Hello Fresh & Blue Apron - My thoughts
Hello fellow home chefs!
I had been increasingly curious about these packaged meal delivery services so I gave them both a try and thought I would share my experience here with anyone who is also curious or interested.
I chose the 2 person 3 meal options with each. Hello Fresh costs about $69 and Blue Apron is about $59. You choose your delivery day for each and each offer vegetarian options and limited meal selections each week. Both are well packaged, though I prefer the Hello Fresh packaging - everything but the protein for each meal is neatly packaged in a single labeled box to easily grab when you're ready to cook. Though the packaging for both is a bit excessive and the large ice packs accumulate very quickly. Blue Apron offers a free recycling service so you can send them back. Both include beautiful recipe cards with pictures and detailed instructions.
Pros:
I love to cook but planning and shopping can sometimes be a pain with my schedule. Having it all done was really fantastic.
It's a good mix of meal planning, grocery shopping, and recipe discovery all in one.
The recipes are really great and having exactly the amount of each ingredient you need for a meal with no waste is also great.
Some of the recipes helped get me out of a rut and try ingredients and/or combinations I hadn't before.
Laying out all of the meal card options available and collaborating on a choice with your family can be fun.
Portion sizes are good - not too much and not too little.
Meal variety is pretty great.
Seasonal options for produce are worked into the meals.
Cons:
Cost - yeah, it's not cheap at about $10-$12 per meal. This is definitely cheaper than eating out, but double or more what I would pay for the ingredients on my own.
As mentioned above - the packaging feels wasteful, though most is recyclable.
While you can pick meals and rule in or out specific proteins, you cannot substitute specific ingredients which you may not like.
Another caveat with both is that, unless you know better, if you order once, you will probably be on hook for 2 weeks since you have to pause or cancel pretty quickly.
Not locally sourced.
I have received 2 weeks of Blue Apron and 3 of Hello Fresh. I suspended service with BA for now and have HF on pause for a week while I apply some of what I learned to my own meal planning and shopping. Pausing/stopping with HF is far easier than with BA. I will definitely hold onto the recipe cards and reuse most of them.
In summary - I am glad I tried them and may continue Hello Fresh occasionally, but definitely not every week. If anyone is interested, here is a code for $40 off your first box: 7BY7CH - or if you PM me, I have 4 codes to give the first box FREE. Again, please remember that you'll be auto enrolled and likely be getting the following week as well at full price.
Let me know if you have any questions and bon appétit! 
= new reply since forum marked as read
We may try this just for the recipe cards 
It sounds good and I appreciate you sharing your experience!
