The Blue Apron Meal…
Finally! I am getting to this post! We are on week three of our Blue Apron meals (what?!?) and man, that time went by fast! I really wanted to share with y’all about Blue Apron because I know I was really curious so I figured if I was, someone else must be too…right?
Here’s some background info for you. We cook at least three, if not four nights a week and frankly, I have been getting bored with the same.ol.food and needed new options. Options that we like {read: flavor] and that my kids will eat {read: not be afraid to try}. We try not to eat out a lot because it really is so expensive and a lot less healthy… So when I finally bit the bullet to do Blue Apron, the cost was calculated out to be less than $9/portion {I purchase the 4-portion option}. For us a portion actually equals dinner for all of us plus at least one additional meal, be it lunch or supper for another day. With that in mind, the cost really comes out to be just under $7/portion, which isn’t so terrible.
Our first box arrived three Saturdays ago…and here’s how it went down…mostly in pictures.
You get this really great box
That tells you that cooking is happy…and in the process you get really happy/excited.
Then, you unload all the goods and get even more excited.
The first meal I chose to make, out of the two that came in our box, was the Crispy Catfish and Sweet Potato Fries. Now, I’m a Georgia girl and my PawPaw had a catfish pond in South Georgia so I grew up eating catfish. I grew up FISHING for catfish on hot Saturday afternoons…where you had to sit perfectly still and quiet. Do you know how hard it is to sit still and quiet as a child…? I have sweet memories of sitting on the bank of that pond fishing for what seemed like an eternity…to catch just enough fish so that we could fry them for supper.
So here I was taking my stroll down memory lane, and thinking that the only true, proper way to eat catfish is with honey… That’s how I grew up eating it!
There was no honey included in this recipe. We were trying something new. And I was still very excited.
I followed the instructions to a “T”, even using the same bowls that my pictures showed!
These sweet potato fries…man, was that a workout! I took a selfie that I will spare you, but it was of my “angry face” because these dang potatoes were so hard to cut through! That was not included in my recipe notes! Let it be known to you out there, who may be novices to cooking, sweet potatoes are hard…so get yourself a really sharp knife, and be careful in the cutting!
Along with the sweet potato fries was sauteed spinach that I had to mash out all of the liquid {which was kind of sinky…}.
But Y’all. This was SUCH a good meal. Simply delicious.
One Eliza Jane was so excited she could barely stand it!
A few things I learned:
- My kids LOVED this meal.
- You need to flip the sweet potato fries mid-way as they cook {else they’ll be charred a wee bit like mine}.
- The 35-ish minutes they said it would take to cook the whole meal was slightly under the almost hour it took me…and I’m not sure if that was due to my lack of experience as a cook or the fact that maybe I wasn’t as organized as they were when they hit their start button.
Nonetheless….this meal really was delicious. The catfish was better than I thought it would be considering there was no honey involved at all. The sweet potato fries were simply amazing and yes, I’ll certainly make those again!
Has anyone tried Blue Apron and had success? What about any of the other food/meal delivery services? I’d love to know your favorites!
Oh, and if you’re interested in trying Blue Apron, shoot me a message and I’ll give you a code that gets you a free delivery! Woot!
Much love!