I did " The Purple Carrot" for about 6 months. Through a charity auction, I got to visit their test kitchen, sit down with the owner, and speak with the chefs developing the recipes / meals. It is. vegan company, so with my wife turning vegan , I figured it was a good way to try recipes and ingredients that I may not select myself. The quality was very good as far as ingredients go. The meals were different each week, yet there were similarities which got to be boring after awhile.
Biggest problem I had was the delivery date. I had the 3 meal plan. It was delivered on Tuesday. Problem being I work long hours Tuesday, Thursday and Friday, not leaving me too much time to cook. By Saturday, the ingredients may not be as fresh. Therefore, I had to do all my cooking on Wednesday. I love cooking , but it became more of a chore, because I had to do so much in one day. If the delivery date was on Friday , that would have worked better , cause id have sat, sun and mon to cook.
Several times an ingredient item was missing. Luckily, I have a pretty well stocked kitchen ,so it was never an issue. But , someone relying on the ingredients being delivered, would probably have been pissed off.
When I was speaking with the owner and chefs, what they do is search the internet , cook books ... to find inspirational recipes. They are given a budged for the ingredients for each meal ( I forgot how much it was ), and the meal must also take no more than 40 minutes to make. After they would come up with a meal, they would give it to the people who work there ( the non chefs), to see if they could make it in the time frame, and also if they had any problems reading and following the recipe. If it passed this test, then it would be added to their meal plan.
They have 2 warehouses . One on the east coast and another on the west coast to allow for quicker shipping and keeping ingredients fresh. Everything, for the most part , was pre measured ( spices, liquid ingredients ...). The produce came whole, and needed to be prepared as the recipe called for ( chopped, sliced ....).
The recipe cards were printed in color, with pictures . Step by step directions. They had an area in there office that was set up specifically for food photos to develop these recipe cards.
The only thing that wasn't included in the boxes was water, oil , salt and pepper. That was expected ( unless there was a specific kinda of oil, then that would be included and remeasured)
In my opinion, I think someone who does this would have to enjoy cooking, and be at least average or better to create a quality meal out of this. I think someone with lacking skills would think its a chore and not find it to be fun at all.
One thing I found a little ironic is that being a vegan company, you think they would be more concerned about the environment ( as stereotypically , many vegans are), but everything was prepackaged in plastic bags , plastic bottles ....
Anyway, thats my take on it.
It was a fun experience. Did find a few new recipes and ingredients, but now I consider it a ' been there, done that'.
From a price point of view, I can definitely cut the cost down by buying my own ingredients .
Also, the portions were a little smaller than I prefer. But then again, I like to eat