Plated Subscription Box Review + Coupon – April 2016

This week our Plated featured dishes with complex flavors and simple preparation.  Plated is a weekly dinner kit subscription box with high quality ingredients and chef-created recipes. Each week you’ll choose from a variety of quick gourmet meals that range from meats, chicken, seafood, and purely vegetarian options.

There’s enough selection to please all palates, and the recipes are seasonally focused. You can swap out your recipes and skip any week you don’t want.  We love the way each meal incorporates only a couple key herbs or spices; the flavors shine through, and the recipes remain easy to follow.  We love getting boxes most weeks to try new recipes — our favorite recipes always remain available in our account if we want to look them up to make again ourselves.

Plated uses recyclable/compostable jute for its insulation.  I have a stack of it in the garage that I’m planning to use to border some trees in our yard and create a weed barrier in some of the plant beds. Boxes are always packed with the meat on the bottom, underneath a few big ice packs — the rest of the food is set on top with more ice.

Plated sends a weekly email — it doesn’t tell you much about your meals, other than what you need from home. There’s now no reminder of the ease of preparation and all the other subscriptions provide some version of that.

On-card information is now streamlined and includes only prep-time, number of servings, and calorie count.  Traditionally, all of Plated’s meals serve two people, but recently we’ve seen a few with 3 person serving sizes.

Plated’s recipes rely on mise en place and then cook – we often mix up the steps from how the recipe is written, but we’re both experienced cooks and know what can be accomplished while something else cooks. So, read your cards if you need the step by steps.

All the food comes bagged up and separated (mostly) into the recipes — meat and some large or delicate items are bagged separately, with the meat nestled at the bottom of the box among the ice packs.

Everything in our box!

Chicken Paillard with Parmesan-Roasted Asparagus and Smashed Red Potatoes. 35-45 mins, medium, 660 cal per serving.

The effort of pounding the chicken between plastic wrap is well worth it (and I’ve learned it doesn’t pay to skimp on the wrap), as it helps the chicken cook evenly and prevents it from puffing into a small mound.  The potatoes and asparagus each were simply-prepared and had excellent flavor and texture without any fuss.  Great, unadulterated flavors in this dish, making it both comforting and classic.

Mac and Cheese with Gruyère, Peas, and Pea Shoots. 30-40 mins, easy, 770 cal per serving.

This version of classic homemade mac and cheese uses Gruyere to pump up the creamy depth of flavor.  As expected, this was an exceedingly simply dish to make, and I loved the use of a quick beurre manié – kneading the flour into the butter – to create a fuss-free roux.

This was a very firm mac and cheese, with the cheese wholly adhered to the pasta.  We concentrated our greens within two thirds of the dish to leave some plain for the kids.  The peas and shoots added a nice dimension to the dish and helped the nutritional profile, too.  Though we are often skeptical of the value mac and cheese in a kit, Brandy said this version was totally worth it.  The Sfoglini pasta is great and the high-end cheese makes it stand out.

Thai Pork Larb with Pineapple and Charred Haricots Verts.  30-40 mins, medium, 580 cal per serving.

I love larb.  This version had lots of great herbs in it, with whole leaves of mint and basil.  The pineapple was a fun touch and added a sweetness that is often lacking in this dish.  Despite the cute little cups, it is a messy dish to eat — I always end up with lime juice running down my hands.  This dish had a nice mass of vegetables to go with the intense flavors.  This was pretty easy to prepare — trimming green beans is the most arduous aspect — after the mise en place, the main body of the larb goes together quickly.

Italian Meatball Soup with Rainbow Swiss Chard. 35-45 mins, medium, 650 cal per serving.

This is a fun and bright version of Italian wedding soup.  It replaces the little pasta with extra greens and adds a hint of lemon to cut the richness of the beef.  The use of large meatballs instead of tiny ones accomplishes many things:  it makes the meatball prep easier, leaves them more tender, and gives you a greater “meal” feel at the table, as you pull apart your meatballs in the bowl and dig in.

This was a good week for Plated.  The dishes drew inspiration from classic ethnic dishes (French, American, Thai, and Italian), but the preparation was simplified to get big, authentic flavors without all the elbow grease required by the original techniques.

Visit Plated to find or more or to subscribe. Currently you can get 2 free plates when you buy 4 when you sign up with this link (no coupon code required).