I’m a big fan of meal kits. Even though I love cooking, living in New York City makes grocery shopping a bit of a slog. Supermarkets can be far from my apartment, and hauling a week’s worth of groceries home often leaves me with sore shoulders. That’s where meal kits come in clutch: everything you need, preportioned and ready to go, delivered straight to your door.
Normally, I stick to three meals per week—any more feels overwhelming, and I worry I won’t have time to cook. But this December I decided to see what it would be like to cook HelloFresh every night for a full week. With travel coming up and a busy schedule to manage, I figured it would be a helpful way to stay home, catch up on work, and save money by cooking instead of eating out.
HelloFresh is the brand most people think of when they think “meal kit,” which makes sense—it claims over 50% of the category’s market share. The service is aimed at a wide audience, allowing you to choose from plans geared toward different needs: meat and veggie, veggie, family-friendly, fit and wholesome, under 20 minutes, and pescatarian.
For my week of cooking, I picked a mix of proteins and cuisines, with a few high-protein options. Selecting meals was super easy. HelloFresh’s interface makes it simple to filter by dietary preferences and find exactly what you want. There were at least a dozen options to choose from each night, and narrowing down high-protein meals was a breeze.
I expected cooking every night for seven days would be daunting or that I’d get bored, but I actually loved it—and even started looking forward to the evening ritual. Here’s what I made, what I loved, and what surprised me along the way.
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Monday: Crispy Parmesan chicken with garlic scallion couscous and lemony roasted carrots
When I first saw this meal, I wasn’t especially excited. In my experience, couscous recipes can be underwhelming. But this dish completely surprised me. In fact, I did something I’ve never done before: I saved couscous for later and absolutely relished the leftovers the next day. The spices gave it real depth, and the squeeze of fresh lemon made it absolutely sing.
This is also where HelloFresh really worked. The recipe was incredibly easy to prepare and mostly hands-off—waiting for the chicken to finish baking was the most time-consuming part The chicken came out perfectly crispy and flavorful thanks to a simple sour cream–based coating topped with seasoned breadcrumbs, and even the carrots—which were roasted in olive oil, salt, pepper, and lemon—were delightful. I enjoyed this meal so much that I saved the recipe to make again with my own groceries
