Green Chef Review
Mostly Organic, Friendly to Most Diets
Pros:
- Many different dietary options including vegetarian, vegan, paleo, and keto.
- Organic ingredients used whenever possible in recipes.
- Healthy recipes.
Cons:
- Specialty diets are a bit pricier.
- No specific allergies can be catered to.
My Verdict:
Green Chef is a meal kit that really puts an emphasis on organic, fresh ingredients, healthy recipes, and realizes there are many different diets that people adhere to these days. I used to subscribe to Green Chef years ago and was always impressed with how fantastic their meals tasted. This month I gave it a fresh go to find that they are still making some bangin’ recipes with the best quality ingredients available.
COUPON: Save $90 off your first four boxes! No coupon needed - just use this link.
This box was sent to us at no cost for review. (Check out our review process post to learn more about how we review boxes.)
About Green Chef
All Green Chef plans offer 3 recipes per week, and you can select between 2 or 4 servings per recipe for any of their dietary options.
Plans & Pricing
The pricing varies slightly depending on the number of servings and dietary needs.
- 2 person plan: 3 meals (each serves 2) per box for $10.99-12.99 per serving (depending on the dietary option) + $7.99 shipping
- Plant-Powered (vegetarian or vegan) – $10.99/serving + $7.99 shipping ($78.93 per box)
- Save $1.00 ($9.99/serving) if you have 2-3 boxes delivered per week (each box will have a $7.99 shipping charge).
- Balanced Living (omnivore or pescatarian) – $10.99/serving + $7.99 shipping ($78.93 per box)
- Keto – $12.99/serving + $7.99 shipping ($84.93 per box)
- Paleo – $12.99/serving + $7.99 shipping ($84.93 per box)
- Plant-Powered (vegetarian or vegan) – $10.99/serving + $7.99 shipping ($78.93 per box)
- 4 person family plan: 2 meals (served family-style for 2 parents and 2 kids) per week for $10.99/serving + $7.99 shipping ($94.91 per box)
*The number of meal options available may change based on the specialized type of meal plan you choose.
Green Chef delivers to all states across the continental US except parts of Louisiana. If they’re not yet in your area, you can begin the sign up process and they’ll send you an email when they become available.
UPS handles the delivery in my area but your carrier may differ. Good to know:
- Deliveries arrive between 8 am and 9 pm local time.
- If you choose to have your package delivered to a commercial address (like work), your delivery driver will make an effort to deliver the package before 5:00 pm local time.
- Boxes are delivered Monday through Saturday. You can choose which weekday you want your boxes delivered, depending on where you live.
- You don’t have to be home to accept the box.
- Food stays cold with insulating liners, gel packs, and cooling material.
Green Chef has a whole page dedicated to how to recycle their packaging (as well as what it’s all made of), but here’s a quick run-down of the most used items:
Their packaging is made from recyclable, reusable, and/or compostable materials – except where they can’t get around it for food safety reasons. For example, their tofu is sent in vacuum-sealed plastic wrapping to ensure you get the freshest experience possible with the outstanding flavor that their chefs intended.
Cardboard Boxes – Made of corrugated cardboard, with a minimum of 40% recycled content. Break down your Green Chef box and recycle it with your regular curbside recycling or at your local recycling facility.
Insulation – ClimaCell is made of a proprietary plant-based insulator that is certified curbside recyclable, with a thin sheet of kraft paper on either side to hold it together. Recycle the ClimaCell with your curbside paper and cardboard recycling, or at your local recycling facility.
Ice Packs – Filled with soluble, non-toxic gel. The outer layer is made of #4 plastic film – low-density polyethylene (LDPE). Save them in your freezer and reuse them, or store them at room temperature for later use. You may also be able to donate them to local charitable organizations. To recycle, simply cut the corner of the pack, drain the non-toxic gel into the garbage, then rinse out the bag and recycle it wherever #4 plastic film is accepted. Make sure the bag is clean and dry before you drop it off. There are easy drop-off programs at most grocery and retail stores you may already visit!
Paper Bags – 100% post-consumer recycled paper. If a bag is clean and dry, reuse it or recycle it with your curbside recycling. If it’s soiled, you can compost it at home or through your local composting facility.
Green Chef Recipes
Green Chef offers quite a few options when it comes to choosing meals, especially if you are an omnivore. Each week I have eight meals to choose from that can be vegetarian, or include fish, pork, chicken, beef, and more. If I decide to change my diet, I can change my preferences at any time. Taking a peek at both the vegan and vegetarian menus for upcoming weeks, it looks like I have seven selections each time, and it’s the same for keto. The paleo option still has six options every week which seems great seeing as though I’d only be getting three meals in each box.
