Sunbasket Review 2024: All You Need to Know

Sunbasket, a convenient meal kit service, emphasizes on sourcing high-quality ingredients and consistent deliveries. With a diverse selection of meals crafted from organic, sustainably sourced whole foods, it emerges as an accessible solution for individuals leading busy lives while also prioritizing their health.

It’s worth noting, however, that Sunbasket’s commitment to premium ingredients does come at a relatively higher price point, which may not align with every budget. Furthermore, the service might also not be the ideal choice for those following a purely restrictive diet or those with specialized dietary requirements.

In this detailed review, we delve into a thorough exploration of Sunbasket to determine whether it’s the right choice for your personal culinary needs.

Justine Kelly, your favorite and James Beard Award-winning San Francisco chef who gained popularity because of her appearance on Top Chef, has conceptualized and developed the mouthwatering recipes of Sunbasket.

She found a huge gap in the meal delivery marketplace where there was no provider of approved organic ingredients with nutrition guidelines for all recipes.

She started Sunbasket to help people cook their own fresh meals from organically sourced ingredients.

Her delicious and easy meals are approved as per nutrition guidelines (500–800 calories in each serving), and the majority of the meals take around 30 minutes to prepare. You can refer to the comprehensive Sunbasket tutorials to get extra guidance on the meal ingredients.

Sunbasket’s business model follows 3 core principles – flavorful dishes, clean eating, and sustainability. They always procure ingredients from sustainable and organic inputs from more than 135 ranches, fishermen, and farms.

The produce they use is non-GMO and organic. Meats are free of hormones and antibiotics, and the seafood adheres to the sustainability standards of Monterey Bay Aquarium.

Sunbasket is very transparent with its food source; at the time of eating, you know what you are taking in and from where its ingredients are procured. Sunbasket is proud of its food ingredients’ origin and provides complete information on the suppliers, which includes some high-quality videos letting you know the people behind the recipes.

The interactive videos will allow you to learn A to Z about the delicious Hodo Soy’s tofu, prepared with the best-quality non-GMO soybeans and aromatic spices from Oaktown Spice Shop.

Sunbasket does have a weekly rotating menu grouped into varying categories such as dinners, breakfasts, lunch, groceries, pasta, pasta sauces, proteins, and snacks.

Furthermore, you also have the option to filter the menu using specific labels such as <20 minutes, <600 calories, paleo, gluten-free, dairy-free, soy-free, diabetes-friendly, and vegan.

You’ll find numerous meal choices within each category each week. The meal kits come in servings of 2 and are as many as 20 different meal kit recipes.

In addition, Sunbasket includes premade meals as part of their weekly offerings, though they are much fewer in recipe variety than meal kits.

Here’s what to expect in each of their meal categories:

• Meal Kits: 20 recipes
• Fresh & Ready Prepared Meals: 10 recipes
• Breakfast: 1 recipe
• Ready-to-Eat Proteins: 1 item
• Lunch: 5 recipes
• Groceries: 7 items
• Proteins: 33 items
• Snacks: 3 items

As for the varied customizations you get to make using the filters, you can select low-calorie, paleo, and vegan recipes out of the abovementioned categories easily. You can also easily avoid specific ingredients like gluten, soy, nut, and dairy from the menu.

All of their meal kits are available in 2 or 4 servings per meal kit. All of their freshly prepared meals are single serve. And for the rest, the selections are preportioned and packed to save time and make cooking easier.

In their meal kits, you have to follow the prescribed steps to cook all the premeasured ingredients together. And when you order single-serve meals, they require only a few minutes of heating in the microwave and are ready to eat.

It’s worth highlighting that even though Sunbasket offers meals with meat proteins, their menu palate consists of a wide variety of nutrient-dense vegetables like butternut squash, cabbage, mushroom, spinach, lettuce, kale, cauliflower, zucchini, carrots, cucumbers, etc.

The ideal serving consists of healthy grains such as carbs, vegetables, and proteins. Following this, Sunbasket offers a delicious combination of vegetables to be prepared in unique ways. Some examples include Olive-Leek Sauce with Sauteed Kale,German Potato and Cucumber Salad,Vegetable Stir-Fry with Cashew-Plum Sauce,Cabbage-Apple Salad, and so on.

