Nowadays, most people live in such a hurry that they often don’t even have time to prepare nutritious meals for themselves, which is a great mistake, as it might have a detrimental effect on their health. Thankfully, we also live in a world where convenience is key, which is why it shouldn’t come as a surprise that someone came up with a solution for this issue as well.
So, how do you find actually healthy, plant-based meals that don't require hours of meal prep?
Daily Harvest attempts to answer that question by offering quality frozen meals built on fruits and veggies. Celebrities such as Kira Stokes, Jesse Tyler Ferguson, and Tabitha Brown have recently endorsed the meal delivery service, and the company has made great strides to increase their food options. In fact, the company gained its original favor when it gained investors such as Serena Williams and Gwyneth Paltrow.
As someone who has followed Daily Harvest's healthy food offerings for years, it's been exciting to see all the ways Daily Harvest has truly evolved since its inception. Naturally, I had to do an updated Daily Harvest review to put the increasingly asked question to rest: is Daily Harvest worth all the hype? Keep on reading if you want to find out my honest thoughts on this subject.
Daily Harvest At A Glance
- Best Match For: Vegans and other people searching for a convenient source of chef-prepared nutritious meals based on mostly organic fruits and veggies.
- Commitment Level: Subscription with weekly or monthly delivery
- Availability: The continental US
- Value: $5.99-$8.99/serving; Free delivery
- Type: Fully prepared plant-based frozen meals, soups, desserts, snacks, and more.
Honest Daily Harvest Review: Is It Worth It?
Daily Harvest is a meal subscription company that delivers delicious organic and nourishing food straight to your door. While the company is most known for their original Daily Harvest smoothies, it’s not the only thing they offer. You can also pick from a variety of:
The pizza, ice cream, bowls, lattes, and snacks are recent additions to the Daily Harvest menu, and I love the variety these new options add to my box. Now, I can easily resist the urge to order pizza delivery because I know I have some awesome (and healthier) options in my freezer! Daily Harvest can cover every meal. Try an oat bowl, chia bowl, smoothie, or latte for breakfast; anything for lunch or dinner; and a Bite or Scoop for dessert.
Unlike meal kits that require cooking, Daily Harvest does not require much effort. You can be ready to eat almost everything in a few minutes, which is perfect for anyone with a busy schedule or just anyone who doesn’t have enough energy to prepare something from scratch. So, let's get into the specifics of what the ordering process is like.
What Is Daily Harvest?
As I mentioned, Daily Harvest is a subscription delivery service that delivers farm-frozen, superfood-based, pre-portioned, no-cook recipes right to your door. Most everything (except for the flatbreads) arrives frozen in a cup about the size of a pint of ice cream.
Everything delivered is vegan, nutritious, and has minimal ingredients. Daily Harvest boxes arrive on dry ice, so you can just pop the convenient cups in your freezer + defrost as needed. A healthy breakfast, light lunch, dinner, or dessert takes only a couple of minutes to prepare.
Originally, Daily Harvest focused on soups, parfaits, and smoothies. The founder, Rachel Drori, was inspired to help people access convenient, healthy food. It's a pretty straightforward service (which I'm thankful for since nothing is more annoying than parsing through complicated instructions to order food).
How Daily Harvest Works
Daily Harvest delivers weekly or monthly boxes of pre-assembled frozen vegan meals and healthy snacks. Fair warning, it's not always a pop-in-the-microwave situation. The service is closer to a fully prepared meal delivery than meal kit services like Blue Apron or Home Chef, but there's still some minor prep and cooking to be done. Honestly, the meal delivery service is between a meal kit and a prepared meal. You don't have to cook, but you may have to do a bit of warming, mixing, and blending.
You can get 9, 14, or 24 items in your box, picking whatever you want from the more than 80 options available. I picked a wide variety because everything sounded like it would taste good. Plus, I couldn't resist a taste of the low-sugar vegan ice cream.
As you browse the menu, you can view the nutritional value of everything, see a list of ingredients, and read the description. The menu options change regularly, but many of the bestsellers are always there. As you browse, you can sort by dietary restrictions and other preferences. Don't like sweet potatoes? You can filter all meals that contain them out with one click.
