Daily Harvest Meal Delivery Service Review 2023: All You Need To Know

Feature-Daily-Harvest

In this post, we’ll tell you what Daily Harvest is for, what its meals are like, and what you get with the meal-delivery service.

Daily Harvest is a plant-based meal delivery service that provides you with grain bowls, ready-to-eat smoothies, oats and chia bowls, flatbreads, soups, snacks, and lattes.

The company takes time to create healthy meals and gives you vegetables and additional fruits to add to your plan.

The article gives you insights into the pros and cons of Daily Harvest and who should try the meal-delivery service.

All of us love the idea of healthy food. And if that food doesn’t require time to prepare, that’s even better. When I say convenient and healthy food, you probably imagine protein pastes and powders. They have the nutritional and practical appeal but don’t taste that good. However, Daily Harvest provides you with great healthy meals that you don’t need to prepare a plan or anything else. You can subscribe to the service and get great meals at your home in no time.

The meals are ready-to-eat smoothies, harvest bowls, chia and oat bowls, flatbreads, snacks, desserts, and everything else that requires very little preparation. The meals are worth the cost.

What is Daily Harvest?

daily harvest logo

Daily Harvest is a meal-delivery service for packaged, frozen smoothies. It now includes meal and snack options for the entire day.

The company uses fresh fruits and vegetables. It has over 100 plant-based meals you can try ranging from smoothies, breakfast bowls, harvest bowls, and soups.

You can select items you want, and the frozen meals arrive at your home. In April 2020, they said they wanted to be a fully recyclable company.

As of April 2022, the company delivers cardboard delivery boxes, cup bowls, and insulated dry ice bags that can be recycled or are compostable.

In addition to that, the Daily Harvest meals are gluten-free and come with no preservatives or additives

Who started Daily Harvest?

Rachel Drori is the founder and CEO of the popular meal-subscription company Daily Harvest. She used to live out her days on stale birthday cakes found in office pantries. And she would attend one meeting after another, feeling her energy drained. That’s how she found a gap in the market. She wanted to make healthy and convenient food for herself and others like her.

Daily Harvest is for everyone who knows how they should be eating but never had the time for that.

How does Daily Harvest work?

Daily Harvest has options for delivering either monthly boxes of frozen vegan meals or frozen snacks. You can blend the smoothies or reheat the meals whenever you’re ready.
The service is much closer to fully prepared meals than a meal-kit delivery service like Blue Apron or Home Chef. Some minor prep work is necessary, like mixing or reheating the ingredients.

You can easily order meals thanks to the readily available information for each meal, like its nutritional value, ingredients, and other details readily listed. In addition, for each meal, you can see actual user ratings and reviews. This is helpful when you want to select your meals. There are dietary filters that let you select keto plans, paleo plans, low-sugar, and low-carb options. You can also remove certain ingredients, say artichokes if you don’t like them.

You get plenty of superfoods, vegetables, greens, berries, and more. You can order meals with trendy food items like kale and turmeric.

The ingredients with their nutritional information are present on the side of each food container. You have suggestions on preparing the meal and additional methods to adapt the food to your style and tastes.

Read more: ModifyHealth Review

Meal selection

Unlike other services, Daily Harvest doesn’t offer a predesigned menu. The customers choose what they want every week.

The plans can deliver nine, 14, or 24 meals every week. You can either order online or use the Daily Harvest app. You can pause, skip weeks or choose different meals, manage your deliveries, and more with the online account.

Once you choose the plan, you can select meals from 100 plus chef-curated meal options. Here are examples of the same:

  • Smoothies: passion fruit, pineapple, cherry, and acai are some options
  • Chia bowls: Chocolate and almond bowl, vanilla bean and apple, blackberry and majik bowl
  • Forager bowls have leek and fonio grits, strawberry and goji berry, and cremini and miso oats, to name a few.
  • The soups are carrot, coconut, butternut squash, rosemary, mushroom, and miso.
  • Flatbreads include kale bread and sweet potato, arugula and pear or artichoke plus spinach
  • Harvest bowls have wild rice hash and sweet potato, cremini, and asparagus, red lentils, and cumin
  • The harvest bakes include chickpea and coconut, cremini and paprika ropavieja, and wild rice gratin
  • Snack bites include hazelnut and chocolate, coconut and lemon, and tahini
  • Plant-based ice creams include vanilla and salted swirled black sesame, cocoa chips, and more
  • The lattes are ginger and turmeric, Chaga and chocolate coffee, and almond

Most items give you one serving per order, and the snacks, ice creams, and lattes have more than one serving.

