I hope the zero waste meal service can be made available all over. Many disabled and elderly people NEED that service. It’s not just a convenience to some people but really improves their nutrition and quality of life.
I'm a social worker that works with elderly/disabled and most can't cook. It needs to be cooked for them. They tend to be able to work a microwave though.
So true, I'm a disabled mom of two disabled teens. We have purchased meal kits for years, because it helps my kids learn food prep skills and independence, the recipe cards are future references, and all of us have functionality challenges. Someone taking it upon themself to DECLARE that *ALL* disabled folx/elders are limited to microwave food only is... profoundly inaccurate and pretty disrespectful. PLENTY OF US can do some degree of cooking, thanks. But chopping veggies is a VERY BIG ASK, and reducing simply that step is a huge improvement. So is reducing plastic. Peeled & chopped fruits and veggies in the supermarkets are VERY ACCESSIBLE (even when many able bodied types summarily declare them "lazy" because they imagine everyone has the same abilities). EVERY manually disabled person we know LOVES pre-chopped produce. We're going to try FP, looks amazing for millions of folx just like us.
KPL she didn't say all. She said most and she was talking about her clients. I am disabled and no way can I stand at a counter or stove to chop and cook. I buy fresh prep and my husband prepares it. I also buy a lot of microwave meals and prechopped fruit and veg. Better to get some food in than none
One thing I love about fresh prep is that when they do end up sending you something wrapped in plastic, you can just wash it out and send it back and they'll handle the recycling for you
God you people are so stupid! I'm a delivery driver. These prep meal boxes are just simply delivered with in a 48 hour time period. If the box is rejected because it took too long to get it to its destination, they are simply dumped in a regular facility dumpster where regular trash is dumped in. Anything edible that goes beyond the required "OK" delivery time is simply thrown in the trash and ends up at the local garbage land field. There's is no "Smart" return process operation. It just gets dumped in the trash like dirty diapers and the prep meal company ships another one. I mean, seriously! Do you of you think a company is going to spend extra money on disposal when all they have to do is dump it at any regular dump facility?
In Austria (Europe) the hello Fresh ingredients are packed with less plastic and the coolbags are filled with water (which you are instructed to use for watering your plants) and are recycled and recyclable.
As a HelloFresh subscriber in the UK, they have now started phasing out the single meal paper bags and instead the whole box is divided into fresh ingredients, packaged ingredients, and the cool ones with water-filled ice packs, so even less waste!
Here in NL they don't have icepacks in the box at all. Instead they use a refrigerated van so all the boxes stay cool during transport. With that said as well... I don't think we have ever gotten pre-cut veggies like union and beet. We just get them in raw form so no plastic there either.
@@mitchnc I can’t believe how pretentious Europeans are. You guys always think you’re better and don’t realize major differences that would cause another culture to not be as “eco friendly”
if you all just throw you crap in the crap and demand the government deals with that you're in the clear. most pollution of say, the ocean, comes from 10 rivers 8 of which are in asia non of which are in europe, america or australia.
@@chickenmuffin Isn't that a good thing..? The Joseph Poore Oxford study states that adopting a Vegan diet is likley the best thing an individual can do to lesson their impact on the environment. Plus it avoids factory farming and slaughterhouses. Win, win.
My husband and I have been using fresh prep nearly the entire pandemic and we love it! I've considered trying other services but after using them for so long, I trust them. They are committed to using high quality ingredients, a lot of which are locally sourced. And I love how sustainable they are. And considering we've been using them for over a year and have only had a handful and repeat meals, that's pretty impressive too.
I appreciate that you said you’ve made these meals in some form before. When I see many people promoting meal kits they act like they have never made a burrito bowl or chopped a carrot.
Very cool. I would absolutely try Fresh Prep if it was in the Bay Area. I use Zero Grocery and get that same "milk man" excitement when a new order shows up on my doorstep and all my jars and bags have been taken back for reuse.
Great topic. I have been very frustrated by the plastic and ice packs in hellofresh. Glad to see someone is addressing this and providing a better alternative. I knew this had to be out of Canada too (I'm from California).
