Meal kits are great for our busy household. We pick the meals we want, and it will be delivered to my place with everything included. It saves our time for driving out to shop and dealing with meal planning. We also enjoy it because we produce fewer wastes and little left-overs. More importantly, being health conscious, meal kits are great to monitor nutritional intakes.

Two months, over forty hours in the kitchen, we’ve ranked the best meal kit service in Vancouver. Our criteria is based on freshness, flavor, ease of use and service (delivery, order accuracy, customer service).

#1 – Fresh Prep

FreshPrep is our preferred choice because it is based in Vancouver. We find the ingredients fresh and meal is easy to cook, small things like onions are already chopped. Compare to other companies, FreshPrep takes fewer times to prep. We also like their use of reusable coolers compare to others who use paper boxes and will accept used containers and packaging for recycling. Unfortunately FreshPrep only services Vancouver and Victoria, they use their own delivery trucks instead of couriers. Their effort to reduce the amount of unneeded packaging is a big bonu

* Free 3 meals using the link above

#2 – Good Food

GoodFood is based in Quebec, it is second on our list because we think it’s servings could be bigger, however each of the meals would come with a salad or side dish to complement the plate. GoodFood has a great and diverse selections weekly and we haven’t feel uninterested. We enjoy the exotic flavors from other countries. They use mainly plastic bags and it is something we take points off the service. We also have a few instances where ingredients are missing, both times they reimbursed us the full cost of the meal within a couple of days.

*$40 off the first order when using the link above

#3 Hello Fresh / Chef Plate

HelloFresh bought Chefplate recently but they are still operating as different companies. They still offer different menu items each week but the selections have been reduced since their introduction. Their packaging are similar to GoodFood with the the use cardboards, they both use paper brown bags for the meals with the exception of Chefplate that has a plastic “window” on the paper bag. The meal wise they taste good and instructions are reasonably easy to follow.

* $40 off the first order using the link above

Chef Plate uses similar packaging as Hello Fresh

#4 Miss Fresh

Miss Fresh remains at the last spot in our trial because we have encounted a couple of delivery issues with FedEx. Miss Fresh ships from Montreal and we find that they are not as fresh as the locally sourced ones above. The reliant and late delivery from FedEx without advance warning is also another issue as our Monday delivery arrived on Wednesday. One of the reason for meal kits is planning and not having an advance warning until I inquired about is disappointing. Due to the ingredient are not local, we find the kits do not last more than 5 days in the fridge and it affects the quality and taste of the cooked meals.

* $30 off the first order

Pending local meal kit service to try: Fuud, Be Fresh

Meal kits delivery is great for our home, it saves us time for shopping and meal planning. We can also eat healthier and have portion controls. Our experiences so far tells us that food tastes better if they are fresh, and we prefer to use companies within our local community. We particularly enjoys FreshPrep because of their effort to reduce packaging and employ their own delivery teams. They are friendly and accommodating and will even pick up the used packaging for recycling.

Of course, meal kits are not for everyone, especially if you have specific dietary needs. All companies we tried have vegetarian options and that’s pretty much it. Also, the portions for the meals may or may not be enough for many. Meal kits also fetch a hefty premium compare to grocery shopping. In our home, we use meal kits in addition to regular cooking. I cannot imagine the costs for 100% relying on meal kits.

Good quality foods don’t come cheap and I strongly believe we are reducing carbon footprint by using delivery as food do not have to travel as much to reduce spoils, wastage and packaging.