Check out the three meals and smoothie recipe that I received in this January 2018 Home Chef Review!
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This January 2018 Home Chef Review is a bit unusual.
I’ll tell you all about how Home Chef works at the bottom of this post. Or, head on over to the Home Chef website to check it out for yourself. The link will automatically give you $30.00 off of your first delivery!
Before I get into the recipes, I want to take a moment to tell you about my long delivery delay, how Home Chef took care of things, and how I still managed to make the recipes.
The winter storm on the east coast where I live caused a pretty long delay in the arrival of my Home Chef box this month. It was supposed to arrive on Thursday, January 4, 2018, but did not.
I contacted Home Chef 2 days later, when I still didn’t have my box or an updated delivery date from FedEx. I was concerned about the safety and quality of the food. Home Chef responded the next day, stating that FedEx was experiencing long delays and that Home Chef would credit my account the full amount, which they did immediately.
My box showed up on Monday, January 8, 2018. The meats were frozen solid, but so was everything else. While the freezing temperatures actually saved some of the food, it ruined some of it as well. Frozen lettuce, anyone? Yeah, me neither. The meals were dated to be made and consumed by the next day, January 9, so I got to work right away!
January 2018 Home Chef Review
Here’s what came in my box. I’ll note where I had to throw out items and when I substituted my own items.
Chicken Ranchero with Cheesy Cauliflower
For this recipe, I had to throw away the light cream and the jalapeno pepper. I substituted heavy cream and actually had jalapenos in my refrigerator, which is rare but fortunate! The cauliflower was frozen solid, but was salvageable once thawed.
This recipe was super simple to prepare. Once you oven is heated up, this recipe takes just 25-35 minutes to make. It’s very straightforward.
The flavors were really good. I especially loved the cauliflower, but that’s not really a surprise. I think I’m borderline addicted to the stuff!
Brasserie-Style Sirloin Steak with Truffle Frites and Herb Butter
I had to toss the green beans that came with this recipe. They were frozen, but just didn’t look good once defrosted. Rather than take any chances, I substituted green beans that I had on hand already. I was concerned about the frozen truffle oil, but it thawed out okay.
The difficulty level on this recipe is intermediate, but it’s still easy. You have to do a little more prep work with this one, though. The potato needs to be cut, the parsley minced, and the green beans trimmed.
This meal was delicious! I’m a huge fan of truffle-flavored everything so the frites were right up my alley. The herb butter on top of the steak was also really good. I was wiping up every last bit with each bite of steak!
Thai Turkey Lettuce Wraps with Water Chestnuts and Sesame Dipping Sauce
This was the last meal that I made because I had to get more creative with it. I had to throw out the lettuce, so this recipe was no longer for lettuce wraps. I also threw out the frozen package of shredded cabbage slaw and the ginger. Once I drained some water out of the thawed water chestnuts, they maintained their taste and texture fairly well. I had ginger to replace what I threw out and used broccoli slaw that I had on hand as the topping. I didn’t have lettuce, but used low carb tortillas to wrap everything in.
This recipe was also categorized as easy. Home Chef does so much of the prep work for you, making cooking everything really simple.
The flavors, although slightly different than the original recipe, were good! I didn’t love the broccoli slaw on top, but hey, sometimes you just have to make due!
Pineapple Lemon Drop Smoothie
I only threw away the frozen lemon that came with this recipe. I had lemons on hand, so it was easily replaced without having to alter the recipe.
This smoothie was so easy to make. Because Home Chef does the prep work, all I had to do was toss everything into my blender and press start!
I loved this! The pineapple, lemon, and Greek yogurt flavors all worked so well together! I described it as sunshine and happiness in a glass on my Insta-stories, because that’s exactly how it tastes!
How Home Chef Works and a Coupon Code
Home Chef is very similar to most of the popular meal kit subscriptions out there, although after this first box, I feel like Home Chef does a bit more of the prep work for you!
The sign up is a little confusing. You have to enter your email address first. Then, you’ll answer a few questions regarding your preferences for different types of meals (vegetarian, meat, seafood), dietary preferences (low carb, low calorie), and ingredients you want or need to avoid.
The next section will ask you to fill in your mailing address, which is where I started to get confused because I hadn’t chosen my meals yet. If that wasn’t confusing enough, the next section asks for your billing information.
Don’t worry! If you’ve already decided that you want to order some of the meals that are on the menu (you can check the menu at the top left of the website), you will still be able to pick and choose exactly which meals you want, skip any week you want, including the first week, and add on anything extra too! You can pick your meals for up to 6 weeks out, or skip the weeks you don’t want deliveries. You are also able to pause your account indefinitely in the account section, so there is no need to call or email should you decide this service isn’t for you.
In addition to complete meals, Home Chef offers a salad, smoothie, and fruit basket each week!
Meals are $9.95 per serving, the salad is $7.99, and the smoothies and fruit baskets are $4.95
Shipping is free for orders over $45, and up to $10 for orders less than that. Home Chef ships to 98% of the United States.
If you’re ready to try Home Chef for yourself, you can save $30.00 off your first box automatically HERE! Stay tuned for even more Home Chef reviews coming soon!
Also, be sure to let me know if there are other meal kit subscription boxes that you’d like to see more reviews of!
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