I wager for a lot of people it's also healthier to use a meal kit service. Pretty sure you guys aren't alone at making the same stuff all the time (I know we're doing it too) and for many people that same stuff won't be all that healthy. Also allows you to try things you wouldn't or maybe even couldn't usually do at home. If a dish needs some vegetable I can't get around here or some exotic spice I'd only need once I'll probably look for something else instead. And while we reduce plastic we're it's not too hard we're not nearly as zero waste as you guys are so even a hello fresh kit wouldn't make that worse, which I think is the case for many people. Similar amount of trash, less food waste. Doesn't seem like the worst deal, even if there isn't a zero waste option in your area.
I don't do meal kits, but I have been using a "meal planning app" RELIGIOUSLY for like 4 years. It's called Cook Smarts and they send you 4 dinners per week to your inbox the previous Thursday with recipes, a shopping list, and prep steps. I love love love it. I was a picky eater and didn't know my way around a kitchen before, and now I'll eat almost anything! Plus we never have to worry about what we're eating, we have very little food waste, and we have the opportunity to try so many different cuisines. Highly highly recommended! (PS: they do Veggie that can easily be adapted to Vegan, plus Paleo menus, and you can easily customize the # of servings). #notspon
Thx for another fantastic video….I prep some of my own food, just cost less doing it yourself, but with that said I don’t work & have the time….we use solar, drive elec car, compost scraps, buy less package stuff, 2nd hand recycle what can etc… IT’s a lot of work & a shame it’s pushed off to us & the companies don’t do better, but fighting that too, who has time to work with all this ha ha….thx again ♻️🌎🌳👍🏻💕
the moment that freshprep comes to ON i will be ordering!! i love the creativity and ease of hellofresh but i was definitely super sad about all the plastic waste from their kits! maybe hellofresh can learn something from this video and make their packaging more sustainable, that would be amazing considering the tons of people who already love them!
Here in the US we use hello fresh once or twice a month for variety. We skip the other weeks' deliveries because they are slightly more expensive than regular grocery shopping. But having that account with hello fresh allows you to download their recipes for free. So we will go shop the groceries on our own and continue to try new things from their website knowing they have been tested!! Which is a big advantage over cooking random recipes on the internet.
Can't wait to have alternatives to hello fresh in Europe. Me and my gf already tried Hello Fresh for cool new recipes and could see meal kits as a new means of getting healthy food sometimes.
Leftovers and meal planning . I'm in my 50s and have only ever cooked for myself . Also wouldnt cook anything with a ton of ingredients or things that can't be used up.
Love this concept for people who benefit from meal delivery services. Also, I always try to remember to like your videos to help save the planet, so when you plug in a reminder I always give your video a like right then and there.
(Germany) I started using HelloFresh about 5 weeks ago, and it has been a godsend for me! I used to enjoy cooking very much, but I have lost interest in it and tended to eat the same (processed) foods all the time. I couldn‘t be bothered with (1) deciding what to eat, (2) making up the shopping list for the ingredients, (3) going to the store to buy the stuff, and (4) doing all the preparation work. And the issue of needing 2 tablespoons of something, but it is only available in liter containers! What do you do with the rest? My main problem is that an order for three meals a week is the minimum and each meal has 2 portions (they really are enough for 2 portions, which is good), and this is a problem for a singles household. I feel a bit under pressure to do the cooking, I have to eat the same meal twice, and I have very little room for dining with friends (restaurants are still not an option, although that may change very soon). Then, too, some things (like lettuce) don‘t really keep for a week, so I have to try to determine what meals have perishables in them and eat them right away. I‘m still adjusting to it all. As you say, it‘s cooking for idiots; I do know how to cook and am free to do things as I like rather than slavishly following the delivered instructions. I must check and see if there are any other services available here. By the way: Germans are fanatic recyclers (I have four different rubbish bins, and there are people who have even more), so HelloFresh has to make stuff as recyclable and organic as possible. They expressly recommend using the water from the ice packs for your plants, and the plastic itself is recyclable (or so they claim).
