An Honest Review of Blue Apron

I adore having things delivered.

There might be nothing in this world I refer to staying at home and having things brought to me. I've always been a homebody, and my love for creating a home has just nestled nicely in with my natural tendencies towards being *inside* and looking at a lovely view *outside*. (After 10 years my husband understands this, but still isn't of the same mindset. Hence he rides bikes outside, and I do exercise videos inside)

Anyway, I have an unending love for Amazon Prime (I wrote about how I think it saves me hours a week here), so this summer, while we were at the vacation house I decided to try Blue Apron. They deliver a box to your door every week with ingredients for 3 meals. Everything is all perfectly portioned, with photo step-by-step instructions. Since we were "in the woods", grocery shopping was not very refined, and this was a chance to spice things up a bit.

Little did I know how spicy it would be. 

Even with our stove and oven being out for 5 weeks (I know, I know, but "in the woods" there are very few repair people), I managed to make the meals Blue Apron sent.

An aside- This is not a sponsored post, I paid for everything, just wanted to let you know my thoughts.

Sorry for the iphone photo, but everything tastes great. The downside, which I alluded to earlier, is that it is WAY too spicy for my kids. So in the end, I wind up seasoning and spicing half of everything, and the leaving the rest plain. The above was salmon crusted with rice flakes, kale with garlic, and miso-mashed potatoes which were a huge hit, even the baby likes them!

The other major drawback is that while the food is pre-portioned (1 tomato, 3 stalks of celery...) it is not pre-cut. So each meal takes about 45 minutes to prepare, but most of that is hands-on time. Not ideal for the baby stage that I'm currently in. I'm used to hands-off dinners, so to find 45 minutes to chop, slice, dice, marinate, sauté, broil, sear, toss and garnish is a tough call most weeknights.

The recipes are delicious, and give me tons of ideas. My kids adored a Vietnamese Shaking Beef (recipe here).

So inspired by the shaking beef success, I made it again and served it to guests. I paired it with corn ravioli in a miso-ginger broth, lime rice, and we ended with poached pears and ice cream. You can find my recipe for poached pears here.

Any new convenience deliveries you are using?

Jessica

Pin It