Plated Subscription Box Review + Coupon – August 2018

Plated is a weekly meal kit delivery subscription that delivers you pre-portioned ingredients and recipes to help you make chef-designed recipes at home. They offer different weekly menus and randomly pick recipes for you based on preferences you submit when you sign up. If you'd rather pick your own recipes from the weekly menu, it's easy to hop in and change your order on their website or their handy-dandy app.

Plated is committed to using sustainably sourced seafood, seasonal produce, and meat that’s free from antibiotics and added hormones. Like most meal kits, Plated won't include standard pantry items (think salt, pepper, olive oil). They will, however, email you to let you know what pantry items you should have on hand for that week's box. Prep time and dietary details are listed in each recipe. And if you love a recipe, you can rate it and download a digital recipe card via your online account. (Highly rated recipes sometimes come back as "Encore" recipes for you to order again, so don't forget to leave your star rating each week!)

Check out all of our reviews of Meal Delivery Services to see every meal kit subscription box option!

This review is for the 2 recipes (4 plates) plan, which cost $48.00 per week (+ $6.00 shipping). I chose to have chicken, beef, shellfish, and fish as options to include in my recipes.

My Subscription Addiction paid for this box. (Check out the review process post to learn more about how we review boxes.)

About Plated

The Subscription Box: Plated

The Cost: Recipes begin at $12.00 per plate:

• 2 recipes (4 plates)= $48.00 per week (+ $6.00 shipping)
• 3 recipes (6 plates)= $72.00 per week (with free shipping)
• 4 recipes (8 total plates)= $96.00 per week (with free shipping)
• Dessert costs $4.00 per serving (available after your first order)

LIMITED TIME DEAL: Save 25% off your first 4 weeks of Plated with any subscription plan (up to a $159.20 value)

The Products: All of the pre-portioned fresh and seasonal ingredients you need to make chef-designed recipes at home in your own kitchen.

Ships to: 95% of the U.S. (Currently, Plated does not ship to Hawaii and Alaska, and there are also a few cities in Texas, including San Antonio, Corpus Christi, Laredo, and Midland, where they don’t yet ship.)

Good to know: Plated was recently purchased by Albertsons.

Plated August 2018 Review

Plated sends each meal mostly packaged together in a plastic bag, except for meat and any larger produce that may not fit. Each individually wrapped item is marked with the meal it belongs to so you can organize them in your refrigerator upon unpacking. I really appreciate this extra step to keep things organized and easy for me when unpacking!

Pesto Chicken Penne with Tomatoes and Shaved Parmesan 

Calories per Serving: 820

Total Prep and Cook Time (listed): 25-35 minutes

Actual Time to Cook: 35 minutes

Plated recipe cards come with a short description on the front and include the estimated prep and cook time and the calories per serving. On the other side, you'll see a list of ingredients, what you'll need from your kitchen (ingredients as well as tools), recipe tips, and step-by-step directions with photos.

There was very little prep with this recipe, a huge plus! All I had to chop were the tomatoes and onion.

Once I had all of my ingredients ready, I cooked the chicken in a pan on the stove with a little olive oil. The recipe cards putting it on medium heat for 6 minutes on each side. At this point, I put my water on to boil with some salt to cook my penne pasta.

Then it was time to caramelize the onions. I added the two butter packets and onion to brown. Then, I added the entire packet of white wine to allow everything to boil down a bit, brown, and then to stir all of the brown bits from the bottom of the pan in with the onions.

To my pan of onions, I added the spinach, tomato, chicken, penne pasta, and a bit of the leftover pasta water. The recipe recommended to take this all off of the heat at this point, but I didn't love the idea of eating the spinach without warming it through a bit so I kept it on very low heat for a few minutes.

Here you can see all of the heavy cream that was added to this pan as well to cook down a bit while being mixed in with all of the pasta ingredients.

I added some shaved parmesan to my final plate and that was it, time to enjoy! I am normally not a fan of pasta dishes that use heavy cream, but this looked very fresh and delicious. There was plenty of food for my husband and me to keep us extra full! I loved the creaminess mixed with the lightness of the spinach and tomatoes. Overall, this isn't something that I would want to cook on a summer evening, but I did enjoy trying this dish plus learning how to cook pasta with heavy cream was very interesting since I had never done it before.

Moroccan Chicken with Cherry Tomato Sauce and Couscous

Calories per Serving: 760

Total Prep and Cook Time (listed): 35-45 minutes

Actual Time to Cook: 40 minutes

Here is our second recipe card, I love reading through the recipe tips that are listed on the back of each card.

I started by baking my chicken in the oven. The recipe card notes to start skin down, cook for 5 minutes, flip, and then cook for one more minute before removing it from the oven.

While my chicken cooked, I made the couscous which is very simple! All I did was bring the water and chicken stock to a boil, add the couscous, cover, remove from the heat, and let it sit before fluffing with a fork. That's it!

After I had my chicken and couscous on, I decided to do my chopping. All there was were the tomatoes, onion, and parsley.

Then it was time to cook down my onions in some olive oil.

In went the tomatoes, harissa sauce, and the white wine to cook down. Now is a good time to note that the recipe also called for dates, but neither my husband or I like dates so we decided not to include them. This all just needs to simmer and cook down slightly for a few minutes.

While my pan was cooking all of the yummy ingredients, I added my butter and spice packet to a bowl. My butter was room temperature at this point so I was able to mix this all together nicely to make a sort of sauce. This is added to the top of the chicken before going back into the oven.

I added my already cooked chicken to my skillet, topped it with the butter, and then popped it into the oven for about ten minutes. Once I removed the pan from the oven, I pressed on the tomatoes a bit to make them a bit more into a sauce.

Time to plate! I topped the chicken and sauce off with the chopped parsley that I did during my prep. All in all this dish was good, but I don't think I would ask for it as a repeat item or cook it on my own. I thought the chicken was a bit overdone from going into the oven twice, and the cut that we received was a bit fattier than I prefer. I loved the couscous with the sauce, but overall I thought the flavors fell a bit flat. I could have used some sort of extra to the dish like some cheese or another type of sauce with it perhaps. I did enjoy cooking this dish though and felt that it was quick and easy!

Verdict: This month's Plated wasn't my favorite meal combination, but I really enjoyed learning how to cook both recipes! Even if I don't love the final product, I am always interested in trying new dishes that I don't think I would normally pick from a cookbook or Pinterest. So I am constantly learning new tricks and tips in the kitchen from my Plated recipe cards! I thought that these meals were better fit for cooler weather, so I might have liked them more if it weren't so hot out when we cooked them.

To Wrap Up:

Can you still get this box if you sign up today? No. The Plated menus change weekly and you need to lock in orders before shipments go out.

Coupon - Save 25% off your first 4 weeks of Plated with any subscription plan (up to a $159.20 value)

Value Breakdown: This box cost $48.00 + $6.00 shipping, which is $13.50 per meal.

Check out all of our Plated Reviews and discover more meal boxes in the Meal Subscription Box Directory!

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Would you eat the meals I cooked from Plated this week?