It’s not enough to say that Sunbasket is a healthy, convenient meal kit delivery service. Its offerings include meal kits, prepared meals, and prepacked food items like pasta, sauces, proteins, and snacks.

So, when you talk about meal plans, Sunbasket with its many varieties of foods offers the following filters that you can use to narrow down your menu options:

• Less than 600 calories
• Paleo
• Gluten-free
• Dairy-free
• Soy-free
• Diabetes-friendly
• Vegan

Additionally, each item on their menu comes with varied dietary labels like no added sugar, carb-conscious, protein plus, keto-friendly, vegetarian, Mediterranean, no antibiotics, non-GMO certified, wild-caught, sustainably sourced, organic, and no hormones.

The last few dietary labels refer to their à la carte proteins such as meat, chicken, and seafood.

The freshness and quality of ingredients used by Sunbasket for both their meal kits and prepared meals are consistently superior. All their meals are packed with not only flavor but nutrition as well with complete transparency with regard to their nutrition facts, ingredients list, and allergy information.

Sunbasket’s specific diet plans like keto, paleo, low carb, and low calorie boast delicious globally inspired cuisines. So, you’re never bored of what they have to offer in their weekly rotating menu.

High-quality, lean proteins, organic vegetables, and whole grains are in abundance, all while maintaining a balanced calorie count ranging from 300 in a single dish to up to 800 in a select few.

The only noticeable quirk of Sunbasket’s recipes is that they offer their meal kits in 2 or 4 servings per recipe. But if you are in need of single servings, their prepared meals would suffice. For couples, families, or large groups, the 2- or 4-serving meal kits are more than sufficient to satisfy any and all kinds of cravings.

Read more: Sun basket meal for vegetarian

What’s the first, most prioritized way of losing weight? It’s definitely cutting back on calories and increasing your daily protein intake.

With that in mind, Sunbasket does give you the option to add more low-calorie meal kits and prepared meals to your diet. In addition, some of these low-calorie meals also have additional dietary benefits such as being carb-conscious, soy-free, dairy-free, gluten-free, and protein-plus.

For example, their Burmese Salmon Salad with Lemongrass and Bell Pepper has 540 calories, is keto-friendly, gluten-free, paleo-friendly, diabetes-friendly, low in carbs, dairy-free, and follows a Mediterranean diet.

Their Fresh & Ready meals are cooked and serve 1 per recipe. The meals have several health benefits other than being low in calories.

For example, the low-calorie Grilled Chicken with Cauliflower-Potato Mash has 490 calories per serving but is also gluten-free, soy-free, keto-friendly, low in carbs, and protein-plus.

Considering that Sunbasket allows you to pick recipes with fewer than 600 calories per serving, you’re not left in the dark about the other nutritional values of their meal kits and prepared meals. You get to see how exactly is a recipe keto-friendly, protein-plus, and more.

If adding low-calorie meals is a part of your weight loss diet and you need to consider other nutritional values as well as how much carbs, proteins, fiber, and healthy fats you consume, Sunbasket is diet-friendly too.

For example, their Farro Soup with Italian Sausages and Kale, which is a meal kit for 2, is equipped with the following nutritional information per serving:

• 530 calories
• 27 grams of total fat
• No trans fat
• 1080 milligrams of sodium
• 45 grams of total carbs
• 11 grams of fiber
• 27 grams of protein

On top of that, you can effectively double or triple your protein intake by including extra portions of proteins from their specialized proteins menu. There is an abundant variety of vegetarian and nonvegetarian protein options, starting from different varieties of seafood, chicken, meat, and plant-based proteins.

In addition to low-calorie and diet-friendly meal kits and premade meals, Sunbasket does accommodate a vegetarian and vegan diet lifestyle.

Many meal kits that are labeled “vegetarian” can be accessed via the menu. It’s a touch disappointing that Sunbasket features a diet filter for vegan meal kits but not vegetarian meals. So, you have to comb through the entire menu to find vegetarian meal kits and prepared meals.