personally, I do admit i shop pretty generally only because its rural where i live, there isnt a lot of options for "small local markets" but i would definitely go if they pop up. I precook and portion all my meals and then freeze them after letting them completely cool down in the fridge. it doesnt work with ABSOLUTELY everything, but it allows me to cook larger portions of food and not worry about it spoiling right away, not to mention it helps mitigate nutrient deterioration that happens in the fridge, etc. Not to mention if you know you're going to freeze food thats about to go bad, it helps reduce food waste itself and save you some money. levi's videos help really put the thought into what you are doing and its impact on the environment
This is cool! their setting the ground for the next best thing! My small town has a local family owned ocmpany that has a similar strategy but the meals are precooked. Like meal prepping, but zero waste with washable containers that you give back every week for your order. love seeing these companies grow :)
Was JUST talking about HelloFresh on my channel, and my mind kept coming back to your stuff when thinking about the environmental impact. I'm also not impressed with the amount of packaging, especially considering that "oh it's recyclable" doesn't really work when you live in an area that doesn't have a lot of recycling options. So good to hear your thoughts on this!
Love this video! My partner and I just started hello fresh last week and we loved it! Thanks for the great content you put out! Keep up the fantastic work!
I love this! I used to use Good food box, but I cancelled it because I hated the amount of waste. I emailed the company several times and really got some sad "we're working on it" type responses, but really no action. It's been years, and I reactivated my account to see if anything had changed and... No :-(. I love that this is also Canadian, and I'm super duper love that I don't have to prep my veggies LOL
Uh, great video Levi, thanks! I tried Hello fresh years ago and although the quality (and tastiness of the food) were great, I didn't think it was worth the extra $$... but actually, with all being pre-chopped and mostly waste free, I wish Fresh Prep was in our country, I would certainly try it!!
Well, if you're vegan or eating plant-based then getting animal products in the meal prep kinda defeats the whole purpose. It's not what you put in to your mouth, it's the use of your money to support that industry that's the issue. I'm sure they'll expand into plant-based options though, as that's getting increasingly popular. Anyways, nice video!
These are EXCELLENT FOR KIDS for to get start off to learn cooking or young guys or girls who are student live far from the parents alone and start to learn how to eat fresh and prepare for a meals.
Thanks for this video!!!! Very well done and informative. I was on the fence with the two meal kits. I love the zero waste idea with fresh prep. I have only used hello fresh before and was never to happy with the plastic waste.
I get Hellofresh and I find it frustrating that they aren't doing more to reduce their packaging and also that you can't elect to leave certain ingredients out (such as herbs you may already have on hand, or the parmesan cheese). However, the food is almost always really good and relatively healthy (I'm on a relaxed paleo), so it's been extremely helpful for expanding my repertoire or recipes. And, as someone who enjoys cooking, I'm glad it's not "already done" for me.
Really impressed by freshprep, (first I've heard of them to be honest) but sadly they're not available in Toronto, however there are community supported farms/shops that almost do the same thing. Fresh City and Mama Earth come to mind. Although I only have experience with Fresh City, most of their veggies came in a cooler with minimal plastic and a fair bit was local (more so when in season) IMO though, the BEST thing one can do is invest in themself and take cooking classes. Unfortunately, from what I've seen, there are few options in Vancouver (moving later this year) so hoping things open up here to at least get one last course in. Good video though and great job highlighting all the excess plastic waste.
I actually like going grocery shopping but since switching to a primarily plant-based diet from time to time I lose inspiration to cook, and as you said this kind of service is a great option to try out if you want to broaden your culinary skills, but I did find an app called noodle that suggests you new recipes to try out and it can be customised based on your dietary goals and interests
I have always wondered the impact of this kind of service ... now I have my answer and this is exactly the kind of answer I was looking for! Relevant, honest, super informative and very well explained. Once again, amazing video! Thank you for that!!
It’s cheaper to just go to a grocery store with a list. It’s asinine to spend several hundred extra dollars for a delivered grocery haul. I would rather spend the savings on something fun.
