My Experience with Home Chef: Review

I have been using Home Chef for the past 6 months now or so and I have some thoughts on Quality, How it works, and what my favorite parts are. There’s also some ways that Home Chef may surprise you (like helping you learn how to cook!)

*All photos are courtesy of Home Chef and this post may contain affiliated links. For more information on this, please see my Disclosure page!*

How it works:

Each order, I receive three meals for two people every other week. In each box is your meat, other dry ingredients, and recipe cards. When you get your very first box, they will send you a cool binder to keep your recipe cards in so you can save them like a cookbook.  I hope they keep track of how many recipes I’ve ordered because I’m due for a new one soon!

When you sign up, you can choose your options to set up your taste profile.  You choose what types of meat you like, or if you want all vegetarian options. You can let them know if you want low-carb, no fish, no wheat, no soy, etc. etc. so that the meals will be specific to your liking each week. This is also great if you have food allergies or any intolerances. 

A week or so before the package is supposed to be delivered, they’ll send you the menu that they’ve put together for the week with your preferences. You have the options to swap out any meals you’d like for something else. 

They do a really good job at picking out meals that meet my requirements because I rarely have to change out the meals for something different. This program is also great for those picky eaters in your family! 

Learning How to Cook:

If you were anything like me, you never really learned how to cook great food and recipes when you were younger. Cooking was never my mom’s favorite “chore,” so I didn’t really pick up on the passion either. She always had this saying, “We eat to live, not live to eat” basically meaning it doesn’t really matter what you have to eat, as long as you have something to eat!

I knew enough about cooking to get by. I knew how to do basic things and luckily I was able to follow recipes and instructions pretty well, so it wasn’t ever really a huge issue. However, cooking certain things, like chicken, without making it dry, was always a challenge.

I personally have been using Home Chef as personal cooking lessons because they show you how to make all kinds of fun recipes that you wouldn’t normally find. I can honestly say that I can now make a chicken breast or chicken recipes where the chicken is juicy and delicious and not the least bit dry!

Grocery Shopping:

Another thing I really like about Home Chef is that it takes the hassle out of grocery shopping for me. I don’t have to waste my time in the grocery store looking for all the ingredients and risk forgetting an ingredient and having to run back to the store. I no longer have to buy ingredients for recipes that I’ll only use one time.

Once, I wanted to make a recipe similar to the Fiesta Lime Chicken at Applebees and the recipe called for the chicken to marinade of various ingredients, including like 2 teaspoons of tequila. I don’t actually drink, so this was quite the task. I ended up purchasing a giant bottle of the nicest tequila the store had to offer because I thought I’d make the recipe a bunch of times. Instead, I made it once or twice at the most and had a giant bottle of tequila leftover that I was never going to use. (Don’t worry, it found a good home ;))

Quality:

Overall, the quality of Home Chef has been very good. The choices and quality of meat have been great. The ingredients are fresh and perfectly chosen. I would be lying if I didn’t tell you about the two times something went a little wrong in my 6 months, even though they didn’t end up being big deals. 

The first thing was that once a lid on some oil was not screwed on all the way and it leaked a little in the bag on the other ingredients. It ended up not being a big deal, but I needed to add some additional oil from my stash to make up for what had spilled out.

The second thing is one time the ice packet inside the box was melted and had a small puncture in the packet and kind of made a mess. Luckily, nothing was inside the food bags, so the food was fine, but it was kind of a pain to clean up.

Favorite Meals:

We have been extremely satisfied with their meals and the variety of meals they provide each order. The meals start at $7.99 per person, but most of the time, my meals end up costing $9.99 a person. If you think about it, this is almost as cheap as a meal at McDonald’s now a days and it’s a lot healthier!!

Here are some of our favorites meals we’ve had the opportunity of trying in the past.

Blue Cheese and Smoked Almond Pork Chop

This is the only meal I’ve received twice, but I purposely left it on my menu for meals because it was soooo good! It was simple, yet flavorful and delicious.

One-Sheet Pretzel-Crusted Chicken with roasted broccoli and honey mustard

I wasn’t sure at first how the pretzels would be on the chicken, but it was the perfect mixture of crunchy and the honey mustard mixture was the perfect flavor combination.

Chicken Enchilada Skillet with zucchini, poblano pepper, and crispy tortilla strips

This skilled is so delicious and flavorful. This is a meal I can see myself making again and again and it’s low-carb. I told a few friends about this one! The leftovers were amazing as well.

Jalapeno Popper Pork Chop with mojito-lime corn on cob

This meal was good with and without the jalapeno popper cream on top of the pork chop! My husband chose to take the topping off of his and  he said it was still really good (even thought that’s the jalepeno popper part!)!

Shrimp with Tiger Sauce and charred snap peas

This was one of our very first meals we received through Home Chef and honestly one of the main reasons why I kept trying the meals. I thought if all of them could be like this, this is going to the best service ever — and I was right!

Pork Tenderloin with Roasted Pears with green beans and garlic-thyme sauce

This meal pushed me out of my food comfort zone because I would have never thought to roast pears with a pork tenderloin and let me tell you — it was delicious! It was crunchy and flavorful and they paired nicely together.

Nashville Hot Chicken Strips with remoulade slaw

These chicken strips were so delicious! My husband said these were “the best chicken strips he’s ever eaten!” These were full of flavor and would be easy to make again!

Coupon for $30 off:

If you would like the opportunity to try Home Chef for yourself, here’s a coupon for $30 off. If you choose to use my link, you will also be helping me out with $30 off! I would love to know your thoughts about Home Chef: do you love it? What has been the most surprising part for you?