Once you find one, for example, the Mushroom Risotto with Spinach and Parmesan, you can see what kinds of plant-based ingredients it contains. The nutrition per serving, cooking instructions, allergen information, and ingredients list are all accessible via recipe cards or on their website.

In many recipes, including vegetarian and vegan ones, there is the presence of some organic ingredients. Most of the whole fruits and vegetables that Sunbasket uses are organic, for example, organic yellow onion, organic mushrooms, organic baby spinach, and organic parsley for the Mushroom Risotto recipe.

There are also vegan substitutes for specific recipes like the Rainbow Quinoa-Black Bean Tacos, Tempeh Sloppy Joes, and Pumpkin Chili with Kidney Beans.

It’s essential to bring to attention that Sunbasket offers a very limited variety of vegan meals, which includes their meal kits and prepared meals.

On the other hand, in vegetarian recipes, Sunbasket offers plenty, which includes not only meal kits and premade meals but additional items like pasta, sauces, plant-based proteins, and desserts. So, it’s fit for someone who’s on a vegetarian diet and wishes to add more plant-friendly meals to their diet.

Sunbasket has an abundance of add-on choices like fresh pasta, pasta sauces, portions of proteins, and desserts. The add-ons fit a variety of lifestyles even with restrictive diets like paleo, keto, diabetes, etc.

You can add as many add-ons as you’d like. All are preportioned and can be prepared in less than 15 minutes.

All the add-ons are homemade, especially the sauces, dips, and variations of pasta.

The abundant selection of à la carte proteins includes different cuts of nonvegetarian options like ham, crab, salmon, shrimp, boneless chicken strips, ground chicken, turkey, steak, ground beef, ground lamb, steaks, pork, and plant-based proteins made of falafel, tofu, and veggie patty.

Side dishes that pair perfectly with their meal recipes include garlic bread, microwave pizza, and healthy wraps.

The cost of Sunbasket meals is likely the only drawback worthy of mention. As it is a specialized organic meal delivery service, it doesn’t match the affordability of many of its competitors. Other meal kit delivery services, being affordable, deliver significantly lower prices per serving due to the fact that they deliver nutritious meals without any dietary restrictions.

Another noticeable aspect of Sunbasket’s meal plans is that along with a weekly rotating menu, Sunbasket also modifies their cost per serving every week. This means that Sunbasket’s meals may cost less or more per serving depending on the dish you order. Not all meal kits and premade meals are priced the same.

Having said that, the meal kits on Sunbasket’s menu cost more than their premade meals. The more meal kits you add to your weekly cart, the lesser the cost per serving.

For example, for a larger order, expect to pay close to $11.49 per serving, but if you stick to ordering the minimum value, the prices may shoot up to $17 per serving for meal kits.

The shipping fee per box is $9.99, but first-time customers get free shipping on their first order. The shipping fee, after the first box, is applied to all orders, regardless of the number of meals you order.

You can order a minimum of 2 dinners for 2 people per week for Sunbasket’s meal kits. Additionally, add-ons cost extra but not as much as the meal kit or premade meals per serving.

The cost per serving varies depending on the dish you order. For a larger order, the cost per serving is close to $11.49. If you stick to ordering the minimum value, the prices shoot up to $17 per serving for meal kits.

So, if you order a minimum of 2 dinners for 2 people per week and the cost per serving is $17, the minimum weekly cost would be the following:

• 2 (dinners) x 2 (people) x $17 (cost per serving) = $68 per week + $9.99 shipping cost

On the other hand, Sunbasket mentions the starting price of their meal kits which is $11.49 per serving which is applicable only when ordering a higher number of meal kits per week.

According to those prices, your weekly expenditure can be the following:

• 5 (dinners) x 4 (people) x $11.49 (cost per serving) = $229.8 per week + $9.99 shipping cost

Assuming that you need to order for 4 weeks at a time, you can easily calculate the cost per month by multiplying the weekly cost by the number of weeks you want to order for in advance.

For a minimum order:

• $68 (weekly cost) x 4 (weeks in a month) = $272 per month

Depending on the specific meals you choose, the cost per month would be approximately $272 to $544, based on the number of weeks in a month you want meals for and the number of meal kits or dinners you add to your cart.

