Hello Fresh - Cooking for non-cooks?

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I will freely admit to not being a great cook. I have a few things I can cook and I can follow basic recipes, but I do not experiment much. We share the cooking between three of us and it tends to be the same few meals on rotation. A friend suggested we try Hello Fresh and there was a discount on the initial order.

Boxes

We ordered five meals for four that arrived in two large boxes. Some of the ingredients need to be refridgerated. Those came in insulated bags with ice packs and were still cool on delivery. There is a fair bit of packaging, but most of is recycleable or made from recycled materials.

I cooked this evening's meal of mushroom pasanda. I first assembled all the ingredients. Most come in a bag that has the same number as the recipe card. You have everything you need apart from oil, salt and pepper. They said this would take 35 minutes to prepare.

Ingredients

I carefully followed the steps and it was all pretty clear. I did not use all the spice mix as my other half does not like things to be too spicy. I did use most of the tumeric for the rice and cauliflower. That latter was roasted. I think it took under 45 minutes, but there would be some variation in getting things heated up.

The result was pretty good. The rice was a bit stuck together, but had some flavour. In general we are not great users of spices, but they do make a difference. This had plenty of flavour without being overpowering. The previous meal we had was a sweet potato salad that was really tasty.

Dinner

We are considering having more of these, but probably not every day. They can add some variety to our meals. They work out at about £3.50 per person per meal. You could buy the ingredients cheaper, but might end up with extra of some that could get wasted. I would consider it semi-fast food in that it is convenient, but probably better for you than some ready-made meals. We do not tend to have things like microwave meals and do cook a lot from basic ingredients.

They have a referral scheme, so you can get something off your initial orders via this link.

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26 comments
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It looks like quite a bit of work with what I can see. Still £3.50 per head is quite cheap. Might try the BBQ again before winter sets in. Supposedly today was our last decent day...

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Nice one, we thought of this....I mean I don't do any of the cooking here....and will tend not to eat....I mean egg and chips or brunch I do at weekends....so good on ya! !PIZZA

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Although I don't like cooking that much I do love food. This is not a bad compromise.

!PIZZA is nice though. So is !BEER

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I like the idea... It sounds easy to cook and from what you write I think it also tastes nice.

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We have chosen to support your post because you are one of the good promoters of Hive on Twitter based on our Hive Twitter Daily Report.

We appreciate your time and enthusiasm for promoting Hive!

Keep up the good job! 😍😍😍

This is done with the support of #theycallmedan and the #threespeak team.

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My wife and I were gifted one of these a while ago. It was nice, but we do a lot of our own cooking so for us it seemed a bit over priced. I think if you aren't familiar with it or good at it, it can seem intimidating and this helps eliminate some of those issues. It looks tasty.

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It might give us more confidence to try other recipes. We could buy our own ingredients to cook these again. You pay for convenience.

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Yeah, I get it. Portion control is a big deal too, so having that already taken care of for you is a good thing.

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£3.50 isn't actually too bad you know, given it's all healthy and compared to a take out!

Sounds like a nice meal, I do like Cauliflower!

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They have a decent selection of veggie meals. We shall have to see if we will get bored of those, but we may be more inspired to experiment.

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This funny as a few youtubers I watch have been sponsored by them, seems a good deal. For me tho, I'm far to cheap...er "economical" to not just buy raw ingredients (and grow as much as I can including chicken eggs) to make my own, but I do LIKE the concept.

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They do advertise a lot on podcasts, but our friend got the referral bonus. It's an experiment for us and we shall see how it goes for a while.

!BEER

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They can work out expensive. Better to keep a supply of herbs in the cupboard and make your own.

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It's a compromise, as with many things. People pay for convenience. This may encourage us to experiment more.

We did find some salad stuff in the boxes started going off, but then it has been hot. Needed to put more in the fridge. They separate some stuff out for that, but we did not check what else was in the other bags. Lesson learnt.

!BEER

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I think they're a good idea for a young professional couple or individual who possibly doesn't have much time on their hands, but I suspect most families couldn't justify the cost.

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Well some people spend a lot on takeaways. That's a rare treat for us.

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I will freely admit to not being a great cook.

You and me both. That's been one of my biggest weaknesses all my life. If it doesn't have directions and you're relying on me, we're finding something else to eat. A friend of mine let me try some of the Hello Fresh stuff he was getting, and honestly it wasn't bad. I need to try more.

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Good instructions help a lot and there's a million cookbooks out there. Just have to find some good ones. We did get more Hello Fresh meals. Will just see how it goes.

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