I'm a Food Editor & I Was Shocked by How Much Time I Saved With This Meal Delivery Service

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At one point or another, we’ve all been a victim of that all too familiar delusion that sets in around 6:09 p.m. You know, the one where you tell yourself cooking dinner “won’t take that long.” Cooking dinner always takes that long. Longer, actually, when you factor in driving to the grocery store and picking up all of the ingredients, and then that second mid-week trip to the store for the one ingredient you swore you had. And let’s not forget about the low-level chaos of deciding what to make in the first place.

Meal delivery services like Blue Apron promise to simplify the process by taking the guesswork out of meal planning, cutting down on grocery shopping time, and streamlining meal prep. But how much time and money does a meal delivery service like Blue Apron actually save? Well, I decided to test it to find out.

For one week, I cooked seven dinners entirely from scratch (as I usually do), and logged exactly how long it took me to prep and cook each meal. I also tracked how long it took me to shop for the ingredients and how much I spent on them. The next week, I outsourced the decision-making (and most of the prep) to Blue Apron and ordered seven dinners.

The results were not subtle.

But before we get into the timing breakdown, let’s go over a few essential pieces of info on Blue Apron.

What’s Included in the Box

Each Blue Apron delivery comes with pre-portioned ingredients and printed recipe cards that are, frankly, doing a lot of heavy lifting. Everything is labeled, organized, and already thought through. The recipe cards give clear step-by-step instructions (and include color photos!) so you don’t waste any time second-guessing the directions. You don’t have to Google any substitutions. You’re not standing in your kitchen wondering if cumin and coriander are the same thing (they’re not).

What I Liked

When you cook for yourself regularly, you tend to fall into a rotation. A reliable, slightly boring loop of meals you can make without too much thinking. Blue Apron breaks that cycle without requiring you to suddenly become someone who casually whips up harissa grain bowls on a Tuesday.

There’s a noticeable shift toward more globally inspired, gourmet-adjacent flavors like romesco, tzatziki, and harissa that feel elevated but not fussy. It’s the kind of cooking that makes you feel like you tried a lot harder than you actually did.

Also worth noting: the portions are satisfying without being excessive, and the recipes are streamlined in a way that minimizes cleanup. You’re not using every pan you own, which is a small but meaningful win.

Who Is This Best For?

Busy families are the obvious audience here. Blue Apron is great for people who need dinner to happen quickly, predictably, and without nightly decision fatigue.

But it’s also surprisingly well-suited for single people, or couples, especially if you’re the type who aspires to cook more but realistically defaults to takeout or something bleak and beige. The structure helps, and the commitment is low (since Blue Apron no longer requires a subscription!), and you end up eating meals that feel intentional instead of improvised. One of the meals I ordered (Lemon and Feta Chicken) was a microwaveable dinner, and even that felt elevated and flavorful.

Cooking Logistics

Week One: Traditional meal prep and dinner

The first week, I made a different meal each night. I cook the vast majority of my meals at home, so while this is something I’m very accustomed to, I have never actually taken the time to log just how much time I spend cooking during a typical week.

On Sunday morning, I sat down and made a rough menu for the week:

As I cooked the meals, I tracked how much time I spent on prepping the meals and how long they took to cook. Here’s where I landed:

Time spent cooking dinners: 12 Hours 29 Minutes

Time spent grocery shopping: 37 Minutes

Cost of groceries: $158.57 (note that this also includes a few extra items I purchased for breakfasts and snacks, roughly $20 worth)

Week Two: Using Blue Apron

While the Blue Apron meals come with a total cooking and prep time on the recipe cards, I still logged exactly how long I spent making each meal. The Blue Apron meals I ordered:

Here’s where I netted out with cooking and prep time:

Time spent cooking dinners: 2 Hours 10 Minutes

Time spent grocery shopping: 0 Minutes

Cost: $167 + $9.99 shipping = $176.99

Total time saved: 10 hours and 19 minutes.

Is It Worth It?

Considering Blue Apron saved me a whopping 10+ hours in one week, I would say yes. Even if you subtract the six hours my chicken spent in the slow cooker during week one, you’re still saving 4+ hours of cooking time and a whole lot of time spent searching for easy dinner ideas on Pinterest.

Cost-wise, Blue Apron was slightly more expensive, but when I went grocery shopping for week one dinners, I already had a lot of the items I needed at home. If I needed to buy every single item for the dinners I planned for week one, I would estimate an extra 40 dollars to be added to the total.

What really makes Blue Apron worth it is the quality. Each meal (aside from the one microwaveable dinner) felt like something you would be served at a restaurant, and that’s just not something I can realistically cook for myself every week. But because of how easy Blue Apron makes the entire process, cooking restaurant-quality meals at home can actually take less time than a DoorDash delivery. So if your goals are to save time and improve the quality of your meals at home, Blue Apron is absolutely worth it.

What Could Be Better

I feel like this is where I need to bring up that one microwaveable dinner. Don’t get me wrong, in terms of microwave dinners, it was probably one of the best I’ve had. But it just wasn’t on par with the other meals I tried from Blue Apron. But if you’re okay with sacrificing a little bit of quality to save a lot of time, then it’s still a great option.

I’m getting pretty picky here, but there’s one other area that I think could save home cooks more time. While the ingredients from Blue Apron are all pre-portioned, you do still need to wash all of the produce. I know, like I said, real picky. But if the produce came pre-washed, you would probably be able to save an extra five or so minutes per meal.

Overall, I really had to dig to find any areas for improvement during my Blue Apron experiment.

Would I recommend this meal delivery service to every overworked, exhausted, and emotionally tapped-out parent trying to feed their family tasty and nutritious meals in less time? Wholeheartedly.