Please note that the cost per month varies depending on many factors like your dietary preferences and the number of meal kits, premade meals, and add-ons you choose.

Sunbasket’s delivery network is spread over 36 states.

They have a clean and minimalist meal packaging that is carefully engineered to retain the freshness even after it gets delivered to your doorstep.

Sunbasket is currently delivering to the majority of the zip codes, excluding HI and AK, parts of MT, ND, and NM.

All deliveries are scheduled from Monday to Thursday between 8 am to 9 pm, depending on the delivery location and zip code.

Read More: How to Cancel Sunbasket Subscription

Though Sunbasket uses plenty of plastic to pack their meal kits and premade meals with, most of the items they send are compostable and recyclable.

The meal kits, which come in individual plastic bags and containers, can be stored in the refrigerator in the exact same manner. Their premade meals, served in single-serving containers, arrive frozen in an airtight bag which you need to keep in the freezer for maximum freshness.

Meat items that are sold separately as à la carte proteins on Sunbasket’s menu are stored using ice packs for cold temperature control. For whole fruits and vegetables, based on the packaging’s instructions, you can either keep them out in the open away from direct sunlight or in the refrigerator, preferably in an airtight container.

Each meal kit containing all the premeasured ingredients is kept in individual brown paper bags, so you won’t end up confusing the ingredients while unpacking.

The packaging that is not eco-friendly, as far as Sunbasket is concerned, is the small plastic packets containing seasonings, spices, and condiments. Even the gel ice packs are covered in plastic packaging that may not be recyclable.

Sunbasket gives priority to organic and non-GMO ingredients in all their meal recipes. They source their ingredients from local farms and fisheries, ensuring superior-quality standards and consistency.

Another interesting caveat about Sunbasket’s ingredient sourcing is that the company’s executive chef had made it a point to mention that the local farms the ingredients are sourced from do not spray harsh industrial chemicals on their soil.

Additionally, for meat-based ingredients like chicken, turkey, seafood, beef, etc., their dietary standards remain consistent with hormone-free, antibiotic-free, certified non-GMO, and responsibly raised ingredients.

The recipes are equipped with information regarding the ingredients they contain and allergen details. Recipes that are gluten-free, soy-free, and dairy-free will not contain those specific ingredients, but it’s important to note that all their meal kit recipes, premade meals, and add-ons are prepared in the same kitchen facility.

This means that people with severe gluten, soy, or dairy allergy may run the risk of cross-contamination when they order a meal from Sunbasket.

For example, a recipe like the Lebanese Beef and Spinach Tacos is soy-free, but it contains ingredients like eggs, shellfish, tree nuts, peanuts, soybeans, wheat, and sesame.

You will, interestingly, find a few recipes here and there that exclude more than one food ingredient that people are often allergic too, such as the following:

• Seared Sea Scallops over Pancetta (gluten-free, dairy-free, soy-free)
• Pad Kee Mao-Style Pork and Rice Noodles (gluten-free, dairy-free)
• Turkey Bolognese Over Zucchini and Carrot Ribbons (gluten-free, dairy-free, soy-free)

First off, it’s important to highlight that Sunbasket offers a perfectly customized list of recipes that offer a preparation time of less than 20 minutes. This means that even when you’re pressed for time, you’ll always have something to quickly whip up and eat.

Most of Sunbasket’s “<20 Minutes” meals are Fresh & Ready meals that you simply have to heat up and eat in less than 5 minutes. A slightly longer preparation time for a Fresh & Ready meal would be required if you use a conventional oven.

For example, their Pecan Chicken with Roasted Butternut Squash and Green Beans can be heated in one of two ways – for 30–35 minutes in a conventional oven or for 4–5 minutes in a microwave oven.

For people who want control over what goes in their food, they can opt for the Speedy Meal Kits with a preparation time of 6–20 minutes, depending on the protein.

Moving on from their quick and easy meal kits, the typical preparation time for Sunbasket’s meal kits is 20–45 minutes depending on which ingredient they have.

