blue apron meals

i'm sharing these 3 meals at once. mainly b/c since the recipe links have pictures already, i didn't feel the need to photograph the experience. if i was more comfortable on camera, i should have recorded it. there were some "are you kidding me?!" moments.

"instructions"

my overall impressions

taste: tasty but a bit bland. i'm guessing this is due to having a mass distro product. you want to please a wider audience so you have to tone it down a bit. much like the current landscape of network tv. (but that's another rant entirely)

ease: the faq page says each meal is meant to take around 30-45 min to prepare. yeah, if you have superior knife skills. i do not. the most difficult/annoying part was that every large onion, clove of garlic and veggie needed to be "small diced." this takes time and skills, both i was lacking at the time. (luckily i had club w to ease my pains)

pan-seared hake
this was the first meal i made. fregola was simple and the veggies easy as well. the fish set off the smoke detector. in all fairness, my stove has a vent above it in the ceiling, not a fan. still, getting the fish cooked took longer than expected and i didn't end up eating the 2nd piece. although i patted dry the fish as instructed, the rice flour caked up pretty well and made the cooking time a bit longer. fish is tricky, making sure it's cooked thru. in the end the fish was ok, but the fregola and veggies were awesome.

orange glazed chicken drumsticks
i'm not a fan of bone in chicken. the tendons freak me out, too rubbery. i do really like the dark meat but i felt like these drumsticks were lacking on the overall meatiness. the sauces could definitely have used more orange and more ginger. you'll notice i had rice instead of the mashed yucca. i ended up having company come to town at the last minute and the yucca didn't last the weekend. (another draw back of having to have 3 meals in one week)

lamb kofte kabobs
this was actually 80% lamb & 20% beef. i didn't make the patties thin enough so they took a bit longer to cook thru, making for a tough exterior. this was the worst in terms of "small dicing." it took me 30 min just to get the veggies prepared. the spice mix was a tad bland but the yogurt made up for it. of the 3 meals this is probably the one i'm most eager to try again, but with more spice and pre-diced onion and garlic from trader joe's.