Why I love Blue Apron!

About a year ago, I felt like I was in a cooking rut.   I do love to cook, but due to our busy schedules we were eating the same meals over and over again.  When we became tired of that, we would order out, which is terrible for our waistlines!  I was looking for recipes that helped me with portion control, and did not take up too much space in our increasingly crowded refrigerator.   That is when I decided to redeem a coupon for Blue Apron.

Blue Apron is a delivery service that sends you ingredients 3 meals for 2 or 4 people for you to prepare.  For the 2 person plan, you can choose 3 meals out of 6 offered.   There are always 3 vegetarian options, the meat options generally have a beef, chicken/pork, and a fish option.  You can indeed mix and match the selections, but some combinations are not always available.  It costs $9.99 a person per meal, which I thought was reasonable for a healthy meal.  Sure, could I go to Five Guys for less, but I would be eating much more than 700 calories per meal!  

When you first open the box, the recipe cards are on top so you don't lose them!

Also worth noting, the portions tend to be generous.  We have never left a meal hungry!  Some times that is due to the meals being for 3 portions instead of the standard 2.    This is perfect for cooking for two, and some of my single friends use the leftovers for a lunch the next day.   It is also a great date idea, Mr. DC Gal and I love cooking together!

My first step is to separate the ingredients by recipe into bags.  T
hat way I can just grab the right bag and start cooking right away!

One of my favorite aspects of Blue Apron is the meal variety, we always get to try something new.  I had never cooked with Bok Choy before getting Blue Apron meals, so it's nice to add variety to our dinners.   Mr. DC Gal's biggest complaint is the chopping.  I love food prep, it helps me relax after a long day!  For those who don't, a nice food processor can probably do the trick and cut down on a lot of your prep time.

The best thing about Blue Apron for me is that it teaches me cooking techniques.  They include recipe cards for each meal, and more recently they have included cards that talk about a highlighted food or ingredient.

Many of our favorite meals originated as Blue Apron meals.  Our absolute favorite is a Chicken Pasta meal, and while Mr. DC Gal loves pasta I wasn't sure how well this would be received.  We now even make a double batch, and I personally look forward to the leftovers.   Not only is it delicious, it does not require many ingredients and they are all readily available!  This is a great summer meal, especially once Roma Tomatoes are in season!   We do it it year round now.    The recipe link is above, I substitute regular fettuccini noodles for the basil version, I just increase the amount of basil in the recipe!  I always add garlic....you can never have enough garlic.  This brings up a great point about Blue Apron, if you know you like spicy food, and I mean really spicy food, you will never think they include enough spice to increase the heat for you.  Be prepared to add crushed red pepper, or whatever your spice of choice is to get the meal to where you like it.  

All that is missing is Basil...massive amounts of basil!

If you are thinking of trying out Blue Apron, do!   You probably have a friend who has free meals, I always have a ton that go unclaimed!  It takes the thought out of meal planning during busy weeks, and you may find a meal (or two, or three!) that become family staples too.

Happy eating!

 

The Last Minute Pasta Shells Experiment

The other night Mr. Dcgal and I were planning on grilling.  We had our meat, sides, and everything ready for a delicious meal.  We came home from work to a torrential downpour!  Some times I think the worst thing in the world is spending the day dreaming about food that in the end you can't have!  

Now we need a new meal.   I learned early on that Italian food is the easiest path to a happy Mr. Dcgal, and I had a box of shells left in the pantry.  Most of the other ingredients I had, as we have pasta so much around here, it always pays to have extra everything!  We did swing by the store to get some garlic bread.  Now, I used those shells previously to try Ree Drummond's recipe.  Now, while it was great, it was a lot of cheese.  A LOT.  The sauce came out really well, so I wanted to do a version of this with maybe a little meat and spinach.

I followed her recipe closely, however I made the sauce with sausage and cooked ground beef separately for the shells.  I also sautéed spinach for the shells also.

For the filling, I weighed the cheese and made the filling as the recipe described.

 I cooked the shells, slightly undercooked since they would be baked.   I thought the best order for stuffing the shells would be ground beef first, then spinach, and then the cheese to seal it all.

Then I put a little of the sauce down and started laying down the shells.

How do I rotate pictures on this thing?

Much better!

Because I added the meat and the spinach, this recipe made two trays of shells!  They will get eaten in this house though!  I placed both trays in the oven, and put the bread on the bottom rack.

It smells so good!  It's making me hungry.

Done!

So this was a pretty quick and easy experiment!  I was finished in about 45 minutes, including baking time which I mostly used to clean up and prep for plating.    Not bad for an emergency meal!

Lessons learned:  I inexplicably cooked the ground beef  with garlic and Italian seasoning...and that is it. In the future, I will probably add tomato paste, so that it has a little more flavor.  It came out a bit bland in comparison to every thing else.  So delicious though!