Home Chef Review & Coupon – July 2019

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Home Chef is a meal in a box subscription – every week, you choose from a variety of recipes and have all the ingredients and preparation instructions delivered to your door. The basic concept is the same as other weekly meal delivery services, but it has its own unique features and recipes. Their meal options include many great Asian, Indian, African, and South American inspired dishes, along with more traditional American home-style and steakhouse fare.

From online to doorstep…to your kitchen table, we make planning and preparing a home-cooked meal simple, intuitive and inspirational every step of the way.

DEAL: Get $30 off your first order when you sign up – just use this link to get the deal!

My items were kept nice and cold with this special insulation.

Everything looked good and was cold, the ice packs are doing their job!

The insulation is more environmentally friendly than styrofoam and is just shredded cotton clothing wrapped in plastic. You can slit the plastic and throw the contents in the trash or compost and then recycle the plastic.

Home Chef offers at least 10 selections available for 2, 4, or 6 people, plus a smoothie choice and a fruit basket selection. Meals for your box are suggested based on your preferences, but you can change the selections any time. The portions are large, and this is currently the least expensive and has the most choice out of any similar major subscriptions (for 2 people) – $9.95 per person per selection (they typically have one meal option a week that’s a premium meal and costs a little more, though).

I received an envelope that was wet from the ice packs. My ice packs were still frozen but had started to thaw hence the moisture.

Some offers were in the envelope.

Everything in my box! The items were packed together depending on which recipe they belong to. I didn’t have any raw meat this time around but rest assured, it is packed separately and placed below the other items with a cardboard separator in between. I ordered two meals for two, and a smoothie add-on, which means my shipping was free!

Sweet Chili Tofu Bowl with Red Bell Pepper (40 minutes, Medium, 813 calories per serving) I went with a vegetarian dish because I’ve simply wanted to try tofu for a while now. I used to eat it growing up, although my mom usually mixed it into scrambled eggs or ground beef taco meat. I’ve never had it as the main protein.

I always make sure to read through the instructions to make sure I have the necessary pans etc.

Here’s everything from the bag. It said I needed to make this within 7 days but the veggies were showing their age some by the end of the week, which is normal (at least for my fridge it seems to be).

I started by dicing the tofu and then draining it on paper towels. NOTE: This took a LOT of paper towels! Also, it was a LOT of tofu!

I also prepped the veggies according to the recipe.

After tossing the tofu with cornstarch I then browned it in a skillet.

It reminded me of bland, soft, scrambled eggs!

I sauteed the veggies then added the soy sauce, red pepper, and chili sauce.

I served it over the rice and topped with chopped green onions. I only used about half of the rice, it made a huge vat of rice. The flavor was very good and not as spicy as I was expecting, although I could have sprinkled extra dried red pepper on top. I thought this would be good with chicken and then I discovered that you now customize some of the meals! You can add meat to a vegetarian dish or upgrade to organic meat or upgrade steaks etc. The cost to upgrade will vary but it tells you as soon as you click “upgrade” what your choices are.

BBQ Ranch Corn & Chicken Grain Bowl (10 minutes, Easy, 583 calories per serving) I wanted a quick lunch option and went with a low-prep grain bowl.

The quality of the food items looked perfect.

I had to chop a bit of green onion.

I microwaved the chicken and then added the BBQ sauce. Next I mixed the pre-cooked brown rice, corn, and some water then microwaved that too. The green onions were stirred in at the end.

All that was left to do was place the rice mix in the bottom of a bowl, put the chicken on top, then sprinkle the fried crispy onions on top and drizzle with ranch. It provided two huge servings and was very tasty and filling. Home Chef doesn’t provide fiber levels but brown rice usually contains more fiber than white. It was also hearty and provided a chewy mouthfeel. I was worried that the consistency of the chicken would be spongy but it was all good!

Frutti Tutti Smoothie (10 minutes, Easy, 174 calories per serving) I usually add on a smoothie pack so I can get my shipping for free.

The strawberries leaked so I had to give everything in this bag a rinse.

The only thing I need to add was ice!

I zested and then skinned the orange and placed it in my blender with the rest of the ingredients and crushed ice.

Next I pulverized it for a minute or two.

It made two large glasses of smoothie! It was so delicious too. I ended up divvying it up between another glass so I could share it with both of my daughters and we all enjoyed it!

My Home Chef meals were a hit with me this month! It is super hot here in Central Texas so I am giving my oven the rest of the summer off and was happy to find these stove top and no cook options. To say the portions are generous is no joke, I could easily get an extra serving out of each of these meals. The quality was good and everything arrived fresh to my door. I had a recent shipment delayed and was worried that my food wasn’t cold enough and Home Chef made it right with a full credit. I appreciate that I can upgrade my meals with different protein sources and everything tasted superb! My shipment totaled $45.78 and that was with free shipping!

Have you tried Home Chef? What did you think of your meals?

Visit Home Chef to subscribe or find out more!

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