All meal kits are minimally packed and require little to no special tools other than basic kitchen tools like a pan, cutting board, knife, and so on.

Recipe-specific preparations include some precooked and all premeasured ingredients to make assembling and cooking easier. Beginners will find the meal kits easy to navigate, as each recipe features just four or five major cooking steps, so it’s intuitive and straightforward.

Sunbasket currently offers two ways in which you can get a discount when subscribing to their meals:

• The first way is that Sunbasket offers free shipping on the first order you place after signing up. The shipping fee is subtracted during checkout, so you only pay for the meals you’ve ordered.
• The second way is that Sunbasket offers a 100% money-back guarantee in case you don’t like the quality, freshness, or taste of their meal recipes.

To get your money back, you have to send them a message via their Help page within 7 days of receiving the order. The refund will get immediately credited to your bank, or you can get a refund back to your Sunbasket account with which you can place another order immediately with meals that you prefer.

The first thing you see on Sunbasket’s website is their extensive menu which varies from preference to preference, including low calorie, paleo, soy-free, gluten-free, dairy-free, vegan, and so on.

You can view the menus for all these categories, plus on the left-hand corner of the menu are further categorizations such as Dinners, NEW!, Breakfast, Lunch, Groceries, Pasta & Sauce, Proteins, and Snacks. This helps you further narrow down your choices for specific meals and times of day.

Once you’re convinced that Sunbasket is the ideal fit for you, click the “Get Started” button to sign up and place your first order.

Following that, you’ll be given the choice of including either meal kits or prepared meals in your box. The price per serving is clearly mentioned with which you can make an informed decision based on your budget:

• Meal Kits start from $11.49 per serving.
• Fresh & Ready meals at $9.99 per serving.

Below your meal type preference, you have the choice to select one or more diets, such as paleo, gluten-free, vegetarian, pescatarian, Mediterranean, keto, and carb-conscious.

Under that, moving forward, you have to choose nutrition and taste preferences, such as high protein, high fiber, low calorie, no added sugar, low sodium, and more. You can also avoid recipes with specific ingredients such as dairy, sesame, fish, poultry, beef, pork, etc.

The last two customizations to carry out before you finish your setup and select meal recipes:

• How many people are at your table, 2 or 4 people?
• How many dinners per week, 2, 3, 4, or 5?

To proceed further, you have to enter your email address and zip code. Based on your location delivery, Sunbasket prepares a convenient delivery schedule if you choose to opt for a recurring subscription.

The needs of an individual vary greatly from the needs of a family. And that is why it’s important to consider the dietary preferences and meal variety offered by Sunbasket from a family point of view.

Even here, Sunbasket’s meals do not let you down. Families will be impressed by the sheer variety of meal kits and premade meals on their menu, with the added advantage of add-ons like breakfast, lunch, pasta, sauces, proteins, and desserts.

Another exciting feature of Sunbasket is that you can mix and match between several different dietary categories. So, even if one or two members of your family prefer a low-calorie meal while the rest of them do not, you can easily include a few low-calorie meal recipes without missing out on the rest.

The meal kit recipes, for example, are packed with premeasured ingredients for 2 or 4 servings. This saves you time in meal prep which can seem endless when you’re cooking for more than 2 people at a time.

In fact, complex recipes take as little as 30 minutes to whip up and, most importantly, only require one or two basic kitchen tools to cook. So, you can imagine how simplified and straightforward Sunbasket’s meals are.

Usually, for a health-conscious family, you can always run out of proteins and have plenty of other kinds of food leftovers. In that case, doubling or tripling your portion of proteins without actually paying for an additional meal is a life-saver with Sunbasket. You save more money and get discounted rates for portions of proteins.

Sunbasket offers the freshest and best ingredients to satiate your taste buds. Their experts pre-measure all the ingredients to create perfect, and hassle-free options which can save your effort from self-measurement.

Sunbasket follows the farm-to-fork principle in preparing all meals. Their experts source all vegetables and meats from local suppliers and farms. Sourcing from reputable and local farms ensures all meats are antibiotic and hormone-free and that the animals are grass-fed.