Ingredients of Daily Harvest meals

Daily Harvest uses good-quality, plant-based ingredients. The meals don’t have additives, preservatives, or fillers.

The company uses regular produce. 95% or more ingredients are organic.

The company doesn’t use pesticides. According to environmental groups, some non-organic produce comes with residual pesticides. Daily Harvest uses organic vegetables and fruits to avoid that.

The meals are vegan and use fruits or vegetables. Meals include nuts, whole grains, spices, herbs, and matcha or cacao.

Ice creams and lattes are sweetened with maple syrup. Customers need to provide liquids like plant-based milk to make the smoothie or reheat the soups.

How is the freshness and quality of Daily Harvest meals?

The chefs at Daily Harvest use high-quality fresh ingredients—this is the hallmark of food at Daily Harvest. To ensure freshness, the meals that arrive are frozen and packaged using dry ice.

You can store these meals in your freezer for three months at least.
You can reheat soups, harvest bowls, and bowls in the microwave or with the stove. You can reheat flatbreads the same way using ovens.

You can eat the ice creams directly from the freezer. Daily Harvest’s meals are full of flavor because the ingredients they use are frozen when they are fully ripe. The herbs and sauces are great too.

If you want more variety, you may be disappointed because the meals start repeating themselves after a few orders. There are only 100 items, and the menu isn’t updated regularly.

Read more: Personal Chef  To Go review

Is Daily Harvest good for weight loss?

Daily Harvest doesn’t claim that it helps with weight loss on its website. It’s great for anyone who wants healthier plant-based meals. Entrees contain fewer than 400 calories. Perhaps that’s why you will be able to lose weight.

Studies show that plant-based diets are associated with weight loss and lowering the risk of obesity. This is due to the amount of fiber present in the plant-based diet. In a study with over 1100 individuals, researchers observed significant weight reductions in the group who ate a primarily vegan diet.

Research also shows that better protein intake can increase your feelings of fullness and keep hunger at bay.

Also, research has shown that a higher protein intake can increase feelings of fullness. The meals are low in protein serving 20 gms of protein per serving, which may not be the right quantity of protein for all of us.

What's the pricing of Daily Harvest?

The smoothies, bowls, soups, and bread cost between $6 to $9.

You can get a more affordable lunch if you prepare the food yourself, but the meals aren’t too expensive at $6 to $9. There are hazelnuts, avocados, chia sees, and more.

The cost of Daily Harvest meals depends on what you select. Additionally, ordering more items reduces the cost for you. The company offers big discounts on bigger orders and has special discounts for new customers.

There are three plans available:

  • The small plan with nine meals.
  • The medium plan with 14 meals.
  • And the large plan with 24 meals.

Each item comes with different pricing based on its specific type:

  • The smoothies are priced at $7.99 each
  • The harvest bowls are priced at $8.99 each
  • The harvest bakes are priced at $11.99 each
  • The flatbreads are priced at $8.99 each
  • The soups are priced at $7.99 each
  • The forager bowls are priced at $5.99 each
  • The scoops are priced at $8.99 per pint
  • The bites are priced at $7.99 for seven bites
  • The lattes are priced at $2.99 for each latte
  • The Mylk is priced at $7.99 for eight servings

That said, the more items you order, the higher the discount you get

  • $10 off a medium box that has 14 items
  • $20 off a large box that has 24 items

The price includes shipping and taxes, so there are no additional costs during the checkout.

The cutoff time to modify your orders is until 6 pm Eastern time on Sunday before your scheduled delivery. You can make changes on the Daily Harvest website or its app.

For new customers, you can get $25 off your order.

How are Daily Harvest's meals delivered?

The items are delivered five days after placing the order inside an insulated package filled with dry ice that keeps the contents fresh.

Are Daily Harvest meal kits easy to prepare?