My Honest Daily Harvest Review
So far, I'm a fan of Daily Harvest's new items. When the service first started, I honestly didn't know how many cups of fruit smoothies and soups I could stand in one week. Don't get me wrong, Daily Harvest's smoothies taste great... but still. Based on my experience, here's everything else you should note before you give it a shot:
What You Can Expect From Your Meal
As you can imagine, these food items are packed with superfoods and whole foods.
I'm usually wary of frozen meals, but these are thoughtfully prepared, and I can pronounce all the ingredients.
No matter what you get, you should expect some interesting flavor combinations. For example, there's a vanilla bean, fig, cauliflower, and apple chia bowl.
The protein bites and Scoops are ready to eat out of the freezer.
You'll need to heat the bowls, flatbreads, and soups, and you will need to blend the smoothie.
All the items have prep directions on the container, and you can always add your own flare.
Sample Meals
Here's a breakdown of all the Daily Harvest meals available:
Bowls
Harvest Bowls
Every harvest bowl I’ve tried has been flavorful, comforting, and nutritious. It’s becoming my go-to quick lunch option on workdays. My favorite Harvest Bowls include the Broccoli + Cheese, Sweet Potato + Wild Rice Hash, and the Brussels Sprouts + Tahini. These Harvest Bowls cook in five minutes, and they have so much flavor. While you can use a microwave, I prefer to heat them in a skillet. It makes me feel at least a little like a home chef.
Other notable Harvest Bowls are:
Forager Bowls
There are three options for forager bowls, which are full of superfoods to power you through your day: Raspberry + Mulberry Seed, Leek + Fonio Grits, and Cremini + Miso Oat.
Oat Bowls
The oat bowls are also full of good flavor combinations. The combinations include:
You can prepare them by heating them up or adding milk and setting them in the fridge for the night if you wish to eat overnight oats instead.
Chia Bowls
I love eating chia seeds, but I've never made one quite like the Daily Harvest ones. You'll add half a cup of milk, then cover it and let it sit in the fridge for at least six hours. Everyone appreciates different tastes, so this might be a hit or miss for you. Mine came out a little crunchy, but next time I'll try soaking it even longer. For these, you'll find options such as Chocolate + Almond, Vanilla Bean + Apple, and Blackberry + Majik.
Energy Bites
If you need a boost of energy or just a tasty snack, these bites will do the trick. You eat them right out of the freezer, and they come in fun flavors like Hazelnut + Chocolate, Coconut + Lemon, Cacao Nib + Vanilla, and Espresso Bean + Tahini.
Lattes
I was pretty intrigued by the Daily Harvest lattes. They contain nourishing ingredients and come in single-serve pods. It's definitely healthier than your average, sugary cup of joe. The current flavors include Chaga + Chocolate, Coffee + Almond, and Matcha + Lemongrass. To prepare it, just run hot water over a pod, unpeel it, and heat it up with your preferred milk.
Smoothies
The smoothie flavors are truly interesting, and I got to try some new ones over the course of a few days. My favorites are:
I used my own milk, but Daily Harvest also sells almond mylk if you'd like to try it in your smoothies or overnight oats.
Other smoothie options include:
Soups
Their soup options are also flavorful, including combos like:
Flatbreads
All of the flatbreads are made from whole, real ingredients, so they taste super fresh. These flatbreads are:
Scoops
Scoops are dairy-free, gluten-free ice cream that's super creamy and tasty. If you like traditional flavors, you won't have a lot of luck with these. However, if you're a little adventurous like me, then you should enjoy flavors like Mint + Melty Cacao Chips, Vanilla + Salted, Swirled Black Sesame, or Pistachio + Hazelnut Crunch. The other three choices are Vanilla + Sweet Salted Caramel, Chocolate + Midnight Fudge, and Strawberry + Rippled Berry Compote. Make sure you let your Scoops sit out for a few minutes before you eat it because it can be pretty hard straight out of the freezer.
