The Freckled Fox: Blue Apron - It's what's for dinner

Happy Monday! I'm very happy to introduce you to a company today that I've had the opportunity to try: Blue Apron! In essence they're a meal delivery service that ships boxes of exact and farm-fresh ingredients and instructions for delicious, chef-designed meals right to your door. I want to share our experience with you today, but also some reasons why I think they're so much more.

We received the blue apron box after coming home to find it by our front door. Even though it has been warmer outside I wasn't worried because Blue Apron sends all it's meals in refrigerated boxes so it's ingredients are kept icy-cold. Opening the box and pulling out the cute little individual packages, to say that they were fresh would be an understatement! Martin and I cook meals daily with fresh ingredients so we have pretty good eyes for quality, but the color in the herbs and vegetables was so vibrantly green, and the cuts of meat were such a beautiful, rich color- we were instantly incredibly impressed.

Before the box was sent out to us we had the option to choose the two or four portion option. We of course chose the four portion option since we have so many little ones, and it felt like such a relief looking through the ingredients knowing that the proportions of each was exactly the right amount for the meals we were going to make! You can never get that sort of accuracy shopping for yourself, and we always struggle to avoid waste with extra ingredients. Blue Apron sends three meals at a time, once a week, which I loved because having the option of which to cook first was great.

In choosing our meal configurations you have the options of 3 meat/fish meals, 3 all veg meals, 3 pescetarian, 3 no red meat, and 3 no fish which I think is so neat! We decided on the meat/fish option, and we received Flank Steaks and Creamed Kale, Thai Chicken Meatballs, and Crispy Salmon & Barley-Fennel 'Risotto', and they were all so so delicious. I'm cooking the steaks and kale in this post because it was the family favorite! That creamed kale was so heavenly, and I couldn't believe how the kids gobbled up their sunchokes:)

Each of the three meals came with very detailed step-by-step instructions on beautiful and quality recipe cards, so that even the novice cook could achieve a beautiful restaurant quality meal in 40 minutes or less! The girls helped unloading the box while I started on the chopping and prep, and then they helped further by adding in bowls of various ingredients throughout the process. I felt that their being able to help was a big deal for all of us since, and it was easier than normal since so much of the thinking was already done for me. We had so much fun!

And there it is! I want to let you know too that the servings are very generous portions, so even though we are a family of six, with the four portion option we still had some delicious leftovers that we enjoyed the next day after everyone was full:) And I love that the recipe cards list all the ingredients so we can make our meals again whenever we want! What do you think!?

Just a couple more points I want to mention about Blue Apron that I think are really good to know:
- there is absolutely no commitment! you can skip a shipment or cancel the service at any time.
- they ship to over 80% of the country (you can see a full map of the zones here)
- there's always free shipping no matter your shipping zone
- each meal is $9.99 per serving, which is not a lot at all when you're getting such superior ingredients as well as the pride of cooking fancy restaurant quality cuisine for your family and friends at home!

Isn't it beautiful? The last point that I wanted to make before closing and probably my favorite thing about Blue Apron, is that this is not only a huge, huge time savor (cutting out all the planning, shopping, proportioning, etc) but it is basically a teaching tool to help you improve your cooking skills right in your own home! It's like having a professional chef or cooking class right in your kitchen teaching you how to cook amazing food, and that is priceless. No matter your experience in cooking.

It made us cook with ingredients that we'd never tried before, it gave me peace of mind that at least three days this week I wouldn't have to put too much thought into having a nice dinner and I wouldn't have to resort to some frozen dinner or takeout. We also had company over one of those nights and I felt so good knowing that I'd have a beautiful meal even though I've been so busy and nauseous lately with the pregnancy. We can't say enough good things about Blue Apron!

Also as a special treat, the first 50 readers to purchase through this link will get two free meals on their first Blue Apron order! So hurry over and get signed up because you're going to love your experience!

Also in case you've been wondering what to get that foodie friend of family member for Christmas, I hope this serves as some inspiration for you! Giving the gift that inspires cooking is always appropriate for beginners and novices alike, and Blue Apron has some great options if you want to check it out! Also they have an awesome line of quality cooking tools, starter kits, cookbooks and so much more so definitely hop over and see if there's something to complete your Christmas shopping:)

Thank you so much for visiting and reading today, and I hope you have a great week ahead!