The meal kits are easy to prepare. Most of the meals, like its soups and ice creams, are ready-to-eat meals. Others need a little preparation, like adding the liquid to smoothies and mixing the bowls.

You can prepare the flatbreads by keeping them in the oven for a few minutes.

The instructions on the containers help you understand how many minutes you need to put the meal inside the microwave or reheat them.

Sample meals from Daily Harvest

As someone who wants to eat healthily, not all of us are on board with the idea of eating frozen meals.

The Daily Harvest meals have vegetable and fruit combinations to provide healthy and exciting grain bowls. Since the vegetables and fruits are frozen at their peak ripeness, everything tasted fresh and balanced.

After weeks of trying the meals, they can start tasting the same. Several recurring ingredients include cacao, avocado, lentils, and more.

Here are some of the sample meals:

  • Artichoke and Spinach flatbread
  • Brussels sprouts with lime pad thai bowl
  • Acai and cherry smoothie
  • Passion fruit and pineapple smoothie
  • Ginger and greens smoothie
  • Mulberry and dragon fruit oats
  • Cremini and miso oats
  • Cacao nib and vanilla bites
  • Cold-brew and roasted espresso bean chip scoop
  • Roasted Eggplant + Red Pepper Caponata harvest bowl
  • Spinach and shiitake grits bowl
  • Raspberry and mulberry seed forager bowl
  • Leek and stew soup
  • Cauliflower and leek soup
  • Sweet chickpea and turmeric soup
  • Tomato basil flatbread
  • Artichoke and spinach flatbread
  • Tomatillo and pepper flatbread

Snacks:

  • Chocolate and midnight fudge scoop
  • Cold-brew and roasted espresso bean chi scoop
  • Vanilla and sticky sweet salted caramel scoop
  • Matcha and lemongrass latte
  • Almond and vanilla milk
  • Cacao nib and vanilla bites

Cold-brew, banana, and almond butter smoothie: This smoothie is similar to what you can whip at home. You can use almond milk for a healthier version of the smoothie.

Chocolate blueberry smoothie with greens, organic banana, and almond butter: This is another great option. The greens paired well with the chocolate blueberry flavor. It feels like having a smoothie salad.

Vanilla and cacao with chickpeas, apples, and coconut cream: This has some uncommon ingredients and pairs chickpeas with coconut cream.

Cauliflower rice and pesto harvest bowl with cashews, organic spinach, and basil: The pesto is delicious. The bowl is light, colorful, and bursting with flavor. It’s a great lunch option.

Brussels sprouts and lime pad Thai with carrots and jalapeno over kelp noodles: The brussels sprouts are spicy and have more jalapeno than most people would like.

Tomato and cremini flatbread: The flatbread has a great flavor because of the tomato. It tastes like a pizza.

Kale and sweet potato flatbread: The flatbread is dry, according to most reviewers. The grated Parmigiano Reggiano on top is the only good thing about this meal.

Lentil and mesquite chili: You can always make your chili, but this soup is better. It would have been more flavorful with some more spice. It’s a mild chili.

Lentil and cremini soup: It’s an earthy light soup with great flavor balance.

Cocoa nib and vanilla protein bites:  The protein bites number seven. They are a good snack to have after meals.

Daily Harvest lattes: There are many flavors like turmeric and coffee, ginger lattes, and more. They arrive as frozen cubes to which you can add dairy or nut milk.

What makes Daily Harvest different from other prepared meal delivery services?

Daily Harvest meals are consistent, more so than other prepared meal services you can buy. It’s a healthy meal service using only vegan, organic ingredients. You can prepare them at home, and it won’t take more than five minutes of prep time.

Compared to other meal-delivery services that may only serve you lunch or dinner, you get a lot of additional options like lattes, soups, bread, and curries with Daily Harvest. You get a touch of internal cuisines in the meals you get. Most meal-delivery services don’t pay that much attention to using organic produce. Daily Harvest does. That’s why they’re one of the best organic vegan meal-delivery services you can subscribe to.

Who is Daily Harvest meal kits good for?

The service is great for students, young professionals, or young families who don’t have time to cook. The dishes are filling, and the food isn’t always enough for large families. The food items arrive frozen, and there’s a great way to store the food if you travel for work or some other reason.

