HelloFresh is one of the most popular meal kit companies in Canada. Even if you’ve never tried them, you’ve probably heard of them. They offer a rotating menu with a ton of meals to choose from each week. Once your delivery arrives and you get cooking, you instantly feel like an expert in the kitchen and meals become much less stressful.
What other companies are like HelloFresh?
As they say, variety is the spice of life, so why not mix it up? We’ve put together a list of five alternative meal kit companies to HelloFresh. These alternative companies include:
- Chefs Plate
- Goodfood
- Hungryroot
- Dinnerly
- Gobble
This lineup of meal kit companies deliver throughout Canada and the United States, so we’ve got a little something in the mix for all of our North American readers. Keep reading to get the full scoop on how these companies compare to HelloFresh.
| Company | Ideal For | Cost Per Week* | Cost Per Plate* | |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Chefs Plate | Those new to cooking and looking for some inspiration | $71.92 CAD | $8.99 CAD | Visit Site |
| Goodfood | Foodies who are comfortable in the kitchen | $68.94 CAD | $9.28 CAD | Visit Site |
| Hungryroot | People who don’t like grocery shopping | $59.94 USD | $9.99 USD | Visit Site |
| Dinnerly | Busy households with picky eaters and no dietary restrictions | $40.73 USD | $4.89 USD | Visit Site |
| Gobble | People who enjoy healthy and balanced meals with a very short cook time | $71.94 USD | $11.99 USD | Visit Site |
You can compare these to HelloFresh, which costs around $123.96CAD per week and $10.33CAD per plate.
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1. Chefs Plate
Like HelloFresh, Chefs Plate offers meal kits across Canada. Their ordering process is similar in that they have a rotating menu with meat, vegetarian, or family meal type options, and customers can choose from different servings and meals each week.
Just like HelloFresh, their servings are available for two or four people. What’s different about Chefs Plate is they give you an option to choose two, three, or four meals per week instead of HelloFresh, which just offers two or four.
Unlike HelloFresh, where you can see the menu as far as six-weeks in advance, Chefs Plate only has three weeks ahead planned.
Chefs Plate’s online order process and packaging is incredibly similar to HelloFresh. If you’ve ordered from HelloFresh before, you’ll notice how similar their interface is with an easy-to-follow buying and delivery process.
Similar to HelloFresh, meal prep times can range from 20 to 45 minutes and you are provided with pre-portioned ingredients and a handy recipe card to guide you through the assembly of the meal.
Portion sizes are about the same and the variety in recipe options are similar. Currently, Chefs Plate delivers to Ontario, British Columbia, Alberta, Saskatchewan, Prince Edward Island, New Brunswick, Nova Scotia, and Manitoba.
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2. Goodfood
Just like HelloFresh, Goodfood lets you select your meals online and delivers the recipes and pre-measured ingredients to your doorstep for an easy dining experience in your own home.
Goodfood offers three main food baskets: Easy Prep; Classic; and Family Plan. Look five weeks ahead at their rotating menu that is broken down into five categories:
- Classic
- Easy prep
- Low card
- Vegetarian
- Family-style meals
These are the only filtering options you’ll receive when selecting your meals so this may slow down the process or leave you feeling limited. Prep for Goodfood will usually run you about 20 to 25 minutes of cook time — a slightly higher “easy” cook time than others on this list – and in our experience this can usually be closer to 30 minutes or more.
What is nice about Goodfood’s meal selection is that the full cooking instructions are listed on their website. This helps you better anticipate the effort required in the kitchen. This also eliminates the need for recipe cards, although these are still included in the box for your convenience.
Unlike HelloFresh, which organizes meals into paper bags, Goodfood packages their meals in plastic. Depending on your location, this may or may not be recyclable. On the other hand, Goodfood offers a box pick up program where the cardboard box, insulated liner, and ice packs are able to be reused.
Goodfood also appears to be leading in corporate responsibility. For each box purchased, they contribute a nutritious school meal to a child in need.
Based out of Montreal, Goodfood delivers meal kits to many locations that HelloFresh also does, including Quebec, Ontario, Manitoba, Saskatchewan, Alberta, British Columbia, and the Maritimes.
Goodfood
$9.46Per Serving
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3. Hungryroot
Hungryroot is a meal kit service that is similar to HelloFresh in that you select the meals you want and they send you the recipes and ingredients to your doorstep. But unlike HelloFresh, Hungryroot does not pre-portion the ingredients. Instead, they send you the necessary ingredients just like you would receive them from the grocery store.
