I too, got the $99 Living Social deal. Scheduling delivery wasn't too difficult, even though they…read moredid tell me they couldn't start delivery for 2-weeks. The 20-meals offer is totally false advertising. Each meal would include a little veggie or fruit pack that I suppose is for "snacks" But considering that most of the meals left me still hungry, I cannot imagine subsisting on these "Meals" alone daily.
Which brings to the point that the meals are designed to help the eater lose weight. Okay, but since they never asked me how much I weigh to begin with, how do they know my optimal daily caloric intake? The portions all seemed to be off. There were meals that left me stuffed, and some that made me want to run to In-n-Out. For the record, I weigh about a buck and a quarter, and if I'm starving, then I can't imagine being a 250-lb man!!!
Now THE FOOD. This is the part that earns the 1-star rating. I read Ashley's raving review and am now thinking that all the discount Living Social folks got some kind of lower tiered meals because I cannot imagine anybody paying $297/wk for this service. In the 5-days I received what I would call 10-meals total. Of those 10 meals, I got turkey patties twice (as "turkey meat loaf" and with bbq sauce). Sliced oranges twice. Sauteed broccoli & carrots twice. Bbq sauce on food three times.
There is no coherence to the meals. For example, there was a meal with some kind of Asian chicken, a salad with Italian dressing, then some random low-cal dessert. All the meals are like this. They're kinda like when I make my kids' lunches. "Hmmm... what's in the fridge? Throw it in and add some ranch dressing." All the meals come with a salad and they are all variations of leafy lettuce with garnish (parsley, cut peppers or tiny broccoli florets) or cabbage with one of the above garnishes and a dressing du jour.
Most of the food is bland and unimaginative. The desserts are the only thing that is a little out of the box (so to speak). Creating low-cal desserts that taste good is not an easy task. There is a dessert with every dinner. They're hit or miss. The puddings are tasty, but the cheesecake is torture. Quite frankly, I'd rather forgo the dessert to have tastier and more satisfying meals.
The salad meant for the 5th dinner of my service was a broccoli slaw that was already way past its prime. It was stinky, slimy and turning black in parts when I opened it. Which leads me to the complete gut rut I had on the second day of service when I had only eaten Slenderzone the day before. I chalked it up to my system not used to so much raw veggies (or raw cabbage) in a day, but after opening the rancid broco slaw, I'm wondering if it was just the integrity of the food.
The DELIVERY. The meals come in the non-microwavable containers and the protein and veggie are always packed separately, so you have to toss the containers and put them on a plate to nuke. Then all the boxes are labeled "nuke for 30 seconds." Raw slab of fish. Really? I've tried some other delivery services and they package in nuke-able containers with the entire meal inside. This is much easier to reheat (part of the selling point is ease of use) and it doesn't clutter your fridge with a ton of 1/4 filled plastic containers when you get a delivery.
The bottom line, all these meals were something you can easily throw together yourself, make in bulk, freeze, reuse. None of the meals would qualify as "gourmet" unless all that means is a decorative piece of parsley. For the price, you could do better ordering takeout/delivery from a restaurant.
