5 Meal Delivery Services That Make Conquering Whole30 Way Easier
Reduce your risk of having to restart the challenge.
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mbg Deputy Commerce Editor
mbg Deputy Commerce Editor
Braelyn Wood is the Deputy Commerce Editor at mindbodygreen. She has a B.S. in journalism from Northwestern University, along with a certificate in marketing.
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June 28, 2022
If you’re trying to change up your eating habits, you’ve likely considered tackling Whole30. The elimination diet ditches processed foods, excess ingredients, and alcohol for one month to help your body reset—and it’s got plenty of devoted fans.
But like any strict eating plan, Whole30 requires plenty of preparation to ensure you’re meeting your daily nutrition goals. One way to bypass this process is investing in the best Whole30 meal delivery services.
These convenient options deliver prepared meals (or all the ingredients for one) directly to your door, so you spend less time reading nutrition labels and more time enjoying your meal.
What is Whole30?
Founded by mbg Collective member Melissa Hartwig Urban, Whole30 is best thought of as a total body reset that helps you uncover inflammatory foods that negatively impact your body.
The 30-day plan starts with eliminating all sugar (real or fake), legumes, grains, dairy, and preservatives, as well as booze. Instead, the eating plan is focused around moderate portions of meat, seafood, and eggs with fresh vegetables, herbs, and seasonings. Some fruits are allowed on the diet, along with coffee and clarified butter or ghee.
Check out the full list of do-and-don’t foods on Whole30 here, courtesy of Urban.
Types of Whole30-approved meal plans:
Only a handful of meal delivery services are specifically Whole30-approved, however selecting a paleo meal delivery service often checks many of the same boxes. These curated options focus on lean meats and veggies while skipping grains, legumes, and dairy.
When opting for a meal kit, you’ll have the flexibility to ditch any ingredients that don’t meet Whole30 guidelines. However, pre-made or frozen meals will require extra vetting, as it’s often difficult (or even impossible) to remove unwanted ingredients from these options. Remember: If you mess up on Whole30, you're supposed to completely start over.
How to choose a Whole30-approved meal delivery service.
In addition to offering meals that follow the Whole30 guidelines, we vetted meal delivery services to ensure they offered high quality ingredients, sustainable packaging, and a variety of recipes to ensure every meal is as convenient and delicious as the last.
How we picked:
We want to keep your taste buds excited, so we searched for brands with at least four Whole30-safe meals available each week.
There’s no denying Whole30 is pretty strict, but it’s still important to account for each individual’s unique allergy or dietary needs within the eating plan, too.
Meal boxes get a bad rep for waste, so we searched for the companies trying to change that notion with sustainability standards.
Every food budget is different, so we provided a range of options to suit different allowances.
Our picks for the best Whole30 meal delivery services of 2022:
Pros:
Whole30-approvedNo prepGluten-freeFree shipping for subscribersCons:
Limited menuPlastic traysNot organicType: Fresh entrée
Skip meal prep by opting for gluten-free meal service Snap Kitchen. It releases six entrées each week that are certified by Whole30 to meet the eating plan’s strict guidelines. Delivered fresh, the prepackaged meals take just two minutes to heat up in the microwave (or 15 minutes in the oven) and pack all the nutrients you need for a filling lunch or dinner.
Every chef-prepared entrée has a full nutritional breakdown on the site, so you can get even further insights to your meals when placing your order. Plus, the brand’s entire lineup is gluten-free, so those with celiac won’t need to worry about cross-contamination.
Score free shipping when you sign up for a weekly subscription, which comes in boxes of 6 or 12. You’ll also have the choice to add on extra proteins and sides to maximize each delivery, ensuring you get the most bang for your buck.
Example Meals:
-Herb butter steak with bacon-roasted Brussels sprouts
-Stir-fry chicken and broccoli with garlic sauce
-Chicken piccata with garlic roasted cauliflower
Sustainability & Quality: The brand focuses on sourcing food locally, so organic produce isn’t always guaranteed. However, you can count on sustainable packaging thanks to recyclable boxes and BPA-free plastic trays.
Cost: From $11 per serving
Pros:
Mostly organicNew menu weeklyCons:
Shipping feeNot strictly Whole30Type: Meal kit
If you love cooking but hate spending time at the grocery store, Sunbasket’s meal kits can give you the best of both worlds. While the menu is not strictly Whole30-approved, you can use the paleo filter to find recipes with a similar set of guidelines (i.e. no dairy, grains, or sugar).
Of course, finding Whole30-safe meals will take a bit of extra legwork. For example, you’ll still find tofu and some legumes in the Sunbasket paleo rotation. But if you’re well-versed on the rules, finding satisfying meals shouldn’t be an issue—especially when you know they’ll get delivered to your door weekly.
