I wanted Home Chef to win. I'll admit that before giving you a single number, because when I signed up for two weeks of their oven-ready meals, I was already picturing Thursdays where I'd walk in from the preschool office, slide a tray into the oven and sit down for the first time all day.
Some of that happened. But on Friday, September 19, I canceled, and here's why.
What we ordered and what it cost
We got two boxes, delivered Monday, September 8 and Monday, September 15. Each had three recipes with four servings apiece. I chose two oven-ready trays per box for my office days and one regular kit for a Wednesday.
- Box one, with the introductory discount: $58.40, or $4.87 a serving
- Box two, full price including $10.99 shipping: $130.87, or $10.91 a serving
- Both boxes: $189.27 for 24 servings, about $7.89 a serving
Just like with HelloFresh in the spring, four servings don't feed the five of us, especially with a ten-year-old who eats like Wyatt. I stretched every meal with a side, usually a pot of rice, a bag salad or a bowl of fruit, for about $2 a night. Both boxes counted against our grocery budget the weeks they came, and I bought less at Aldi to make room.
For comparison, our home-cooked dinners average about $2.75 a serving this year, and my office-day dinners usually cost $10 to $15 for all five of us. One full-price Home Chef meal for four worked out to $43.62 before the side.
What the trays were actually like
The idea is simple. Everything comes in an aluminum tray, assembled or nearly so, and the tray goes straight into the oven. No chopping and no pan to wash, because the tray is the pan. For a former line cook who still cleans as she goes, that part was lovely.
Here's how the six meals went:
- Chicken and green chile enchilada tray: good flavor, a little soupy and smaller than it looked. Eli refused it on sight because of the sauce.
- Italian sausage, peppers and penne tray: the hit of the two weeks. Wyatt had seconds and would have had thirds.
- Beef and broccoli stir-fry (regular kit): fine, but it took 35 minutes of chopping and stirring, which is exactly what I didn't want from a kit.
- Barbecue chicken with roasted potatoes tray: needed ten minutes more than the card said before my thermometer read 165 in the thickest piece. Eli ate the potatoes and a piece I set aside before the sauce went on.
- Shrimp tacos (regular kit): quick and good. Matt's favorite.
- Cheesy meatball bake tray: the kids split. Wyatt and Rosie ate it happily. Eli ate rice.
On a practice Tuesday, the tray went in at 5:45 and we ate at 6:30. On a Thursday, it went in at 5:00 and we ate at 5:45. I didn't touch a knife either day, and I'll miss that.
Where it fell short
The first problem is the oven. Oven-ready means the oven runs for 30 to 45 minutes, and in a Dallas September that heats our whole open kitchen and living room. I measured our oven back in June at about 32 cents for a typical dinner, so the electricity isn't the issue. Comfort is.
The bigger problem is price. Two office days a week at full price would cost us roughly $63 more each week than the Crock-Pot and Instant Pot dinners I already make, or about $270 a month. That's more than twice our summer grocery creep.
And honestly, the trays solved a problem I'd mostly solved already. My office-day system of Crock-Pot Tuesdays, Instant Pot Thursdays and a strip of painter's tape on the lid gets dinner on the table almost as easily, for less than a third of the price. The trays were easier, but not $30-a-night easier.
What I'm keeping
Canceling took about two minutes in the account settings, before the cutoff for the next box. What I'm keeping is the idea. On a Sunday afternoon, I can build my own oven-ready dinner in a disposable foil pan, like white chicken enchiladas or a pan of chicken spaghetti, cover it, write the day on the foil and slide it into the oven on Thursday. On the weeks it cools off a little, that's the plan.
I made the first one this afternoon anyway: white chicken enchiladas for Thursday, $12.80 for all five of us, sitting in the fridge with "THURS 375, 35 MIN" written on the foil in marker.
