deliveries for home and they will show up between 12 – 7 am, or at work where they will arrive between 8 am – 1 pm. I chose to have my food delivered at home because I was off this past Thursday and Friday. I was sent 2Â meals and 1 snack per day, along with a dessert box and a yogurt parfait. It was a LOT of food!
So what did I get? A little bit of everything. In order to start my trial last week I let them pick my meals for me. Usually you order what you want off the menu, but this worked fine for me. I let them know to leave out red meat, but otherwise I eat pretty much anything. This is what they sent me:
- Breakfast
- Southwest Breakfast Burrito
- Pancake Breakfast Sandwich
- Creme Brule french toast with turkey sausage
- Lunch/Dinner
- Seafood Mac n Cheese
- Pomegranate Nectarine Chicken
- Basil Marsala Turkey Breast
- Snacks
- Crab, artichoke, & spinach dip
- White Bean turkey chili with corn bread
- BBQ Bacon Pulled Pork wrap (1/2)
- Others:
- Dessert box – peach cobbler tart, chocolate walnut cookies, jelly doughnut cupcake, chocolate haystack
- Peanut Butter & Chocolate yogurt parfait with granola
I was really impressed with the food choices. Even without being able to pick what I wanted for this trial I was able to get a good idea of what they offer. Each meal is completely cooked and packaged for cooking. You can reheat your meals in the microwave OR the oven without moving the food to another container. I loved that because it meant one less dish to wash.
Overall I was really impressed with the quality and the taste of the food. There were only two meals that I just didn’t like. There wasn’t anything wrong with the food, it just wasn’t right for me. Considering they sent me 11 items that I didn’t pick, it is pretty impressive that I only had 2 items I didn’t like.
Since everything is fresh there aren’t preservatives – this is good and bad. I love it because the list of ingredients is short and not full of things your can’t pronounce. But at the same time it means that everything has a fairly short shelf life. One helpful hint? If your delivery includes any sort of wraps, try to eat those first. I waited until the third day to eat my Southwest Breakfast Burrito and the tortilla had gotten a little soggy. Thankfully it was still very tasty, just not that pretty to look at.
All of their meals/snacks/desserts are between 350 and 450 calories. I think the highest calorie meal I got was 401 calories and that was the Seafood Mac N Cheese. I felt full (but not stuffed) after every meal. It was more than enough to hold me over until the next time I ate. The snacks were a lot bigger than I thought and I actually ended up eating two of them for lunches because I wasn’t hungry for a full meal.
The dessert box was one of my favorite things. It contains 4 desserts and they are always paleo and gluten-free. Each dessert is just enough to get me through a sugar craving without completely undoing all the good work I did with my healthy meals throughout the day. My favorite dessert was the Peach Cobbler Tart. I would have been happy with a box just filled with those 🙂
Fresh Meal Plan has a national renowned chef/owner that is always bringing in new, innovative items to the menu. With a database of over 5000 meals, you will rarely repeat a meal (unless of course you want to). FMP allows members to have access to a weekly menu choosing exactly what you want, with the ability to add “a la carteÍź” items if you see an item that they would like to try without committing to a larger program.
Overall Fresh Meal Plan seems pretty awesome. Meals come to under $8 each, which compared to eating out is pretty good. And since its not like a “diet” plan it doesn’t require you to supplement with other foods. This means that this is all you would need – no grocery shopping to go with it. I think this would work out really well for folks that are constantly on the go or single folks like me. Most of the reason I don’t cook is because cooking for one is just a pain. It means I end up eating a LOT of salad or eating out to much. This would definitely help me keep my diet a bit more varied. If you are someone who cooks a lot or doesn’t eat much this may end up being expensive for you. Like anything you have to look it over and see if its the right thing for you.
*Disclosure: Fresh Meal Plan provided me with a complimentary 3 day trial. All opinions regarding Fresh Meal Plan are my own.