What FreshPrep did is what looks like lateral thinking in making the infrastructure that you'd find at Subways or Chipotles, where ingredients are all sectioned out by individual containers, portable. Really neat idea! Lateral thinking at its finest
I live in Austria. I’m a keen cook, and we have lots of supermarkets close by that I cycle or walk to - we never, ever drive to the shops. But we have a toddler now, and so I don’t always have time to cook, and I had hoped a meal kit would streamline our processes and mean we wouldn’t be doomed to pasta with pesto on the many nights I finished work late. Last month, I decided to try Hello Fresh. One aspect was a bit different to what you describe: here, the ice packs are filled with water and it tells you to water your plants with them, which I did. However, I found several things so irritating that I did not continue after the reduced cost trial period. 1) cost. The meals at full price were €7 per portion. This is the price of restaurant food here, especially since we often share. 2) ingredients were frequently substituted - peppers were missing every week, even though they were in stock in every local supermarket! And other vegetables looked, and tasted, pale and out of season. 3) complexity. Those pre-chopped vegetables from Fresh Prep looked amazing, but Hello Fresh dispatches whole vegetables, so all the chopping and slicing was left up to us. Combined with the silly, wasteful techniques (roast these vegetables in the oven, mince this in a food processor, use four pans, a grater, a blender, and a hacksaw), I found I was drowning in washing-up and had more pots and pans on the go than would fit on my 60x60cm four-burner hob. I was also trying to do everything at once, whereas I’d normally have a big pot of rice or soup in the fridge, or leftovers to quickly turn into a new dish the next day. Tending to three or four components with a toddler at my feet was simply impossible. Overall, I got the impression that this is a service aimed more at other markets, such as North America, where food deserts are a reality and kitchens are bigger. In a context like that, I can see how a delivery of fresh vegetables would be a godsend and four pots would fit on an expansive range! But I also felt it fetishised the process of cooking to a counterproductive extent. I know how to cook: I wanted a service that would simplify the process, not make it harder. I wish they had sent sealed packs of slow-cooked meat stews (as Helen Rennie so wisely pointed out, this is the stuff I don’t have the time to do) and long-simmered curries for me to reheat, or minimally-packed bags of pre-chopped stir-fry vegetables like the ones I miss from every supermarket back home in the UK. Instead, I got the same entirely unprepped ingredients I could have bought around the corner, only poorer quality, and accompanied by eye-wateringly overcomplicated processes.
Since I started using hello fresh I eat better, spend less on groceries, eat out less, get take out less, learned to cook better, AND waste FAR less food. I'm going to try FreshPrep soon though because A) it's Canadian, and B) Hello Fresh has its fair share of mixups. I've had caterpillars on food, rotten food etc. To be fair they are excellent about covering their missteps, but it defeats the purpose if ingredients are missing or I have to get takeout because something wasn't ok to eat. All in all though, I feel like meal prep kits gave me my life back. I love cooking, and cook almost all the meals in my house. With this I get to cook and eat great food, without any of the waste, planning, running back to the grocery store for things I forgot etc. As a busy dad it's so helpful!
Haha my family did blue apron probably five years ago and we still have all the ice packs and have just reused them at parties, for camping, and as ice packs for injuries but that should tell you jsut how many were included. My family used blue apron once for a month and it’s been FIVE years and we still are going through all the I’ve packs we got from it.
