Sun Basket Review & $30 Coupon – September 2016

Sun Basket is a meal kit delivery subscription box.   Their chef-developed and nutritionist-approved recipes focus on helping people create delicious, healthy meals using quality ingredients and globally-inspired flavors.  Recipes are created by Chef Justine Kelly, formerly of the James Beard award–winning restaurant The Slanted Door.  Meals are between 500–800 calories.  Meal ingredients use certified organic produce and responsibly sourced meats and seafood (free from antibiotics and added hormones).  Pick and choose 3 recipes between the following meal plan menus for your weekly selections:  Chef’s choice, Paleo, Gluten-free, and Vegetarian.  You can also opt for the Rise & Shine menu which consists of two dinner recipes and two 5-minute breakfast recipes.  Sun Basket is now providing 20-minute meals as part of the weekly selection for those short on time, as well as a globetrotter meal that highlights an international destination!

Sun Basket included this label on the outside of the box.  This information is useful if you have concerns about where your food is sourced.

Food is well insulated, and recipes are separated into individual bags (with color coded labels).  Meals are packaged to stay fresh in the box for up to 8 hours after delivery.  Immediately refrigerate ingredients after removing from the box.  Note from Sun Basket, recipes with delicate greens and fresh mushrooms are best used within 4 days of delivery.  Sun Basket provides most of the ingredients needed for your recipes, but there are a few pantry staples that you’ll be asked to add such as olive oil, grapeseed or sunflower oil, plus salt and freshly–ground pepper. Occasionally, you’ll be asked for wine or butter as an optional recipe item. All Sun Basket packing materials are either recyclable or compostable. (Note:  SunBasket has recently changed it’s insulation, and the new version can be rolled up and put out with your plastic recyclables.)

Each week Sunbasket includes an information card related to the meals in the basket.  This could be details on a basket ingredient or helpful cooking tips.  This week’s card highlighted the gulf shrimp featured in the Yemini grilled shrimp with fattoush salad.

This week’s recipes.  The front of each card outlines start-to-finish timelines for the meals, calorie content, and servings.  On the back (not pictured) are step-by-step directions, as well as ingredients/quantities so that recipes can be repeated if desired.

Chicken with Green Olives, Capers, and Lemon:  

Making the meal:  Roast the chicken, prep the sauce ingredients, and cook the sauce and spinach.

I was worried that the sauce would be overly salty from the olives and capers, but it wasn’t.  The lemon in the sauce helped cut through the richness of the butter and added a nice bright note.  I may have overcooked the spinach, though.  All that was missing from this dinner was the Italian countryside.

Mushroom-smothered Steaks with Arugula-Walnut Salad:  

Making the meal:  Toast the walnuts, prep the mushroom ingredients, cook the steaks, cook the mushroom, and make the salad.

I was SO happy to see this recipe in the week’s lineup.  I LOVE sauteed mushrooms and onions with my steaks!  This version subbed shallots for the onions, giving a milder flavor that was still just as tasty.  The sweetness of the mirin paired well with the shallots. Although I missed having a baked potato, the walnuts in the salad helped give some heft to the side dish.

Yemini Grilled Shrimp with Fattoush Salad:  

Making the meal:  Marinate the shrimp, toast the naan, prep the salad veggies, cook the shrimp, finish the salad.

This meal turned out better than I expected!  The shrimp were super flavorful, and who doesn’t like seeing skewers.  The toasted naan was able to stay crisp even with the dressing and yogurt-buttermilk sauce.  My dad was a fattoush newbie and said that he could eat this meal again.  His favorite part was the yogurt-buttermilk sauce; he thought it would be a good replacement for his traditional ranch dressing on salads.  SunBasket may help me turn him into a foodie yet.

You can choose between the 2-person or 4-person plans (weekly $74.93 and $143.87, respectively).  Sun Basket meals breakdown to $11.49 per person, which is similar to eating out at a casual restaurant.  There is also a $5.99 weekly delivery fee.  You can skip or cancel at any time.  Sun Basket has an expanded delivery area.  However, they do not deliver to the following states:  AK, HI, IA, KS, LA, MN, MO, MT, NE, NM, ND, OK, SD, TX, and WI.  They only deliver to parts of AR.

Have you tried Sun Basket yet or any other meal service? Save $30 on your first box – about half off! Use this link to get the deal.

Visit Sun Basket to subscribe or find out more!