**Meal Kit Review: A Comparison of Blue Apron, Sun Basket, and Every Plate**

As a home cook, I was excited to try out different meal kit delivery services to see which one would work best for me. In this article, I'll share my experience with three popular options: Blue Apron, Sun Basket, and Every Plate.

**My Experience with Sun Basket**

I started with Sun Basket, which is known for its high-quality ingredients and creative recipes. When I received my first meal kit box, I was impressed by the attention to detail in labeling and packaging. Everything was neatly organized in a paper bag, making it easy to identify which meal I was pulling out of the fridge. The ingredients were also very fresh and mostly organic, which was a nice touch. However, when I cooked each of the meals, I realized that the pictures on the website didn't quite match up with the reality. The dishes looked bland compared to the colorful images, but fortunately, the flavors made up for it.

I thought Sun Basket's recipes pushed me out of my comfort zone in terms of cooking techniques and ingredients, which was a great experience. However, some portions were on the smaller side, so it's worth considering that when choosing a meal kit service. My favorite dish from Sun Basket was the Pad Thai, which tasted like something I could have gotten from a top Thai takeout restaurant.

**My Experience with Blue Apron**

Next up was Blue Apron, which is often considered the flagship of meal kit delivery services. When I received my first box, I noticed that some ingredients had HelloFresh branding on them, which might seem unusual at first. However, overall, the packaging wasn't too bad, and many of the produce items were loose, which was a nice change from other meal kits.

Blue Apron's recipe cards themselves were a bit confusing to follow, with only two steps to divide the instructions. I would have appreciated more division and bigger recipe cards to make it easier to follow along. Despite this, the meals were all excellent, and I didn't feel like I was skimping on ingredients because I chose a cheaper meal delivery service.

My favorite dish from Blue Apron was also impressive - the Chicken Katsu was delicious, and I found myself wanting more of that flavor. The portion size was also generous, which made it easy to cook multiple meals with what I had leftover.

**Every Plate: A Surprising Winner**

After trying out both Sun Basket and Blue Apron, I decided to give Every Plate a shot as the least expensive option. I have to say, I was pleasantly surprised by how little waste and plastic packaging there was in every box. Most of the produce items were loose, which was great to see.

Every Plate's recipe cards themselves were also less confusing than Blue Apron's, with more division and clearer instructions. However, some ingredients did have a HelloFresh sticker on them, which might be jarring for some users.

Despite being cheaper, Every Plate still delivered delicious meals that exceeded my expectations. My favorite dish from this service was the Chicken Katsu again - it was truly delicious, and I would love to make it every week. The portion size was also generous, making it easy to cook multiple meals with leftovers.

**The Verdict: Choosing the Best Meal Kit Service**

After trying out all three meal kit services, I have to say that Every Plate won my heart (and stomach). While Sun Basket and Blue Apron were both excellent options, I preferred Every Plate's lack of packaging waste and plastic usage. The meals themselves were also just as tasty, if not more so.

In terms of ease of cooking, taste, and price, every service had its strengths and weaknesses. However, for me, Every Plate was the clear winner. If you're looking for a meal kit delivery service that won't break the bank but still delivers delicious and healthy meals, I would definitely recommend giving Every Plate a try.

**Waste Generation: A Surprising Reality**

As part of my research, I also wanted to explore the waste generation aspect of each meal kit service. Unfortunately, it's surprising how much plastic packaging there is in many meal kits. Blue Apron was the clear winner in this regard, with very little waste and minimal plastic usage.

Sun Basket came in second, but still had some plastic packaging and small individual portions that seemed unnecessary. Every Plate was a surprise in this regard, with surprisingly little waste and no plastic packaging at all. Many of the produce items were loose, which made it easy to reduce waste.

**Conclusion**

In conclusion, my experience with meal kit delivery services has been overwhelmingly positive. Each service has its strengths and weaknesses, but ultimately, the decision comes down to personal preference and cooking style. I hope this review helps you make an informed decision when choosing a meal kit service that suits your needs.