Mylk
Daily Harvest makes special plant milk that contains no thickening gums, no preservatives, and no added sugars. There are two flavors, Almond and Almond + Vanilla. In their compact package, you get a pod of nuts and a little sea salt that you'll blend with water at home to make your milk. Pretty cool. One more thing that I should mention here is that the Mylk wedges can be used when preparing other meals delivered by Daily Harvest, like the Smoothies.
Delivery
According to the website, Daily Harvest delivers almost everywhere in the continental US. To find out if they can deliver to you, simply enter your zip code and email into the form on the homepage. Once you pick a plan and checkout, your meals will arrive in a cardboard box with ice to keep them cold and fresh.
You can manage deliveries online from your account page. From there, you can change your delivery frequency, change your order, and skip or pause your deliveries. Your plan is automated after sign-up, so you don't have to do anything else to keep getting meals every week or month. However, I like to mix things up, so I make sure to select new items before my next box ships.
Costs - Is Daily Harvest Worth the Money?
An honest review wouldn't be complete without talking about the Daily Harvest cost. All of the items are $6 to $9 each, and you can typically save a little money on your first box (Use code MEALMATCHMAKER for $25 off) as Daily Harvest often runs promotions for new customers. Compared to similar services, the price isn't bad for a week's worth of high-quality snacks and meals. In fact, meals from places like SnapKitchen, Hello Fresh, or similar meal delivery services are more pricey. Plus, you have to add in the convenience factor.
I thought the food was good, and the peace of mind I get from knowing the food is as natural as possible made it worthwhile. When you think of your average vegan food place or smoothie shop, you often pay way more for similar items such as harvest bowls and oat bowls, and you usually don’t have the convenience of it being delivered to your home, unless you pay for the delivery costs.
I also appreciate that Daily Harvest lets you pick everything in your box. Some meal subscriptions send you their own selections and give you no control from week to week. With this one, I'm glad I'm paying for the stuff I actually want. This is great for picky eaters, who, instead of not being able to eat a meal which doesn’t suit their taste, can make sure that they’re getting something they will enjoy.
FAQS
Daily Harvest was created to provide nutritious, easy meals right to your door. Every item is organic, plant-based (vegan), and free of fillers, preservatives, or additives. You can find the nutrition information for every item when you click through the online menu. The bowls and smoothies also list the ingredients on the outside of the cup.
In my opinion, Daily Harvest is worth it. The frozen meals are extremely convenient because they're ready to eat within minutes. Additionally, 95% of the ingredients are organic. Unlike some subscription services, you have full control over what items come in your box. Not to mention that the Daily Harvest menu is quite diverse, which means that no matter what you’re craving, you should find something that will satisfy it. I mean, just look at the selection I mentioned above.
While Daily Harvest is not marketed for weight loss, nutritious, vegan meals can be part of a balanced diet. The Daily Harvest soups and bowls contain hearty ingredients that may help you stay full longer, and many items are below 400 calories. In general, vegan diets are often associated with weight loss and weight control.
Each Daily Harvest meal comes with an instruction manual on how to prepare it, which I greatly appreciate, as it makes the whole process easier. You don’t have to wonder whether you did it right or not - you just need to take a look at the instructions. Good choice for those who are all thumbs in the kitchen.
If you were wondering where to buy Daily Harvest in stores, the answer is nowhere. Daily Harvest is an online service that delivers meals directly to your doorstep, which means that the only way to get them is by ordering the package size you wish from their website.
The cost of your plan depends on how many items you order per week and how frequently you get your delivery. You can choose from 9, 14, or 24 items at $6 to $9 per item. The company frequently has promo codes for new customers to save on your first three boxes.
Yes, you can cancel Daily Harvest at any time. There is no long-term commitment necessary.
Splendid Spoon and Daily Harvest are both vegan meal delivery services with healthy options. Daily Harvest allows you to purchase boxes by the number of items, while Splendid Spoon offers different meal plans for breakfast, lunch, and dinner. Overall, Daily Harvest is less expensive and has more meal options.
Yes, you can skip a shipment up to eight weeks in advance by logging into your account online. You can also pause your subscription and pick it back up at any time. To skip a delivery, do so before 6 pm ET on the Sunday before your ship date.