Sadly, it doesn’t look like you can check the upcoming menus for the plans until you sign up so here are some examples of future Green Chef “Balanced Living” (omnivore, including vegetarian) meals:
- CHICKEN WITH BASIL PISTOU and roasted red peppers, artichokes & fennel, rice with chard & dates
- KOREAN BEEF & NOODLE STIR-FRY with broccoli, cabbage, carrots & cashews, ginger relish
- BLACKENED TROUT WITH CREOLE DIJONNAISE and couscous with corn & peppers, apricot-glazed green beans
- GREEN PEA & FETA FALAFEL with lemon-basil yogurt sauce, couscous, kale salad
- VEGGIE PAD THAI with shiitakes, carrots, peas, bell pepper, scrambled eggs & peanuts
Green Chef sends you all of the ingredients like grains, bread, meat, and produce you’ll need to make the meals. They do expect you to have a few basics on hand though.
The ingredients to have on hand:
- Salt
- Pepper
- Olive oil
- High-temperature cooking oil (such as vegetable, safflower, canola, avocado, or coconut) or ghee.
The kitchen tools to have on hand:
- Pots and pans (ideally in a range of sizes and types such as non-stick and oven safe)
- Chef’s knife
- Cooking spoon
- Spatula
- Strainer
- Peeler
- Measuring cups
- Tablespoon measure
- Sheet pan
- Aluminum foil
Occasionally, you may need:
- Grill or grill pan
- Ladle
- Tongs
- Microplane zester
- Box grater
- Teaspoon measure
- Thermometer
Preferences & Allergens
Green Chef provides what I found to be the most robust dietary options for meal plans. The most common option is probably “Balanced Living” which allows you to choose between omnivore, pescatarian, or no preference, which will give you a little of everything, including vegetarian meals. That’s what I chose and will be reviewing in this post. They also offer a “Plant-Powered” option that lets you choose between vegetarian or completely vegan meals. I have several married friends who are vegan, subscribe to this option, and love it! Even further, Green Chef also has catered to popular diets to bring both keto and paleo options. MSA’s own Tiffany reviewed the keto version for quite a while and you can check out her reviews here.
At the moment, Green Chef doesn’t have a place to specify any allergies but you can find out more information here, on their help page if you have more detailed questions.
My Green Chef Review
Why Green Chef?
If you’ve been following along with me since 2017 when I started reviewing for My Subscription Addiction, you know I’ve tried A LOT of meal kits. What you don’t know is that Green Chef was one of my favorites even before that, and one that I paid for out of my very own pocket each week for several months. While I am a fickle pickle and tend to start and stop meal kits all the time based on budget, my review schedule, and my general need to constantly be trying new things, this is one that I truly held quite high. It’s not the cheapest of the meal kit world, indeed, but it has consistently good recipes I love that gently nudge me from my comfort zone. They also have very high-quality ingredients that always arrive fresh and are often organic.
Here, I’ll run through the basics of signing up and navigating the recipes before I get to the cooking and enjoying of the food!
Signing Up
Green Chef makes it easy to sign up:
- Go to their website.
- Click the “Get Started” button.
- Add your email address and zip code.
- Choose a dietary option and number of servings that suits your needs.
- Put in your delivery details (including day of the week and address).
- Then add your credit card info and create a password to finish your account.
- Now go choose some tasty meals!
My Green Chef Menus
Once I signed up, Green Chef auto-selected three meals for me.
There were five other meals I could also choose. Two of my recipes were vegetarian which is nice to have since sometimes I like to take a break from meat.
I just had to click the “Edit Order” dropdown menu to change my recipes, modify my order, or skip the whole week. Green Chef shows you five weeks at a time where you can choose your meals or skip. If you sign up for email notifications, you’ll get emails prompting you to choose upcoming meals as well.
Here are the three meals I ended up going with (2 servings each). The cool thing here, too, is if you know you’re having company or you want extra leftovers, you can change any recipe to have 4 or 6 servings instead of the standard two up at the top lefthand corner.
My Meals
Does Green Chef allow you to adjust the protein in your meals? I don’t eat fish.
I loved green chef while I was on it. However, one note about the review is that it says they offer vegetarian and vegan options but they don’t do that anymore. The current plan only offers a plant powered option suitable for vegans and vegetarians. This was not exactly my favorite idea since I’m an ovo-lacto veg, but the recipes are delicious anyways so it’s fine.
Does Green Chef have an app for your phone? Many of us were recently dumped by Plated. 💔. I have cooked with them and Hello Fresh for the last 3 years. We tried Green Chef for the first time last night and we’re pleasantly pleased. The only thing I don’t like is the fact the don’t have an app.
It doesn’t look like they have an app. Maybe they’ll introduce one soon! Glad you are liking it though since Plated is dunzo.
I love Green Chef! I have tried many many meal kits and Green Chef is by far my favorite. We have been getting Green Chef for a couple of years now. We love their vegetarian options and their customer service is fantastic. The fact that they are mostly organic is also a big plus to me.
Thanks for chiming in with your experience as well, Donna! Happy to hear how others feel about it too!