"WEBVTTKind: captionsLanguage: enall right moment of truth yeah that looks pretty good it feels like there's a million meal kits to choose from so let's break it down and work out which is the best meal kit for you settle down settle down now i researched a bunch of different meal kits and i whittled it down and i managed to cook a week's worth of dinners from each in three distinct categories now all these meal kits work in a fairly similar way you go online you select the meals that you want for the week you can also swap in proteins and also indicate some dietary preferences say if you're vegetarian but if you have more specific dietary needs we do have a full breakdown of meal kits that cater for pretty much every person on cnet.com so the three categories that we're gonna test out are the classic or the og this one i chose blue apron the name synonymous with meal kit delivery the second category is the gourmet this one is sun basket to cater for a few more interesting recipes and things that you might not normally cook yourself at home and the third category is the cheap and cheerful this one i chose every plate now speaking of price there is always always always going to be a discount code available for these meal kit services just do some quick searching online even if you go to the company's website and start making an account and start looking at items to throw into your meal kit they'll usually offer you a discount code on the spot so at least your first few boxes won't be at full price but at the time of recording for four meals per week for two people this is the price without discount codes blue apron is eighty dollars sun basket is ninety dollars and every plate was around fifty dollars all right let's start with the og it's blue apron so i'm excited to see what's it's not inside food or bricks in here oh good it's food so when i took everything out of the box i noticed that all of the ingredients were either organic or had some indication on them about where they came from and how sustainably they were sourced which i really liked these are important the instructions on the menu cards were pretty clear and easy to follow which i appreciated and there were also some photos to give you an idea of what things should look like after you've prepped them do you know what the heck medium dice means for the bell pepper does that look right even though i still have no idea what medium dice means hawaii now the meals themselves were really flavorful and very tasty and i have to say blue apron was the closest to the photos when it came to me plating up my dish i was surprised that i could make a dish look that good and i didn't even bother trying to food style it it was just as it instructed me to plate it the one downside with blue apron for me was that the portions for some of the proteins specifically the fish and the chicken just weren't big enough for hungry appetites like mine so i suggest if you have a larger family or people that are a little bit more hungry i mean me definitely consider adding another portion to it and then maybe having leftovers because it's still going to be pretty tasty my favorite meal from blue apron was far and away the calabrian beef gnocchi oh chef's kiss it was like your nonna made it and i just walked into this kitchen with aromas everywhere it was really good and i want to eat that again i like haikus now let's get a little fancy with sunbasket when i unpacked the ingredients from this meal kit i was pretty impressed that everything was labeled and placed in a paper bag so this made it super simple to know which meal i was pulling out of the fridge and i didn't have to go hunting around going is that cucumber meant for this dish or do i have to save it for the other dish because the other two meal kits didn't have things labeled as well as sunbasket did it's actually been squeezed for me like how crazy is that like blue apron the ingredients were also really fresh and mostly organic when i did take them out of the box add olive oil yes please but overall when i finished cooking each of the meals and i did my big reveal this was the meal kit where the pictures definitely didn't match up to the reality they didn't look anywhere near as vibrant or as colorful as the meals that i'd cooked which looked a little bit bland compared to those pretty stock images now fortunately what the dish looked like didn't necessarily reflect in the flavour i thought that all of the sun basket meals were pretty tasty some of them were not as much of a hit as others but i did appreciate that all of the meals really pushed me outside of my comfort zone in terms of things that i would normally cook and again some of the portions were a little on the smaller side so do take that into consideration my favorite meal from sunbasket was far and above it was the pad thai which honestly this tasted like something i could have got from a top thai takeout restaurant it was so good i honestly want to eat this every week all right my first every plate box arrived and our final category which was the least expensive meal box this one is every plate now every plate is hello fresh it's the cheaper sibling so you might notice a couple of the ingredients do have the hellofresh branding overall when i took the ingredients out of the box i like that there wasn't too much plastic packaging a lot of the vegetables were loose which was great because a lot of the other meal kits they were wrapped in plastic i don't know why you need to wrap individual scallions individual carrots in