Does anyone use e-meals?

[LittleIzumi]

Is it worth it? I know I'll have to make some food allergy subs, but I always do. I'm mainly looking at the vegetarian option, because we only use meat once or twice a week.

[LittleIzumi]

:lurk5:

[Melissa in Australia]

Sorry, have never heard of it

[paulasue]

I have used Saving Dinner and loved it. They have lots of different meal options including vegetarian. I had the regular menu years ago and loved it. I have many of the recipes that I still continue to cook now. We loved most of the recipes, there was one recipe that we didn't like. I like SD because she uses more fresh ingredients. She doesn't use hardly any canned ingredients, including can of whatever soup. When I looked at E-meals years ago, they used lots of canned vegetables, package mixes and can of soups a lot. Often, when you need taco seasoning for a recipe she will give you all the spices needed rather than tell you to buy a package.

 

I know for the regular meals, the meat types were varied throughout the week including usually one vegetarian meal.

 

It looks like now she does 4 dinner meals and one lunch meal. She does this so that you have some days to add in your families favorite meals or often families will be away from home for 1-3 meals a week.

 

Here's the product description... Every Tuesday during your subscription you will receive 4 dinner menus and 1 daytime menu. Our dinner menus include: Regular (with Vegetarian options), Low Carb (complete with side dishes, gluten free options, and kosher options), Heart Healthy (lower sodium and fat) and our ALL NEW Paleo menu. The Daytime menu includes breakfast, lunch, and snacks.

 

Right now, they have the Menu Mailers, their weekly meal plans, on sale for half price, $27 for a year. But you can also buy it in 3 months intervals.

 

http://savingdinner.com/

Edited July 2, 2012 by paulasue

[HSMWB]

I got the e-meals for I think two rounds, I would have only went one, but it was on auto renew and I forgot.

 

I got the 'allergy free' menu even though we are not GF or DF, but we do follow a traditional, real food, only food, type diet. And I felt looking through the choices that it was the best fit for our family.

 

My biggest issue what that I didn't really feel that the menu's were 'dinner' quite often enough. Every singe week there was a dish where the only side would be 'sliced apples' or something like that. And whatever the main dish was, I felt was really more of a side dish. So I felt like I still had to come up with 'dinner'.

 

My kids also don't like eggs much, and every week there was an egg based dinner like quiche or omelets or something it seemed. So once again I was doing something different and needing to substitute.

 

Good Luck!!!

[mamaraby]

I used it for about three months. The first couple of them weren't bad, but then as time went on there were more and more meals they had planned that just weren't something my family would eat. I used to get the Cooking TF meal plan when we had fewer kids and more money for groceries and much preferred that one to e-meals.

 

Eating Well has a vegetarian meal plan that covers 28 days (and all three meals) that's free on their website. Otherwise, I'd probably look into something like Veggie Meal Maker which has a 30 day free trial or something like Whole Food Meal Plans.

[Moxie]

I agree with the Saving Dinner recommendation and I think it is still on sale 50% off (better hurry though). Her cookbook is really good too.

 

E-mealz is okay. There is ususally one seafood meal per week and I don't care for seafood so I have to substitute. Some of the meals are strange. I remember a casserole that was topped with mayo :confused:, and several recipes that called for canned chicken (looks like cat food to me). Depends on how picky you are about your food, I think. HTH.

[nova147]

I liked emealz when we used it. I saved the menus so I could reuse. We used the traditional menu, so I can't comment on the vegetarian.

 

Right now, I'm using Build A Menu. I like it a lot. Instead of a list of 7 meals picked for you, you choose up to 7 dinners, as well as a few sides, lunches, breakfasts, and snacks. They have a number of categories (frugal, family friendly, vegetarian, gluten free, etc) and you can mix and match. It's easier for me because my family is kind of picky. DH doesn't like pork, pretty much only eats ground beef, doesn't care for anything but chicken breasts, etc. And my kids are, well, kids. :D Oh, the other thing I like is they have meals that feed 1-2 as well as other meals that feed 4-6. I sometimes choose one or two smaller meals to make for myself for lunch.

[mrs.m]

I've been a subscriber for almost 2 yrs. It works well for our family. We like most of the recipes. It is easy to cross out recipes that you know your family will not enjoy and then sub with staple recipes. I mostly use the WW friendly plan as it fits into how we eat and offers more veggies. I make occassional side dish substitions and I never felt like the main dish is more of a "side dish" as described above, so it must vary by the plan. The meals are very easy to make. My 12 yo has prepared dinner from their plan a few times.

 

I'm also not against some of the processed foods that they offer because at one point we were mainly eating drive-thru meals and hamburger helper. :glare: E-meals is at least a step in the right direction. (so give me some grace here! and I encourage anyone to at least make this step if that's where you are at.) But now I make some of the instant stuff myself (I don't use canned chicken, I cook it myself!) rather than buying what is on the list. But it's still less work than meal planning on my own and it makes dinner time almost auto-pilot rather than chaotic!

Edited July 1, 2012 by jannylynn

[Trillian]

I just started using it (two weeks in) so I will say I tentatively like it. We're using the clean eating plan. I *hated* meal planning, so I'm quite relieved not to be doing it anymore. I love that the recipes are simple. I have made substitutions for my son's dietary intolerances; since the recipes are simple, it's fairly easy to do. So far, there's been a couple days of chicken meals, a couple of fish (personally, I'm not a big fish eater, but the rest of my family does, so I like that it pushes me to make it), a soup day (cold both times), lamb (once I subbed beef because I don't like lamb and it's pricey), and vegetarian. We're used to eating vegetarian meals a couple times a week, but I can see how if you're not they may seem more like side dishes. My DH will usually add leftover meat to his meal that day. The family plan is meant for 6 people (I think) and I've found I definitely need to cut the recipes in half.

 

HTH,

[Deniseibase]

I have used Saving Dinner for several years, and I like it quite a lot, but be aware that her vegetarian options are pretty limited. A LOT of them (like 2-4 times a week) are simply "Make the regular meat recipe, but substitute tofu or non-breaded vegetarian chicken flavored patties", which just got boring, expensive, and kinda gross when we tried it. I really like her service, but she's really big on the whole low-carb/paleo eating right now, so if you are specifically looking for vegetarian, it might not be a good choice.

[Excelsior! Academy]

Yes, but it has been a couple of years ago. We liked it when we used it. Any specific questions?

[Blueridge]

Have you seen this site? They offer a monthly meal plan for free. :)

http://www.thebettermom.com/?s=Bi-weekly+meal+plan