Babeth's Feast is a meal delivery service that "provides access to more time, freedom, and comfort with food. Our creative chefs craft small-batch, French-inspired, restaurant-quality food you can savor on your own time—at home and at work. Whether eating with friends, family or solo, enjoy real food, as effortless as it is delicious! With Babeth’s Feast, you don’t have to cook to eat well at home."
This box was sent to us for review purposes. (Check out our review process post to learn more about how we review boxes.)
About Babeth's Feast
The Subscription: Babeth's Feast
The Cost: $9.99 per meal (includes main + side dish) with a minimum order of 6 meals.
The Products: Babeth's Feast meals are frozen, and shipped to you weekly or biweekly. All meals include your choice of mains and side dishes and are $9.99 each.
Ships to: The Contiguous US for free. No PO boxes.
Babeth's Feast May 2018 Review
When you go to sign up for Babeth's Feast, you'll choose a minimum of six meals for your delivery. Once you choose the quantity of the main dish you'd like (there are currently 16 to choose from), you'll see a pop up that offers three choices of a side dish compliments it. Since I'm only ordering for myself, that means I got to choose six different meals as opposed to getting two servings of each, like most meal kit services. You'll also choose if you'd like weekly or bi-weekly delivery, and a start date. Once you submit your order, your box will arrive soon after.
Everything comes packed in a generic perishable box with fibrous stuffing and dry ice.
There's paper packing material that keeps everything snug.
Everything is in a plastic bag with the dry ice to keep it super cool since these are all frozen as opposed to just refrigerated.
The only paperwork you'll receive is a packing list of the meals you selected including the side dishes.
Let's take a look at what I got!
Main: Roasted Lemon Parsley Chickpea Salad, 8 oz., 450 calories
Side: Long Grain White Rice, 6oz., 290 calories
The main and side dish are each packaged separately. The main dish comes in a box and the side is a vacuumed plastic package. The side dish has a sticker with all of the nutritional info and cooking directions (including microwave, and "pouch in water" versions) right on it.
The main dish has a pouch inside the box (which you'll be cooking/soaking intact).
The back of the box has the cooking directions and nutritional info just like the sides.
There are essentially two ways you'll prepare your meals from Babeth's Feast. The first is the one used for things like a salad that don't need to be warm but need to be defrosted. The package will tell you what to do, and my first meal called for me to soak the main dish in a bowl of warm water for 20-25 minutes. I should add that there are microwave cooking directions as well but I don't own one and prefer to do my cooking on the stove or in the oven anyhow. I thought for sure after 25 minutes it would still be frozen but it was perfect.
While the salad was soaking, I made the rice using the second method, as directed. You essentially boil a pot of water, then turn it down to "just under simmering" (185 degrees) and submerge the pouch for the required amount of time. My rice needed 10-12 minutes.
Both were "cooked" perfectly and even though each one says to put it in its own bowl, I thought they worked together just fine. You'll notice that every recipe calls for you to put in a bowl, but I'm a grown woman and will eat it from whatever vessel I choose (mostly bowls, actually). 😉
This was really really really good. I love artichokes and this had a wonderful lemony flavor. It also includes roasted chickpeas and carrots and is mixed with a lemon parsley vinaigrette. I remember thinking "if this is how good they all taste, I'm on board!". The rice was also perfect and this all tasted deliciously mixed together.
Main: Chicken Marsala, 8 oz., 300 calories
Side: Roasted Cauliflower, 6 oz., 45 calories
Next up were the chicken marsala and cauliflower. The chicken marsala ended up being a bit soupier than I was expecting, but perhaps that is why is suggested to serve in a bowl? It doesn't look hecka appetizing in my photos, but the chicken was tender and the mushrooms were quite lovely and tasted fresh. The cauliflower tasted exactly as if I had prepped it myself and cooked it at home. Again, I thought these had a great marriage together and I enjoyed it.
Main: Lentil Salad with Cauliflower Rice and Kale, 8 oz., 340 calories
Side: Fingerling Potatoes, 7 oz., 240 calories
This meal was my first mishap. I cooked the potatoes as directed and soaked the salad pouch in warm water, but the potatoes especially were still a bit frozen after the directed time. If you look closely, you can actually see the frost which I didn't notice until I was biting into it. Arg. I figured since the pouch was already cut open, I'd pop them in my toaster oven for about 10 minutes. After that, they were warm enough but still tasted a bit "off". The lentil salad was alright but didn't really wow me. This one was a bummer, but I'm going to soldier on to see what else is good.
Main: Lemon Chicken with Artichokes, 8 oz., 250 calories
Side: Farro with Root Vegetables, 6 oz., 250 calories
This was another one that I just was not feeling even though I love both chicken and artichokes and was looking forward to. The chicken thighs were sous-vide and include shallots in white wine sauce along with the artichokes. The farro with root vegetables consisted of carrots, parsnips, and turnips with balsamic vinegar, olive oil, and salt and pepper. Perhaps I just don't like thigh meat? The color was a little strange and I wasn't feeling the texture of the main dish and the side wasn't really saving it. 🙁
Main: Chicken Curry, 8 oz., 360 calories
Side: Sous-vide Green Beans with Garlic, 6 oz., 120 calories
This Chicken Curry was AWESOME. It's a toss-up between this and the artichoke salad for my favorite. I'm a big Indian food lover and this really hit home and had just enough spice without being overwhelming. Looking back, this definitely should have gone with a rice but I was trying to mix things up for my first experience. The green beans with garlic ended up being great too, but no real mind-blowing thrills there. The curry used sous-vide chicken thighs as well, so I don't think the cut of meat was the issue with the lemon chicken. The sauce is made with coconut curry sauce, onions, cilantro, and lime. YUM.
Main: Beef Asada, 8 oz., 190 calories
Side: Sous-vide Asparagus, 6 oz., 110 calories
Whoa-yea. This beef Asada was super duper tasty! I am a sucker for a hearty beef stew and this was very much on par with my favorites. There were chunks of potato, bell pepper, and onion along with the Asada sauce. What I didn't realize is that Asada is a spicy sauce, but I enjoy a little spice so I was pleasantly surprised. The asparagus was a little limp, but that could have been from me over-cooking them after the fingerling potato incident. This meal was probably my third favorite of the bunch. Two thumbs up.
Verdict: I found my first delivery from Babeth's Feast to be a mixed bag. I tried to choose meals I would like, but about half of them fell a little flat. The ones I did like, I liked a lot and would definitely eat again. The portions here are not huge but I can appreciate that they control the amount I eat which I very much have a problem with. When looking at cook time (NOT using a microwave), I averaged about 20 minutes for each meal to "cook" but I didn't have to prep anything at all and had no clean up besides my plate, bowl, and silverware. At $9.99 per meal/serving, the value here is certainly a lot more expensive than your average frozen dinner, but that really depends on what quality you are talking about and where you are buying from. These meals also have zero food waste and packaging for each is minimal. If you're a busy person and own a microwave, you can have these dinners ready in about 10 minutes, so these are a great option especially if you don't want to bother with a grocery store.
To Wrap Up:
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Value Breakdown: At $59.94 for this box, each meal was $9.99 and included free shipping. Get 30% off your first subscription order with code 30OFF1SUB – sign up here!
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