plastic it's a waste a waste a waste of plastic so that was really impressive about every plate all that said most of the produce i noticed in every plate was not organic so that is just something to bear in mind if that's important to you tonight's menu will be crispy chicken katsu i subbed out the pork for chicken step one wash and dry produce already have because i'm paranoid now the every plate recipe cards themselves look these were not laid out the best and they were a little bit confusing even for someone that cooks almost every night like me i really would have appreciated a little bit more division maybe a bigger recipe card would help a couple more steps just to divide it up but all that said every plate the meals were really tasty and i didn't feel like i skimped out on anything because i chose a cheaper meal delivery kit they were all excellent meals my favorite overall was the chicken katsu which oh it was delicious i i've actually look i could have used another piece of chicken but that's only because it was so tasty the portion size is on every plate were really good as well and definitely didn't feel like i needed to add too much more i was just being greedy because i really like the flavor that's pretty good i made that okay so before i choose an overall winner i wanted to give you an idea of the waste that these meal kits generate each week it's kind of weird and gross but i did keep all of the packaging from each week's meal kits to give you an idea of what was generated so this this is blue apron it's a pretty big bag mostly plastics there are there's maybe like one tin can in there and just a lot of small bottles and packaging then this was sun basket which was a lot of paper bags and again some plastic packaging and small individual portions and finally this was a surprise it was actually every plate which was the least amount of waste and plastic packaging out of all three alright time to pick the overall winner across all the different categories taste ease of cooking waste generation and also the price the winner for me is every plate i'm actually surprised that i chose this one yes it is the cheapest but overall i felt like these were meals that were closest to things that i would actually cook and something that was easy enough and not as expensive as the other two options and i really liked the lack of packaging it was nice that all those vegetables weren't individually wrapped sure it wasn't as fancy as some of the other two boxes but overall i think i would definitely get every plate again thanks so much for watching i hope this was helpful for you in working out the best meal kit that will work for you if you want to check out our full comprehensive list of all the other meal kit delivery options you can find that on cnet.comall right moment of truth yeah that looks pretty good it feels like there's a million meal kits to choose from so let's break it down and work out which is the best meal kit for you settle down settle down now i researched a bunch of different meal kits and i whittled it down and i managed to cook a week's worth of dinners from each in three distinct categories now all these meal kits work in a fairly similar way you go online you select the meals that you want for the week you can also swap in proteins and also indicate some dietary preferences say if you're vegetarian but if you have more specific dietary needs we do have a full breakdown of meal kits that cater for pretty much every person on cnet.com so the three categories that we're gonna test out are the classic or the og this one i chose blue apron the name synonymous with meal kit delivery the second category is the gourmet this one is sun basket to cater for a few more interesting recipes and things that you might not normally cook yourself at home and the third category is the cheap and cheerful this one i chose every plate now speaking of price there is always always always going to be a discount code available for these meal kit services just do some quick searching online even if you go to the company's website and start making an account and start looking at items to throw into your meal kit they'll usually offer you a discount code on the spot so at least your first few boxes won't be at full price but at the time of recording for four meals per week for two people this is the price without discount codes blue apron is eighty dollars sun basket is ninety dollars and every plate was around fifty dollars all right let's start with the og it's blue apron so i'm excited to see what's it's not inside food or bricks in here oh good it's food so when i took everything out of the box i noticed that all of the ingredients were either organic or had some indication on them about where they came from and how sustainably they were sourced which i really liked these are important the instructions on the menu cards were pretty clear and easy to follow which i appreciated and there were also some photos to give you an idea of what things should look like after you've prepped them do you know what the heck medium dice means for the bell pepper does that look right even though i still have no idea what medium dice means hawaii now the meals themselves were really flavorful and very tasty and i have to say blue apron was the closest to the photos when it came to me plating up my dish i was surprised that i could make a dish look that good and i didn't even bother trying to food style it it was just as it instructed me to plate it the one downside with blue apron for me was that