I wrote recently that I was trying BistroMD. While I found it, okay, for some meals, I wasn't blown away, and honestly, there were a couple I had to choke down. I also didn't realize they were going to be frozen. I was looking for something fresh this time.
BistroMD had interesting choices but you are also supposed to remember to take out what you want to eat the next day and move it from the freezer to the refrigerator. You can put it in the microwave right out of the freezer, but the directions are, for best results, thaw in refrigerator overnight. I forgot almost every time. I don't know if not defrosting it beforehand and heating it from frozen made a difference or not but I can't say I loved any of the food enough to get a second delivery.
On the positive side though, BistroMD has breakfast meals included in your weekly number of orders. I was looking for a meal delivery service that offers breakfast, lunch, and dinner. While lunch and dinner food is one and the same for a lot of people, I also wanted a plan where there was some lighter fare for lunch that feels more like lunch food. For example, Jenny Craig has a macaroni and cheese with vegetables on the side, a loaded baked potato, a baguette with ham and cheese, a panini. I don't want a full chicken marsala meal mid-day. Even though it seems like a Lean Cuisine or whatever, I have a thing about what is breakfast food, lunch food and dinner food.
I decided that since BistroMD is no obligation, I wanted to try another service instead. I chose Factor home delivery meals next. They are highly rated when I looked up reviews online- not reviews on their site, but I looked up: Best meal delivery service 2022. I got BistroMD and Factor over and over on different review sites.
Factor's meals come fresh and are kept refrigerated, not frozen. They have a different menu every week so hopefully you like enough on the menu to order however many meals you're getting. I did a Black Friday deal where I got eighteen meals for approximately ninety dollars. However- most of these services, including this one, you have to pay before you pick your meals. I didn't really understand that while they do have some breakfast food, it's not included in your meal order. If you order eighteen meals, that's eighteen meals off the regular menu- which does not include the breakfasts or these add-ons they have. I paid for eighteen meals before I realized this so I was stuck and not sure how I was going to eat eighteen meals in a week. Since BistroMD is frozen, whatever I didn't eat is still in my freezer.
It was fine though because I figured B and/or E could eat some of the overflow. I got my first delivery about a week after ordering. Each meal comes individually packaged, labeled with what it is, and heats in the microwave in two or three minutes each. The directions say on almost all of them I've had so far is to microwave for two minutes, then add thirty second increments if it isn't hot enough. Personally, I just start at two minutes and thirty seconds because I know my microwave.
I do like more of the food from Factor than I did from BistroMD. I really like their cranberry pecan chicken, sundried tomato chicken fusilli, rosemary pepper pork chop, butternut squash and sage chicken pasta, and a couple of others. I've gotten two boxes so far- the eighteen box and then I switched to six boxes, because I know I'm only going to eat them for dinner. I picked the eighteen for the deal on Black Friday because it was such a good deal and I wanted to be able to try as many meals as I could. OR, if one was horrible, I wanted to be able to swap it out for something else.
If I had to grade BistroMD, I'd give it C. If I had to grade Factor, I'd give it a B. And it's only a B because I personally, have the palate of a first grader. Other people who eat more grown-up food in general might like some of the more interesting choices. I'm looking for more plain food. However, with, Factor, out of all the meals I've tried, I've only thrown one away that, to me, was totally unappetizing. I've gotten twenty-four boxes total, and had to throw two away because they were over the time given to eat them- I never got to them in time. Those two were fish- a shrimp scampi and past dish and a pesto salmon. I'm not eating old fish.
Factor isn't overly exotic but there are definitely meals that try too hard. There is a balsamic chicken with butternut squash risotto that seemed like it had a lot of potential. Then I opened it and see Brussels sprouts under the chicken. They've been soaked in balsamic for however long under the chicken like they're eggs being laid. I don't eat Brussels sprouts to begin with but if I did, I wouldn't want them microwaved under chicken. There are directions for a conventional oven but the whole idea of meals like this is quick and convenient and using a conventional oven is not quick OR convenient. A meal like that could've had green beans, carrots, corn- something that isn't ruined in a microwave. I took the sprouts out, threw them away and just heated the chicken and risotto.
Risotto is difficult for the average person to make. It takes a little skill. I LOVE the idea of having it as a side with these meals but they need to do some perfecting. I'm no foodie, but no one wants mushy risotto. That's not how it's supposed to taste. It was edible, but I wouldn't say it was one of their better attempts.
I've never eaten any kind of riced cauliflower in place of potato or rice or whatever. But the cauliflower and red pepper mash under the pork chop was great. I had no idea what it was until right now when I just looked up that meal to write about it. Riced cauliflower is one of those things that also takes skill because I've seen it in other brands of packaged meals and it was disgusting. Factor hit the mark with this one.
When the menu comes out for the next week, you can choose Chef's Choice, which is where they just send you their selections for however many meals are supposed to be in your box. Or, you can choose your own. You always have the choice to pick from any of the meals but they are labeled into categories: Calorie Smart, Keto, Vegan/Vegetarian, Non-Spicy, Non-Dairy, etc. I choose mostly from the Calorie Smart menu but if there isn't enough I'd eat from there, I'll chose a Keto.
Eighteen meals for ninety dollars was a super deal. I couldn't eat them all - even including B and E, so some went to waste. Now I moved to six meals and my next box is going to cost seventy-one dollars. It's not much far off from price I paid for the eighteen meals that I got on the deal. I think my I'm still getting some kind of discount. I haven't really investigated their pricing system. There is some kind of reward at four boxes and I'm not sure what that means yet.
There is no obligation, which I like. I can keep going, stop now, skip weeks. I skipped the next week's meals because I didn't like six meals on that menu enough to bother. You can double or triple up on meals- or even order six of the same meal but I didn't want to do that. I don't remember if there was any favorite I had previously that I loved enough to have six days worth. You have until Wednesday of the week to change, skip, or cancel your next week's order. I suggest putting Wednesdays in the calendar to remember whether to keep your order going or not.
It's just like any meal planning- you have to know what you're doing that week and how to fit the meals into your life. I'm not generally a meal planner. I decide what I want to eat on a daily basis because I don't cook. Most people I know meal plan though, as I see posts in my social media groups or message boards, where people have all their family meals planned out for the whole week. I'm not that person.
I'm going to keep doing the Factor meals for awhile. If I don't love the vegetable, I can always supplement with my own. If you want a big discount off a box to try it, use my referral code.
*The photo of the Factor meal at the top of this entry is showing refrigerated on the left and heated up on the right side.
BistroMD Frozen Meal
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