How Do Meal Plans Work?

Get meals direct to your door. Everyone loves delicious, healthy home-cooked meals. Usually, most of us don’t enjoy the hassle of grocery shopping, planning unique meals then following complicated recipes. If you have other important things to deal with in you life, you may yearn for an easier way. Time, or lack thereof, can leave you no other choice than to head for your local drive-thru for another fast food dinner. Lately there is another choice.

Meal Plans

One choice is to sign up with a meal sit. Find one that has an app that will save you the hassle and time of planning the meals and creating a shopping list.

For a fee, they will provide you with an app that lets you input a few of the parameters that you need in your meal(s). A team of dietitians will then devise a meal plan for a week, complete with a shopping list. You can use the list to shop yourself or you can skip the grocery store. Send your shopping list directly to Amazon, Walmart, Kroger, Instacart, Shipt and others to have your items collected for you.

Once you get the ingredients you follow a simple recipe to complete your meal.

Pickup And Delivery

Pickup orders for Kroger® Pickup or Walmart Grocery. You order through the app or online and pick up at the store.

Alternatively you can have your food delivered to your door with Kroger’s Instacart, Amazon Prime Now or Aldi’s Instacart. These pickup and delivery services are in selected areas. Click on their links, input your zip code or address, to see if it’s available to you.

There are many other ways to get your groceries if you don’t want to shop yourself.

Meal Kits

Meal kit delivery services send pre-packaged meals that include all of the major individual ingredients and come with easy to follow recipes.

Do hate to cook? Are you a complete novice?  You can cook great meals that will have you forgetting about the stack of take-out menus in your junk drawer.

What Types of Meal Plan Services Are There To Get Meals Direct To Your Door?

It’s hard to imagine that you have needs that can’t be met by one of these services.

Vegetarian?-

Sure, not a problem. Meal kits combine fresh, organic, and even locally-sourced produce sent directly to your door. Saving you the trouble of trying to find a store with the premium produce you need.

Most meal kit delivery companies offer extensive vegetarian meal options. The cost is usually the same or less than the meat meal plans. The added advantage is you will be provided with new and interesting ways to make good, health vegetarian meals.

Some companies have more extensive options than others, for example, HelloFresh has a veggie plan as one of their 3 meal plans offered.

Vegan?-

When ordering from a meal kit company, check if it specifically has vegan meal plans. If not, read the fine print and see if you can get what you need from the vegetarian options.

Vegans can have an exceptionally hard time finding new recipes to stretch their animal-free diet. The right meal kits can help.

Gluten-free?-

Gluten-free menu options are very important to many people today and these companies know it. Most meal kit companies know there are many customers that have special needs, including those with celiac disease or sensitivity to gluten. A number of companies also specially-wrap their products in order to prevent gluten cross-contamination.

Again, kit companies are a great way to find new recipe ideas that can keep meals interesting.

Organic?-

The meal kit delivery industry was established in part to provide quality, question-free ingredients especially when it comes to organic food. Most companies highlight their investment in time and money, finding sustainable, organic food. This has become a major selling point for these companies.

Sun Basket, is a USDA-certified organic handler with over 99% organic produce. They deliver meal kits to you ready to cook and assemble in under 30 minutes.

Blue Apron- “Following our step-by-step instructions you’ll experience the magic of cooking recipes that our chefs create with your family’s tastes in mind.” Just one of a number of companies that have partnered with Monterey Bay Aquarium’s Seafood Watch to make sure their seafood offerings are sustainable.

Reheat And Eat?-

You can also find companies that cook your meal for you. All you do is heat it and eat it. Freshly is one of those.

Freshly – Chef-Cooked, “Healthy Meals Delivered To You“, has a list of 85 banned ingredients (like corn syrup and preservatives).

Weight loss?-

To lose weight you need healthy high quality food that gives you the nutrition you need without the calories.

Meal kits help you plan out meals ahead of time with interesting, healthy ingredients.

One of the great benefits of using a pre-designed meal plan is that you will learn new recipes and cooking techniques that you can then integrate into your daily life.

This can help you eat healthy at home more often, which can be a great way to lose weight, even without a rigid diet.

Stricker?-

If you’re looking for a strict diet meal plan, companies like NutriSystem or BistroMD can provide you with dietitian planned meals sent to your door which are designed specifically to help you eat healthier and lose weight.

Paleo?-

Generally, the paleo diet focuses on meat, fruits and vegetables, cutting out breads, dairy and sugars.

A number of meal delivery companies offer menu items which are suited to the paleo diet.

SunBasket takes it further, offering more than 120 Paleo meals that feature high-quality lean meats.

Even if a recipe doesn’t specifically say it’s paleo, all you have to do is look at the ingredients. Judge for yourself, to see how it matches up to your requirements.

Youngsters In The Family?

With Martha & Marley Spoon,(yes, that is Martha Stewart) you can order 2-person or 4-person “family boxes.” Just filter the menu options specifically for ones that are “kid-friendly.”

SunBasket says “Our Family Menu makes things simple. Choose from 6 delicious kid-friendly recipes each week with Chef’s Choice and Vegetarian Meal Plan options. All recipes are portioned for 4 adults with leftovers for families with younger children.”