Meal-Kits: Costly, or Cost Effective?

Polly Watton

Food&Drink Writer

Recent years have seen a rise in ‘meal-kit’ services such as HelloFresh, Gousto and AllPlants, especially during the pandemic, when recreating restaurant quality meals became a preferential past-time. In fact, the purchase of meal kits and grocery boxes in the UK increased by 114% between April 2020 and 2019. As society recovers from the pandemic and returns to normal life, finding time for cooking proves difficult and food waste feels inevitableespecially for students who find themselves swamped by deadlines and frequently tempted to get a takeaway or join friends for a post-lecture dinner out. Are these meal-kit services the way forward?

The first question we might ask is just how cost-effective are these services? The 2022 National Student Money Survey highlighted that the average monthly cost of groceries cost a student £116, spending £29 per week on a food shop. In comparison to Gousto, which provides a box for six meals (three meals for two people) for £29.99, and Hello Fresh which for the same amount of meals costs £28.49, the prices are not hugely different. However, it is also important to keep in mind that while there may be occasional leftovers, these services do not usually include breakfast, lunch, or snacks.

AllPlants is slightly different, as you can pick from breakfasts, lunches and desserts, along with your evening meals. Dinners roughly cost around £5.75 and serve two. So, compared to HelloFresh and Gousto, three meals for two people would be £17.25. This is significantly cheaper than the other two, although there is a minimum order spend of £25. Despite oneoff discounts, regularly using these services would not be cheaper than your average food shop. Nonetheless, if you do have enough money to purchase these services each week, what are the benefits of doing so?

The cost of these services are certainly not cheaper than pre- planning your own meals, as just six dinners would cost roughly the same amount as an average student weekly food shop. However, during exam season, when conjuring up meal ideas, going food shopping, and standing in the kitchen cooking is not viable, perhaps the monetary costs can come second to the benefits for mindfulness. UoB student Amelia Bailey states, 'Gousto made cooking healthy hearty meals accessible to me while I was busy with exams during second year. During a time when we often feel as if there is no time to eat at all, Gousto made cooking a time to take a break and focus on feeding myself in a relaxing and tasty manner.' Furthermore, many of these services offer first time discounts: HelloFresh offers 60% off your first box, meaning six meals would cost you just £11.40.

Aside from ease, another one of the main benefits comes from how these services work to combat food waste. Cutting food waste is one of Gousto’s founding principles. According to Gousto, all of their ingredients are pre-measured so that 'none of it ends up in the bin'. Likewise, HelloFresh state: 'we waste 21% less food waste than traditional food retailers.' In fact, HelloFresh recently ran a survey of 2,000 adults that revealed the average Brit has £171 of uneaten food sitting in their kitchens. But are these companies the way to go in order to combat this food waste, or are there more cost-effective strategies?

Methods to reduce food waste without cashing out on these services are plentiful. There are countless tips out there, such as making soups with leftover vegetables, creating meal plans, and understanding that 'best before' dates are not the same as 'use by' dates. Freezing your food is also a great alternative to throwing it out and many packaged foods have freezing instructions. However, if you are looking to try something new and can afford the price tag, services like Gousto, Hello Fresh and AllPlants certainly offer a straightforward means of cooking healthy meals, whilst also having a positive impact on the environment.

HelloFresh: My Experience

Ashley Kabue reviews the Hello Fresh mealkit service, and praises its hassle-free and quick cooking experience - for a steep price.

Ashley Kabue

Food&Drink Editor

HelloFresh is one of the leading meal-kit subscription services in the country. It claims to have 'both delicious and nutritious meals' that can be cooked in 'around 30 minutes', and is popular with those on busy schedules as it cuts out the hassle of going to buy ingredients and thinking of what to cook during the working week. As a student on a tight budget, when my friend offered me a discount code that reduced the price of my first order from £38.99 to just £5, I couldn’t refuse! Here are my thoughts:

Ordering:

The website is easy to read and presents a wide variety of plans to suit different lifestyles and dietary preferences. With categories such as 'Healthy', 'Vegetarian', 'Rapid' and 'Family-Friendly', alongside premium options with luxury meats such as steak, it took a long time to make up my mind on a meal plan. After debating on appealing choices such as 'Rogan Josh Style Lamb and Lentil Curry' and 'Spiced Roasted Broccoli on Zhoug Couscous', I finally picked three options: 'Hoisin Beef and Mixed Veg Stir-Fry', 'Black Bean and Sweet Potato Harissa Stew', and 'Cajun Spiced Bass and Chive Dressing'. Each of my options provided three meals for two people, totalling a whopping 18 meals.

Delivery:

The delivery options are extremely flexible as they allow you to pick a specific time frame in which you will be home to receive the order –either in the day, or evenings. The packaging is largely paper and cardboard, and it was pleasing to see their commitment to reducing plastic waste. The items are individually packaged, and then divided into two sections: the pantry items are kept separately from the items that require refrigeration, which are kept cool with an ice pack. I arrived home an hour after my box was delivered, but was pleased to find that my food was all still cold.

Cooking: sauce, and mixed vegetables in thick noodles - simple, but hearty. The 'Black Bean and Sweet Potato Harissa Stew' was my favourite, as the soup was creamy and delicious. Finally, the 'Cajun Spiced Bass and Chive Dressing' was fresh and zesty. All recipes include ingredients such as ketjap manis, hoisin sauce, harissa sauce and cavolo nero that are not easy to source from the supermarket, and added an interesting twist to my usual cooking. I found that whilst the flavours were generally tasty, they occasionally lacked depth. Chopping up a few onions and adding chilli or smoked paprika will certainly elevate your experience. I found myself adding ingredients to every recipe, which was fine as I was experimenting, though doing this did increase the cooking time which defeated the point of the service in a way. They are decent meals, but if you are used to cooking for yourself, you might value the convenience of HelloFresh more than the quality of the food. Even so, the produce was all fresh and tasty, and my friend who had an issue with receiving an incorrect item stated that it was really quickly resolved.

When it comes to cooking, each meal comes with a card that shows a labelled picture of the food item, and a detailed recipe with instructions on exactly how to cook the meal. This recipe card is extremely clear: it lets you know which ingredients you will need that are not included in the delivery - such as water and oilas well as which utensils you will need to cook the meal. The instructions leave no room for confusion as they instruct on exactly how to cut any vegetables, precise cooking times, and when to complete each task. They also include helpful cooking tips, such as rinsing noodles in cold water after they are cooked to avoid them sticking together - things that might be intuitive to natural cooks, but are easy to forget if you have less experience in the kitchen. Cooking with HelloFresh was extremely beginner friendly, easy to clean up and quick.

General Thoughts:

Overall, I found the service to be extremely convenient - it eliminates the hassle of food shopping, the questioning of 'do I have all these ingredients, what should I do with them?', and is quick and hassle-free. However, at full price, my £38.99 box would have amounted to £3.59 per serving; whilst I believe this to be a fair price for those with full-time jobs, I think that on a student budget, you can create similar meals with ingredients from ALDI for much less!

Taste:

My 'Hoisin Beef and Mixed Veg Stir-Fry' included hoisin