Plated Review
Out of the meal delivery options out there, Plated offers an adventurous look at new recipes, bringing flavors from all over the world directly to your table. With a completely customizable rotation of meals, Plated offers a solution to the age-old question, “What are we going to eat tonight?”
Pros:
- Filter out certain meals, including difficulty levels and cooking times.
- Change your delivery options and day from week to week.
- Artisanal ingredients delivered in small batches for unique flavors.
- Pre-portioned Plated meals offered in local grocery stores across the U.S.
Cons:
- Not ideal for single eaters who don’t want leftovers.
- Vegetarian plans are limited and there are no vegan plans.
Complete Review of Plated
A twist on the usual meal delivery recipes, Plated brings flavors from all over the world straight to your kitchen. Designed for all types of chefs, beginners to experts, all Plated meals take your taste buds on a journey. You can filter out your meals to choose just how difficult you want your meals to be, so if you don’t want to design a culinary feast, you can opt in for that quick 20-minute meal.
Jump to:
- Thoughtfully Sourced Ingredients
- Flexibility is Plated’s Unsaid and Imaginary Middle Name
- Options for Special Diets
- Plated Cost
- How Plated Looks Against Its Meal Delivery Competitors
- Plated Alternatives
Plated not only comes with new recipes to try, but it also connects you with a community that inspires, connects, and teaches you new cooking techniques. Through their new and improved online blog, you can check out the ins and outs of cooking. Stay updated with holiday recipes, new flavors for the grill, and more. Plated isn’t just a meal delivery service, but also a way to unlock your adventurous foodie side.
Thoughtfully Sourced Ingredients
While Plated doesn’t go into full details behind their sources and purveyors, they do disclose that their ingredients are locally sourced, with food being sustainably sourced when possible. We’ve seen other meal delivery services dive deeper into their sourcing details, whereas others have been more private, so Plated falls in the middle.
Plated selects seasonal, hand-picked produce, and reviews have all commended their arrivals for being fresh and ready-to-eat. Plated promises that their meats come from farms that do not use antibiotics, the beef has no added hormones, and they use local farms when possible.
One of the biggest things we love about Plated is their search for artisanal ingredients that they put together in small batches, which makes that recipe all the more special. These are ingredients you can’t find in the grocery store, which gives them a bit of an edge over conventional shopping. They choose produce you might not use otherwise, giving you step-by-step instructions on how to slice and cook each item. This can be a huge bonus if you’re trying to impress someone with your cooking skills, especially when you bring out the rare and hard-to-find fruit that no one can name.
Flexibility is Plated’s Unsaid and Imaginary Middle Name
At the heart of Plated is a strong emphasis on flexibility and the consumer’s access to an ever-changing menu. You can skip, cancel, or modify your order at any time, as long as your box hasn’t left the fulfillment center yet. You’ll get recommendations on what kind of recipes match your preferences, but you’re never stuck to just one meal plan. You can change your preferences week by week, and the same goes for your serving sizes and recipes that you want to cook up each week. There is no charge to change this information, making Plated one of the most flexible meal plans out in the market.
On top of this week-to-week service, you can also pick up Plated meals in your local grocery aisles! Plated is one of the few meal delivery services that has made its way into brick and mortar stores, ironically landing its meals in the one place you might be trying to avoid.
As Plated expands their in-store deliveries, you might start seeing their products pop up in your local Safeway, Randall's, and more! So, next time you’re in the grocery store for a new toothbrush or shampoo and your delivery day isn’t until tomorrow, you can snag a Plated pre-portioned, pre-planned meal off the shelf and get to cooking that evening.
Options for Special Diets
While there is no set special diet menu like other meal delivery programs, there is a way you can filter out your preferences and what you’re looking for. If you want an all-vegetarian diet, just indicate that as you’re choosing your meals, and you’ll receive recommendations on which recipes fit the bill. You can filter out just about anything, including whether you want just a simple stove-top only meal or something that takes up to an hour of your cooking time.
If you are vegan or have more strict dietary concerns, like diabetic-only recipes, you won’t find what you’re looking for in the current Plated menu options. You can stick to a gluten-free meal plan, low-calorie, and more, but if you’re looking for a specific list of ingredient exclusions, you’ll want to consider other meal delivery services.
Each menu is designed for the individual user, but you can change it and update it as often as you’d like. Feeling like a full vegetarian menu one week but wanting steak the next? You can change up your dietary preferences without any issue.
Plated Cost
Getting started with Plated is simple. Just choose how many servings per meal you'd like to make (2, 3, or 4), then select if you would like to receive 2, 3 or 4 meals every week. The meals are priced at $11.95 for 2 servings per night or $9.95 per serving if you choose more than 2 servings per night.
While this price will most likely change at some point, it’s currently higher than other meal delivery services. We can point this cost at the variety of recipes that Plated has to offer, as well as their sustainable sourcing, overall flexibility, and their options when it comes to choosing exactly what you want to eat. Shipping is free for all orders over $60, so you might think about adding an extra dessert on to your 2-serving, 2-night order if you want to avoid a shipping cost.
How Plated Looks Against its Meal Delivery Competitors
Plated truly stacks up when it comes to flavors, portions, and flexibility, but it isn’t the only option when it comes to meal delivery services. For the price, it’s important to note where it falls short and where it beats out the competition.
Plated vs. Blue Apron:
Blue Apron and Plated have similar standards when it comes to their food sources. Blue Apron provides a detailed list of each of their family-run farms, even highlighting each one on their website. Blue Apron goes to more lengths to ensure that they’re following sustainable practices, but we believe that Plated will soon follow up with more in-depth guidelines as well. Both are similar in their flexibility, but Plated has been reviewed as having more unique flavors and dishes to try out due to their artisanal dishes.
Plated vs. HelloFresh:
Plated gives HelloFresh a run for its money when it comes to flexibility, offering consumers the choice to change their delivery day of the week. This is especially helpful for busy folks who never know which day of the week they’ll consistently be around to take their box inside. HelloFresh is priced a little bit lower per serving than Plated, but Plated offers bigger portions for single people to use if you’re looking for hefty leftovers the next day.
Plated vs. Home Chef:
Home Chef offers less meal options to choose from than Plated each week, giving Plated consumers a bit more variety in their choices. Because of this, Home Chef can price their servings at a more affordable cost. However, Plated has more options when it comes to the amount of servings that you want with each recipe. With Plated, you can narrow down your menu options to include easy or difficult meals, giving you the freedom to choose a 20-minute meal or a chef’s masterpiece. Home Chef, on the other hand, offers meals that are mostly ready to cook in 20-30 minutes, limiting user options if you are feeling less or more energetic in the kitchen on any given day.
Plated Alternatives
It’s worth it to dive into eccentric and unique flavors with Plated, especially since they’re consistently offering new recipes to try. You can order a cookbook from Plated if you want to try the recipes without committing to the service, but we say “commitment” lightly since it’s such a flexible service. For a service filled with culinary surprises, Plated gets a heartfelt recommendation by both our beginner and adventurous inner chefs.