This is one of the best vegan meal-delivery services for you to try. If you want a healthier breakfast and lunch but lack time to prepare them, look no further than Daily Harvest. It has vegan bowls, smoothies, and snacks for you. The smoothies and snacks may taste average, but lunches and dinners offer plenty of variety and are easy to prepare.

Daily Harvest meals are delivered frozen and require little preparation. This service is great for anyone with a busy schedule making the service great for those who want to eat healthily.

Daily Harvest’s meals, snacks, and lattes are gluten-free, plant-based, and meant for a balanced diet. This makes it great for those who find it hard to get meal-delivery services that are right for them.

Because customers need to add their milk and liquids for broth, they can decide if they want the soups and meals to be vegan or dairy-free.

The items are high in carbs and may not always be right for those on low-carb diets or following the keto diet. Some meals are paleo-friendly. The meals aren’t all designed to be that way.

About 95% of the produce used is organic.

Who is Daily Harvest not good for?

Daily Harvest may not be the best choice if you want high-protein meals. Smoothies and bowls have proteins in them from lentils, beans, and others, they are plant-based proteins. There are vitamins and antioxidants but not meats or fish.

Daily Harvest isn’t great for children because children have diverse taste profiles. This is for a more mature audience. With turmeric, bitter vegetables, and greens, it’s the best choice for healthy eating adults may like.

People who want a low-carb, keto diet may want another plan that fits their needs. The meals are not designed to be either low-sodium or low in fat. People who have heart problems may not find the diet to be very healthy for them. In addition, the meals have detailed nutritional information written on them, so you can choose what’s right for your needs.

Another thing to note is meals are low in calories and protein. Depending on your needs, they may not be filling enough or provide the right level of calories and nutrients. People who live an active lifestyle need more protein and calories because they need additional snacks or meals to meet those calorie needs.

Daily Harvest isn’t the best choice for those with food allergies. Allergen information is readily available, but all meals are prepared in the same facility, and there’s a real risk of cross-contamination.

Pros and Cons of Daily Harvest meals

Pros
  • Offers several plant-based meals made with quality ingredients
  • The items are vegan, gluten-free, additive-free, and filler-free.
  • The items are frozen and require no preparation
  • Customers can select items and can add premade, plant-based meals
  • Healthy meals that are made with high-quality ingredients
  • The meals are ready in minutes, and they taste great
  • You can store them in the freezer and reheat them any time you want
  • Subscriptions plans are not necessary
  • The frozen food can be readily stored in the freezer and stays fresh for longer that way
  • The packaging is recyclable
  • The ingredients are organic and of high-quality
  • Provides free shipping
  • The subscription is easy to manage
  • It is easy to customize for your dietary preferences.
Cons
  • The dry ice packs are not convenient to throw away. You need to wait 24 hours for the dry ice to evaporate completely
  • A few items require overnight refrigeration
  • Some items need more ingredients like milk and grains
  • Expensive, considering there's additional food buying for the week
  • The ingredients aren't all organic
  • Not great for anyone with food allergies or those with diets like keto or paleo
  • A little bit expensive
  • Most people don't like the flatbreads or the unhealthy snacks
  • A few flavors are repetitive

Daily Harvest packaging and the environment?

The Daily Harvest meals arrive in easy-to-recycle paper containers with plastic lids. The plastic covers aren’t recyclable but are razor-thin and don’t cause much environmental damage.

According to reviewers, the box may arrive before evening and at times mid-morning and on opening was cold to the touch. Most items remained upright and weren’t jostled sideways or removed from their place. The box had an internal liner with cardboard dividers to separate the meals. The food containers can be recycled; the bowls are the Harvest, forager, and oat. You can let the dry ice sit out for more than 24 hours to let it evaporate.

Daily Harvest is environmentally conscious, and the agriculture system it sources from is designed to meet this goal. The company works with farmers to roll back some of the damage to the planet and ensure the land remains fertile for future generations. Daily Harvest wants to give back money to those who labor in it.

Daily Harvest also combats climate change by creating more organic farmland and improving accessibility to organic food at lower prices. They have 283 partners worldwide who source organic beans from regions like Nicaragua and Colombia.