the portions for some of the proteins specifically the fish and the chicken just weren't big enough for hungry appetites like mine so i suggest if you have a larger family or people that are a little bit more hungry i mean me definitely consider adding another portion to it and then maybe having leftovers because it's still going to be pretty tasty my favorite meal from blue apron was far and away the calabrian beef gnocchi oh chef's kiss it was like your nonna made it and i just walked into this kitchen with aromas everywhere it was really good and i want to eat that again i like haikus now let's get a little fancy with sunbasket when i unpacked the ingredients from this meal kit i was pretty impressed that everything was labeled and placed in a paper bag so this made it super simple to know which meal i was pulling out of the fridge and i didn't have to go hunting around going is that cucumber meant for this dish or do i have to save it for the other dish because the other two meal kits didn't have things labeled as well as sunbasket did it's actually been squeezed for me like how crazy is that like blue apron the ingredients were also really fresh and mostly organic when i did take them out of the box add olive oil yes please but overall when i finished cooking each of the meals and i did my big reveal this was the meal kit where the pictures definitely didn't match up to the reality they didn't look anywhere near as vibrant or as colorful as the meals that i'd cooked which looked a little bit bland compared to those pretty stock images now fortunately what the dish looked like didn't necessarily reflect in the flavour i thought that all of the sun basket meals were pretty tasty some of them were not as much of a hit as others but i did appreciate that all of the meals really pushed me outside of my comfort zone in terms of things that i would normally cook and again some of the portions were a little on the smaller side so do take that into consideration my favorite meal from sunbasket was far and above it was the pad thai which honestly this tasted like something i could have got from a top thai takeout restaurant it was so good i honestly want to eat this every week all right my first every plate box arrived and our final category which was the least expensive meal box this one is every plate now every plate is hello fresh it's the cheaper sibling so you might notice a couple of the ingredients do have the hellofresh branding overall when i took the ingredients out of the box i like that there wasn't too much plastic packaging a lot of the vegetables were loose which was great because a lot of the other meal kits they were wrapped in plastic i don't know why you need to wrap individual scallions individual carrots in plastic it's a waste a waste a waste of plastic so that was really impressive about every plate all that said most of the produce i noticed in every plate was not organic so that is just something to bear in mind if that's important to you tonight's menu will be crispy chicken katsu i subbed out the pork for chicken step one wash and dry produce already have because i'm paranoid now the every plate recipe cards themselves look these were not laid out the best and they were a little bit confusing even for someone that cooks almost every night like me i really would have appreciated a little bit more division maybe a bigger recipe card would help a couple more steps just to divide it up but all that said every plate the meals were really tasty and i didn't feel like i skimped out on anything because i chose a cheaper meal delivery kit they were all excellent meals my favorite overall was the chicken katsu which oh it was delicious i i've actually look i could have used another piece of chicken but that's only because it was so tasty the portion size is on every plate were really good as well and definitely didn't feel like i needed to add too much more i was just being greedy because i really like the flavor that's pretty good i made that okay so before i choose an overall winner i wanted to give you an idea of the waste that these meal kits generate each week it's kind of weird and gross but i did keep all of the packaging from each week's meal kits to give you an idea of what was generated so this this is blue apron it's a pretty big bag mostly plastics there are there's maybe like one tin can in there and just a lot of small bottles and packaging then this was sun basket which was a lot of paper bags and again some plastic packaging and small individual portions and finally this was a surprise it was actually every plate which was the least amount of waste and plastic packaging out of all three alright time to pick the overall winner across all the different categories taste ease of cooking waste generation and also the price the winner for me is every plate i'm actually surprised that i chose this one yes it is the cheapest but overall i felt like these were meals that were closest to things that i would actually cook and something that was easy enough and not as expensive as the other two options and i really liked the lack of packaging it was nice that all those vegetables weren't individually wrapped sure it wasn't as fancy as some of the other two boxes but overall i think i would definitely get every plate again thanks so much for watching i hope this was helpful for you in working out the best meal kit that will work for you if you want to check out our full comprehensive list of all the other meal kit delivery options you can find that on cnet.com\n"