Wow I’m amazed at your dedication! Haha but yeah it doesn’t make sense if you use it a lot... you’ll have ice packs laying around for the rest of your life lol
Honestly, the main reason that I wouldn't use meal kit services would be added cost. Dave Ramsey's side-by-side comparison of $39.96 meal kits found that they cost ~43% more than sourcing ingredients from a local grocery. In addition to an on-trend desire to support local small business, those are some not-insignificant financial figures that add up over time. But hey, I guess I'm not the right target market for this product. :)
Yeah I agree. We won’t be buying meal kits unless we really need to for some reason. We enjoy the grocery shopping/cooking process too much to give up. 👍🏼
Omg Just the pre-prepped veggies and such is already a godsend. It takes me forever to prep for cooking. Too bad I’m in the US actually used the first article aa one of my sources for a paper I wrote for English 101 last year (right before the pandemic) and it was hard to find enough sources at the time, and I didn’t het a good grade on it because of how inconclusive it was on if it was a “better” or not choice to use subscription boxes or not. I want to try it again since I’m retaking the class
Fantastic.. if there is one thing I am sick of seeing when I go on YT is ads for flipping Hello Fresh.. the amount of packaging in these boxes especially plastic appals me and they cannot be cheaper or better for the planet than making your own meals surely..Also who has the money to pay £3 to £5 for a meal. My whole grocery bill is only £20 a week. Also there is the fact they may include ingredients that you don't like or wouldnt buy.. if they included coriander for example probably in a plastic bag... that stuff is going right in the bin, etc Levi I am surprised to see you make a video on this topic.. this should be fascinating..Of course I value your opinion as I know you will have done your research and trust you not to agree to anything that isn't reasonable. PS This video was immediately followed by a Hello Fresh ad lol
Got me excited only to realize Fresh Prep is only for the greater vancouver area. I can really relate to your skepticism you had. I love to cook, and people would nag me to try hello fresh. I was/am extremely skeptical because the common argument is always 'well you dont contribute to any food waste so the excess packaging isnt that bad'. Well I make it a point to not waste food, and its honestly not some difficult plight that people make it out to be. Aftering reading Salt, Fat, Acid Heat, its easy to make good food with almost anything you have on hand. I can appreciate the comfort of trying new food because it is so easy to get trapped in the same routine of making the same food. I think time of year should be a huge consideration for these meal kits.
Man if I lived in Vancouver I'd definitely sign up to fresh prep! Tried Hello Fresh once and loved it because it provided everything needed for the meal. I dont normally cook with alot of different spices and refuse to buy a bottle of something that I'll only use for one meal. Honestly when I got Hello Fresh it didnt have as much plastic as yours did, guess it also depends on which meals you get though. I'm trying the Good Food meal kit soon, wonder how it'll compare.
I used to work at one of those meal kit services as part of the production crew. I found that there was a lot of food wasted in the process of putting the meals together. Any vegetable or fruit with little imperfections doesn't get included in the box and goes to the garbage. We were able to take the vegetables that didn't make the cut home, but there was still a lot that went to the garbage. The company tried donating some of it to the food bank but they don't accept produce that can go bad right away.
Yeah I think sadly food waste is almost impossible to eliminate completely. Sadly the statistics show that most of our foodwaste happens in households. 😬
I am from Quebec and tried a few companies that claim to be fresh and mostly local... well in every single box I received there was some rotten veggies. i mean with mold not just veggies that aren´t super fresh. i´d be curious to see what´s happening in their warehouses to know the amount of food waste they are producing
Interesting. In europe there is only hellofresh but it comes with less Plastik apparently, and the ice packs are whater for the plants. The plastic can (theoretically) then be recycled. Thank you for your video
I love cooking , and enjoy that Time of my day! We did try hello fresh this winter, but i was discouraged to continue due to the waste it creates. Im going to look up fresh prep as an alternative when we want to discover new recipies and have less Time to cook. Thanks for sharing!
Be careful providing this company with your bank account or bank card information. We canceled our "subscription" in March, and we just got hit with a surprise charge for $91. When we called to see how this could have happened the first "customer service representative" was extraordinarily rude and hung up on us. I've had to take the extra measure of getting my bank involved and may have to cancel my wife's card if they do this again.
So neat! I hope they expand to other Canadian centers, I’d definitely try it out. The bits of plays tic and lack of vegan options has always stopped me from trying meal kits.
Most meal kit services put all of their recipes on their websites for free. A great (and cheaper) alternative is just to copy and paste that into your supermarkets website and get it delivered for about 30% of the cost. It's not as low waste and the ingredients won't be pre-measured, but it's a cost-effective alternative for if you don't live in an area where these deliver. Edit: it might even still be cheaper or the same cost if you get it delivered from your local farmers market / zero waste store (emphasis on delivery only since it's almost the same experience as a meal kit).