The process of ordering your food on Hungryroot is as follows:
Step 1. Take a quiz: You tell Hungryroot about yourself, then they create a grocery plan for you.
Step 2. Fill your cart: Hungryroot creates personalized meal suggestions for you based on the results of your test.
Step 3. Cook, eat, and enjoy: Once your Hungryroot box is delivered, you can get eating!
Their quiz is quite extensive and it gives you many meal options for breakfast, lunch, dinner, and snacks to get a better sense of what you enjoy; however, it is a very unique feature that may not be a favourite of those who like to have more control over their meal choices. However, if the personalized meal options don’t sound good to you, you will have the option to choose your own meals and grocery items after completing the quiz.
When selecting your meals from Hungryroot, they have some really handy filters to choose from including:
- Cook times of 5 minutes or less.
- Cook times of 10 minutes or less.
- 2 and 4 serving size options.
- 500 calories or less.
- Many dietary needs including vegan, vegetarian, dairy-free, gluten-free, and more.
You can also order basic grocery items individually if you want to completely eliminate the need to go to the grocery store! Items like produce, meat and seafood, plant-based proteins, grains and pastas, sauces, dressings, dips, bread, eggs, beverages, snacks, and more.
For every order, you can select up to 16 meals but at a minimum you’ll need to purchase six meals per order. This evens out to three recipes, which is quite standard when compared to HelloFresh.
Their ordering process is unique and can take some getting used to. Your first order might feel overly complicated but if you’re feeling adventurous, patient, and looking for healthy groceries with simple recipes, Hungryroot might be the right fit for you. Delivery options are available to most of the United States with the exception of Alaska and Hawaii.
Hungryroot
$8.30Per Serving
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4. Dinnerly
Dinnerly is a great alternative to HelloFresh as it offers a nearly identical meal kit delivery service. Select your meals, have the ingredients delivered to your doorstep, and assemble the meals yourself.
Just like HelloFresh, you are in control of how many meals you get each week and if it’s for two or for a family of four. Their rotating menu offers 16 easy meals to choose from each week and you can view the menu as much as four weeks in advance.
Dinnerly focuses on using as few ingredients as possible. This can be handy for busy households with picky eaters and makes for an easy cleanup. However, this can also mean the meals are not as balanced, often having a heavy focus on carbohydrates and meat. Dinnerly doesn’t have many options for those with dietary restrictions and when selecting meals from the menu, there is no filter feature to help narrow down your choices quickly.
What’s really cool about Dinnerly is their recipes are all digital instead of on paper. This is a nice feature for environmentally-conscious folk.
Consider trying Dinnerly as an alternative to HelloFresh if you live in the lower 48 states of America.
Dinnerly
$6.50Per Serving
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5. Gobble
Gobble is similar to HelloFresh in that you select your meals, then the ingredients and recipes are delivered to your doorstep. The biggest difference is that Gobble does all the prep work for you. This includes the peeling, chopping, and marinating. Talk about a time saver! It’s no wonder they market their meals as a 15-minute cook time.
Their meals are a bit more balanced than HelloFresh and some of the other meal subscription companies on this list. Gobble offers a speciality option called Lean & Clean for those looking to eat extra healthy! Lean & Clean meals are low calories, low carb, high protein, and high veg servings under 600 calories. What’s even more wonderful? These ultra healthy meals come with the same luxurious 15-minute cook time as their usual recipes. You can check out their weekly menu items up to four weeks in advance.
If you’re looking for some nearly ready-to-eat meals and you are located in the continental U.S. (with the exception of Montana), we recommend trying Gobble.
Gobble
$14.45Per Serving
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What’s the best alternative to HelloFresh?
There are a handful of excellent meal kit delivery contenders. Each one is best for different types of eaters. Give them a try to find out which is best for you.
While HelloFresh has dominated a large portion of the Canadian meal kit delivery market, these alternative companies are providing some healthy competition. Like HelloFresh, all companies listed above provide healthy meal options, allowing you to skip a week if needed, and offer a convenient approach to cooking at home.
We hope this comparison has been helpful in your decision making process when seeking an alternative to HelloFresh. If we missed any meal kit delivery companies that are similar, please let us know in the comment section below. We’d also love to hear about your experience with any of the above companies. Did you love them? Did you hate them? We want to hear it all!
In the meantime, happy meal kitting!