Other meal kit delivery services don’t quite disclose the source, quality of food, and ingredients they use unlike Sunbasket, who is completely honest and open on the source of the ingredients.

All partner farms are featured on the Sunbasket website to increase awareness amongst consumers. All their vegetables, fruits, herbs, and meat are organically sourced and GMO-free to make them healthy and high-quality.

You can even refer Sunbasket to your friends to make them experience the unique meal delivery service. With your reference, they get 3 free meals, and you receive $25 as referral fees. If you gift them a Sunbasket meal, you can either select 1, 2, or 4 weeks delivery for your friend. You can email a personalized gift note to them, and they get to choose their delivery days at their convenience. It’s an ideal incentive for your friends for munching healthy foods together.

Splendid Spoon

Subscribing to Splendid Spoon can positively impact your life in many ways. For starters, it’s a 100% certified gluten-free meal delivery service. So, if your primary reason for not liking Sunbasket even though you find their meal recipes delicious is the fact that the majority of them contain gluten, Splendid Spoon can be your next best option.

Splendid Spoon is also better than Sunbasket for people on a completely plant-based diet. Its offerings are ideal for people with food intolerance, IBS, high cholesterol, and other similar health problems.

On Splendid Spoon’s menu, you’ll find a wider variety of meal options, such as smoothies, soups, noodles, dishes, shots, and juices. On the left side, you are provided with varied filters for customizing your dietary needs, excluding ingredients, and sticking to health-focused diets like gut health, heart health, blood sugar regulation, immunity, and more.

Green Chef

There are many similarities between Sunbasket and Green Chef as they both offer organic ingredients. What differs, in favor of Green Chef, is that their meals are more diet-conscious offering an entirely vegan, keto, or gluten-free menu.

If eating a variety of healthy foods is your priority, you don’t have to compromise on flavor with a service like Green Chef. They offer a balanced diet, with many protein-rich, fiber-rich, and weight loss-friendly meals at an affordable price range, cheaper than some Sunbasket meals.

Home Chef

Finally, but equally important, is the meal offerings by Home Chef popular for its quality variability and family-friendly meal plans. Home Chef typically offers more budget-friendly options compared to Sunbasket. The former has various customizable meal plans to choose from, including options for 2 or 4 servings per meal, which can help you better control costs.

Home Chef differs from Sunbasket in meal variety in that it offers a more balanced and nutritious approach to healthy eating with some dietary preferences such as calorie-conscious, vegetarian, etc.

Lastly, compared with Sunbasket, Home Chef’s meal kits are not very complex to cook. Home Chef is known for its user-friendly approach to home cooking, featuring quick and easy-to-follow recipes with fewer cooking steps, making it the better user-friendly option for busy people, beginners, and experienced home cooks.

You can easily get in touch with Sunbasket as they offer the following features via their Help Center page:

• Self-Service: 24/7 automated chat support
• Text: +1 208-960-6505
• Call: (866) SUN-BSKT or (866-786-2758)

Not only that but in case you need to email them to request a refund and have some unique doubts cleared, you’ll find an email box as you scroll down the page. This saves you time and effort because you don’t need to open your inbox to email them separately. Simply enter your name, email, and phone number, and type in the message to send the email directly via their website.

But to tell you frankly, I don’t see why you would need to contact Sunbasket directly. Their FAQ page lists all commonly asked questions about their meal plans, ingredients, packaging, delivery, and more.

Sunbasket is a tough competitor for those seeking a convenient and diet-friendly meal kit and prepared meal delivery service. Nevertheless, it’s necessary to consider that it is a relatively expensive one in the market, as it serves and uses certified organic ingredients.

In our assessment, Sunbasket holds value if your budget is slightly flexible. The use of organic ingredients and the meal variety make Sunbasket a long-term investment for health-conscious individuals, couples, or families.

Sunbasket doesn’t neglect nutrition for flavor or flavor for nutrition. Both aspects of healthy eating are perfectly balanced.

Related posts:

• Blue Apron vs. Sun Basket vs. HelloFresh
• Honest In-Depth Review of Sun Basket, Blue Apron, and HelloFresh