Daily Harvest helps you add organic foods to your diet and improve your eating habits. They reduce food fast by freezing the ingredients directly when sourcing from farms. The meals don’t have fillers, refined sugar, stabilizers, or any kind of artificiality in them.

The dishes contrast with some meals offering great heat and spices and others offering mild heat. The bowls and other dishes added tropical flavors to the meals.

How to sign up for Daily Harvest?

Signing up to Daily Harvest is easy. You can complete the sign-up in three steps. Start by submitting your zip code and email to create your account. After that, you will see the plans and pricing. Select your plan and choose between three box sizes the small one with nine items, the medium plan with 14 items and the large plan with 24 items. Next, you need to fill the box. The menu plan is extensive, catering to multiple dietary preferences. Before adding items to the virtual cart, use the filter option on the upper left corner of the order page. The tool lets you customize meal delivery options based on your diet and preference.

You can also use the filter to choose ingredients you like more than others. Customer reviews are available for meals, so it becomes easy for you to decide. When you place the order, you can see that the small and medium plans have limited weekly options. The large box has both weekly and monthly delivery. You can choose any day for delivery, adding to the convenience.

Once you place the order, you can manage the account online or with the app.

Frozen foods can be reheated easily any time you want. There’s no cooking or cleaning involved.

How to change or cancel your Daily Harvest order?

You can cancel the order or subscription without incurring charges before each week’s cutoff time at 3 pm.

Daily Harvest customer service and reviews

Daily Harvest 3.9 stars out of 5 on Trustpilot. This is from 931 customer reviews. The reviews highlight the customer service, the incredible detail to dietary needs, the flavors of the food, and the benefits of adding fruits and vegetables to your diet. Some reviewers are not happy with thawing out the food.

According to one reviewer, she enjoyed 80% of the food from the plan and loves the rating system that helps you rate foods you love and downgrade ones you don’t. This makes it easy to choose the meals. There’s no junk food in the plans.

Conclusion

Daily Harvest is a reliable and consistent way to get healthy vegan meals. Daily Harvest meals are frozen and have to be put inside the freezer until the time you want them. You don’t need to stress about eating them right then or getting other prepared meal services.
The ingredients are high quality and flavor-packed, and you may enjoy the snacks and meals.

Daily Harvest offers different options; not everything on the menu qualifies for a meal. Some of the items qualify as lunch or snacks. You can customize your plan based on what you want, and the food arrives at your doorstep fully frozen.

Daily Harvest sources sustainable ingredients for its meals. It sources food from sustainable farms and farms that grow organic produce and don’t use pesticides. Considering everything, Daily Harvest is a great choice.

Read more: Sakara Life Review

FAQs:

Most of the ingredients that go into the meals are organic, including dirty dozen ingredients – strawberries, peppers, apples, nectarines, spinach, peaches, cherries, tomatoes, celery, potatoes, and bell peppers, which are said to have the highest pesticide residuals in them.

You can check out the ingredients list to find out the details of each item to see if they’re organically grown or not. Only one percent of American farmland is presently certified to be organic. They source from farmers transitioning to organic food to make it a less risky process and meet the demand. The growers they source from use organic processes but have a three-year waiting period to be certified the USA organic.

Most of the food is ready in minutes out of your freezer. There’s no compromise made on quality. You only need to reheat the food.

Daily Harvest makes it simple for anyone to have a diet rich in fruits and vegetables by offering 80 plus chef-crafted meals. The plans are based on the number of meals you want, say nine, 14, or 24, how often you want the delivery, and other factors. It’s easy to customize the delivery timing based on your needs.

By freezing the meals and ingredients, they can lock in the meal’s nutrients, flavor, and texture. They pick the produce at its peak ripeness and freeze it within hours of Harvest to let the fruits and vegetables have the best taste. Comparatively, most store-bought ingredients are ripened in transit. This doesn’t produce the best results. Half of all produce in America is tossed as waste because they don’t meet the cosmetic standards of grocery stores.

The cardboard boxes, the cups, and the insulation are all easy to recycle. Even the dry ice can be recycled. The lids are accepted at most locations. The liner holding the dry ice is made of paper and plant-based materials. The bowls are made of molded pulp and starch and can be easily recycled. Please visit their recycling page for more information.