I love Fresh Prep and Vegano! They're both based in Vancouver. I'm from Vic as well so its super close. Vegano is very much the same but its much more prepared and is much less effort. The plastic is minimal too. And it's all plant based! You should check them out too, their meals are sooo good.
Thank you Levi. I was wondering if you were going to get to the difference between food and plastic wastes. With all of those variables up in the air that were mentioned in the article, I am still convinced that **on its own** food waste is better for the planet than plastic waste. The whole ecosphere is not geared to breakdown and use plastic for better lifeform flourishing. We see this in the sea life that wash up on shores full of plastic through to the microplastics acting as endocrine disruptors in our own bodies right now. I agree: we just don't know what consequences plastic will have above what it already has caused for life on Earth. Food waste, and the decomposition of organic matter is the opposite. The caveat to that though is how our food waste is dealt with in industrialized countries. A lot of people still rely on cultural habits of placing all trash, food waste and other, into one single-stream plastic bag to be collected and sent to incinerators or landfills. So, for a lot of people, the choice between Meal Kit Services and grocery shopping still involves plastic waste. Biodegradable and compostable bags as alternatives to the plastic bags don't help either because they don't actually break down unless put through processes at commercial compost facilities. ASTM declares this in their D6400 specification. All in all, I'm not sure how you solve people's busy-ness and lack of meal planning time while upholding sustainability and waste minimization without looking to other cultures The West might not be accustomed to. In Japan and Taiwan, for instance, almost all meals are served from restaurants and made by others - not oneself. This is true in The West, but people still enjoy making their own breakfasts/lunches/dinners to still feel that sense of autonomy, control, and mindfulness. I'm not saying it's wrong to do that, but for people that do cook themselves, including myself, we all need to be better at being aware of our consumption. I used HelloFresh maybe twice in my life, first for an entire week and second accidentally for two weeks. I immediately felt concerned about the amount of plastic waste delivered from this service. That can't be the answer, but at least there are companies like FreshPrep trying to improve the service. I remember this NowThis Earth video where Lucy investigated this company that provides reusable plastic containers that can be cycled and circulated between restaurants that sign up to the service. Packaging doesn't have a single life in this way. Hopefully innovations like this make their ways to the Meal Kit sector.
My two cents without mentioning things you've already mentioned: I don't see the logic of these services. I'm sure it helps people out but A) I'm a picky eater, good luck haha B) they are WAY to expensive for me C) I need to do groceries anyway D) if i meal prep the service can't even come close to it price wise E) You're hungry? Too bad. you're getting exactly X grams. E) Hello Fresh (here) requires you to do all the work, they mearly give you just enough materials (often not even included things like rice). That to me doesn't make sense if I have to add big compontants But Def love the zero waste local option.
I've been using blue apron for almost a year now. It's unique because you get to cook a really unique meal that you may have never heard of with new ingredients. They said 75% of their packaging is recyclable however, I feel bad throwing out the ice packs and tape for packaging when it's only for 2 meals.
Great video! I'ma look up a fresh prep alternative for Belgium cuz damn that stuff looks good! Hello fresh is available here but I'm curious to see if a zero waste option is around...
I live in France and just gave Hello Fresh a try last month. They package dry ingredients like pasta and bread crumbs in paper bags here. But I quickly realised it was not an option for our family when we received basil grown in Kenya, when we are growing our own on the balcony...
I love this concept of zero waste meal kits! I wish we had that here in the Netherlands. We get a meal kit from Marley Spoon three days a week, because they have more options for vegan and vegetarian meals than Hello Fresh. If I find a better option with less packaging here I would love to switch.
I appreciate the thoughtful video and considerations that went into it. But I think you may have missed one key thing - the lost of nutrients. FreshPrep cuts everything up and in most cases, the micro-nutrients and antioxidants losses their effectiveness by the time they reach your home in that chopped/diced state.
super cool. I heard about Hello Fresh before, but never of freshprep. Well the latter doesn't exist in my country sooo that might be the reason, but as their concepts looks pretty impressive, maybe the will expand in future
