plated reviewed

Our box from Plated arrived just in time on Friday for all the cold and snow we’ve had in the Northeast the past few days.

You may remember I scored this box of 3 meals for 2 at just under $20 from Gilt City a few weeks ago! Perfect opportunity to give Plated a try without much risk.

The dollars: A weekly subscription for 3 meals for 2 people delivered to our zip code would have been $72 at full price. Definitely not the cheapest food option, but probably more cost effective than ordering delivery or going out 3 times for a couple.

The food: We tried three recipes from their Super Bowl inspired menu. White Pizza with Buffalo-Sriracha Chicken and Yogurt Ranch; Turkey, White Bean, and Poblano Chili with Baked Tortilla Chips; and Philly-Style Cheese Steaks…Each recipe was under 750 calories per serving and took under 45 minutes to make.

The likes:

Lots of room to customize: Plated let us choose the meals we wanted in our box. There were seven meals in total offered during the week and we picked 3 (the amount our pre-purchased voucher was worth). There’s also freedom to select just how many servings of each meal you want. Meals are sold by the plate, two plates at a time. A minimum delivery is four plates.. but that can be four of one meal, or two plates of two different meals.

Organized: All of the ingredients (minus the meat) for each meal came in a little bag labeled by what meal it was for. No more digging around looking for your ingredients. Just grab your bag and start prepping.

The dislikes: 

Mistakes: Our turkey chili failed to tell us when to add the beans in to the mix. Ut-oh.

Printed Recipe Quality: This is definitely nit-picking but I expected a higher print and paper quality for the recipes in this box. One of the best parts of these meal services is that you now have a Chef created recipe to add to your Recipe Rolodex.  At the price point I expected professional quality printing on gloss paper, but was disappointed to find something I could have printed on my Cannon on card stock.

The bottom line: We were impressed by the meals (our favorite was the Turkey Chili) and had fun with the delivery but aren’t convinced that the price for the service is worth it for us. Since we already cook most of our meals at home and have created quite a stocked pantry, finding recipes we like and shopping for them on our own is probably best for us.

You should try Plated if: You want to eat high quality, nutritious meals and like to cook but don’t necessarily have the time to browse for recipes and shop for all the ingredients. You don’t have a big pantry of spices and “staples”. You are ordering delivery and take out wayyy too often and need to cut back on your budget. You love trying the subscription boxes.

Has anyone else tried Plated before? What did you think?