Daily Harvest meals ship frozen, and they are best kept that way until you're ready to consume them. You do not need to thaw most items, except for Scoops, before preparing them. In fact, the company recommends you even eat the Bites straight out of the freezer.
The company includes the costs of shipping and taxes in the cost of each item, so there is no separate shipping charge. When you check out, you'll see the exact cost of your box with no hidden surprises.
Each smoothie contains 16 ounces of plant-based ingredients. To prepare one, you'll simply need to add a liquid such as a plant milk or water and then blend.
The meal service does not have a student discount listed on their website. However, they do have a Daily Harvest promo code for new members.
You can skip a shipment as often as you need to, up to eight weeks in advance. You can also pause your plan indefinitely if you need a break. The site will save all of your information, making it easy to pick up where you left off.
The daily cost depends on your items and whether you have weekly or monthly delivery. On average, nine cups of Daily Harvest smoothies per week costs $69.75 per week.
The service offers different items at different prices, and the cost of a box decreases based on your number of items. The smoothies are $6.99 - $7.99 per item, while chia bowls are $5.99 per bowl. With a variety of items, you may average about $70 per week with nine items.
You will select your delivery date when you checkout, and you'll receive tracking information to keep up with your order. The packages include enough dry ice to keep the food frozen in transit, so you don't have to be home to get your delivery. Finally, all Daily Harvest packaging is recyclable.
Daily Harvest uses organic ingredients 95% of the time. They always use organic ingredients for fruits and vegetables that are typically pesticide-intensive, such as bell pepper, potatoes, celery, tomatoes, and grapes.
You can use any liquid in your smoothie since the containers only include dry, frozen ingredients. You are free to add oat milk, almond milk, coconut milk, juice, or water. Then, just blend everything together and enjoy.
Yes, Daily Harvest has a section of their website dedicated to gifting. You can send a custom gift box of nine items, a box of six pints of scoops, or a gift card. If you want to get a subscription for someone else, you can always use their address instead of yours when you check out.
According to the Daily Harvest site, the meal service includes enough ice to keep your items frozen one to two days after the scheduled delivery date. They also adjust the amount of ice based on the climate in your location.
You can choose to get a weekly or monthly delivery of Daily Harvest's meals.
That depends. A lot of kids don’t enjoy greens, and Daily Harvest has a lot of them, so in that case, that would be a no. However, if your child is not one of those, and they actually like fruits and veggies, then I’d say it could be a good choice - especially since almost all ingredients used to prepare the meals are organic, so you don’t have to worry about what they’re eating and whether it will be bad for them.
The Daily Harvest smoothie lids are made of curbside-recyclable plastic, and their Mylk seal is made of #1 PET plastic. The company is working to eliminate the use of single plastics in their food delivery model.
Daily Harvest Costs
A subscription lets you select breakfasts, lunches, soups, dinners, snacks, and desserts costing $5.99-$8.99 per serving. Delivery is free for all members.
Pros & Cons
To make things more concise, here are my straight-up pros and cons.
PROS:
- The latest menu additions make for a great variety
- Options cater to diets such as keto, paleo, and others
- Meals have no additives or preservatives
- Meals take little to no time to prepare
CON:
- Not very kid or allergy-friendly
Food For Thought - Daily Harvest Review
If you don't love cooking (or just don't have time) but want healthy meals made of fruits and vegetables, then Daily Harvest is a worthy pick. Honest review: I enjoyed the variety of their revamped menu, though some of the flavor choices are ambitious. That being said, while I would say it's perfect for busy moms, this may not be the best choice for kids. But maybe your kids like greens and tahini. These meals also last up to a month in the freezer, so you don't have to worry about something going bad if you don't want it right away.
Though you don't have to add anything to the harvest bowls, soups, and flatbreads, I like the fact that you can customize them to your liking. I can throw some onion into my harvest bowl or some nutritional yeast and protein powder in my smoothie if I want, making these items totally personalizable. To wrap up this Daily Harvest review, I appreciate the quality of these frozen meals. They're extremely convenient to have on-hand when you need something quick and tasty.
Daily Harvest meals are most compatible with people looking for frozen, vegan food delivery.
Daily Harvest