And don’t fret if you make a mistake when ordering; it’s easy to ditch an ingredient when preparing your meal to ensure you stick to the guidelines. Each recipe also features an in-depth rundown of ingredients to ensure you have plenty of time to vet.
Example meals:
-Lettuce-wrapped turkey burgers with spicy chraime carrot salad
-Chicken larb lettuce cups with carrots and fresh mint
-Pork and stone fruit salad with harissa-roasted sweet potato
Sustainability & Quality: Every recipe features 99% organic ingredients—and Sunbasket always lets you know when it needs to swap in foods that aren’t. This commitment to green continues with packing that’s primarily curbside recyclable sans the plastic bags used for some pre-portioned ingredients.
Cost: From $12 per serving
Pros:
OrganicGluten-freeWhole30-approvedFree shippingCons:
Limited customizationType: Fresh entrée
Get pre-made meals delivered to your door every Friday from the Fresh n’ LeanWhole-30-approved menu. Made with organic ingredients, the entrées are prepared by chefs in a gluten-free kitchen and take just three minutes to heat up once delivered.
Unlike other meal plans, Fresh n’ Lean doesn’t give you much control over your recipe selection. You’ll have the option to avoid up to three foods and select any allergens, such as egg, sesame, dairy, shellfish, tree nuts, and soy. (FYI some of these are already excluded in Whole30 meals). This means you may end up eating a few recipes twice depending on how many entrées you add to your box; the smallest order contains 5 meals, while the largest has 10 entrées.
Example meals:
-Hearty vegetable taco soup
-Macadamia nut chicken thigh
-Mexican bowl
Sustainability & Quality:
The packaging—which includes a BPA-free plastic tray, plastic seal, and cardboard box—is totally recyclable except for the ice gel pack, which can easily be reused for a picnic or donated to your local food shelter. Plus, ingredients are completely organic and sustainably sourced.
Cost: From $11 per serving
Pros:
Organic produceChef-curatedFree shippingCons:
ExpensiveLimited customizationType: Fresh entrée
While you won’t find a Whole30-specific menu advertised on the website, it’s actually hidden under the brand’s paleo menu. When you go to order your meals—which skip dairy, soy, grains, legumes, gluten, and processed ingredients—you can select for your entire order to be Whole30-approved.
The largest delivery packs 28 vacuum-sealed entrées with options for breakfast, lunch, and dinner. Opt for the 5-day plan to get a little culinary freedom on your weekends or stick to the 7-day plan to make meal prep obsolete.
Either way, you’ll have to trust in the system to deliver delicious meals, as the curated plan only allows customers to input two allergen or taste preferences. Once meals arrive on Friday, they can last in the fridge for up to 10 days or in the freezer for three months.
Example meals:
-Sausage and egg scramble with sweet potatoes
-Roasted chicken breast with asparagus
-Korean beef bulgogi
Sustainability & Quality: Trifecta Kitchen is USDA-certified organic and relies on humanely-raised animals for its protein-heavy recipes. About 98% of packaging is compostable—and the company plans to reach 100% by 2023.
Cost: From $15 per serving
Pros:
Allergen friendlyRecyclable packagingNo subscription necessaryCons:
Not strictly Whole30-approvedExpensiveType: Fresh entrée
When you’re dealing with allergies, it can be scary to entrust someone else to make your meals—but not with The Good Kitchen. The meal delivery service follows strict production guidelines to prevent any cross contamination with gluten, peanuts, or soy.
Another Whole30 partner, the company creates fresh entrées, which can be purchased from Amazon and Walmart, or directly from the brand with a subscription. Online you’ll find a menu with 11 different Whole30-approved recipes available in packs of 6, 8, 10, or 12 entrées. Just pick the frequency of your shipment and prepare to delve into a fresh delivery every Friday.
Example Meals:
-Blackened chicken with sweet potato and kale
-Smoked Carolina BBQ pork with vegetable dirty rice
-Chimichurri chicken thighs with fingerling potato hash
Sustainability & Quality: Produce from small local farms rounds out organic ingredients for a high quality entrée that always tastes fresh, especially when you factor in the 100% grass-fed and grass-finished beef, pasture-raised pork, lamb and turkey, and antibiotic- and hormone-free poultry and eggs.
Similar to other brands, packaging is recycling, from the cardboard shipping box to the plastic food trays.
Cost: From $14 per serving
The takeaway.
Partaking in Whole30 doesn’t have to be an intimidating experience, especially with the help of the best Whole30 meal delivery services. Whether you want to master your culinary skills or cut out meal prep altogether, these sustainable picks from Sunbasket, Fresh n’ Lean, Snap Kitchen, and more will help you conquer the challenge for a total body reset.
