The 7 Best Home Chef Recipes to Try Right Now

Even for those of us who love whipping up an elaborate homemade meal, the commitment to meal prep and kitchen clean-up every night is real when life gets busy or priorities are elsewhere. As convenient as it can be, the idea of getting takeout doesn’t always thrill your senses either. For those weeks when you’re hustling (or feeling lazy), one meal delivery service has strived to achieve a trinity of deliciousness, health, and efficiency: Home Chef.

With Home Chef making our Best Meal Delivery Services for Families list, it's no surprise that they offer users new recipes each week to suit a variety of dietary restrictions and preferences, creating a robust and personal dining experience—without the commitment of doing all the recipe searching and mental planning yourself. Between the different Home Chef menus each week and their magic “customize” button, they aim to please every palate.

When the fresh, pre-portioned ingredients arrive at your door for your Home chef recipes, you’ll be set up to easily glide into a finished meal through step-by-step recipe cards. We’ve tried some meals that are too good not to share, so that’s exactly what we’re going to do.

Standard Home Chef meals start at $8.99 per serving with a minimum weekly commitment of $49.95 (though subscribers are able to cancel or skip orders as needed).

Once you have your base meal, customizations and add-ons typically come with additional costs. Home Chef meals can also be found in-store at Kroger stores across the country; this includes local Kroger-owned stores like Ralphs, City Market, Mariano’s, and more. (Check out the Home Chef website for a list of all stores where meals are carried.)

1. Blackened Scallop Pasta
2. Asian-Style Turkey Lettuce Wraps
3. Tonkatsu Pork Chop
4. Creamy Tomato Parmesan Tortellini
5. Spicy Plantain and Black Bean Tacos
6. Sweet Chili Ginger Pork and Broccoli Stir-Fry
7. Picadillo Pork Stuffed Peppers

Weekly routines can be comfortable and easy, like boiling water for the same type of pasta you’ll eat for the third time this week. But if your taste buds are craving a little more, it can sometimes be just as easy to put together a creative new meal.

Go ahead and boil that same pot of water, but this time get your scallops seasoned to perfection and ready to go in this zesty, cajun seasoned bowl of delight. We love how this meal puts a twist on a typical pasta dish and isn’t much more work to throw together. It can really transform just another night into a more special occasion.

We’re here for anything that easily makes the move from dinner to leftovers. Not everything does so easily, but these turkey lettuce wraps are simple to store and quickly reheat for tomorrow’s lunch. This meal doesn’t sacrifice health for flavor and uses condiments and add-ons like sriracha, water chestnuts, and slaw mix to create a rich taste with a low-calorie payoff.

This flavorful and filling mixture can be wrapped up in pretty much anything that will hold its weight, though the recipe’s suggestion of butter lettuce is hard to beat. Tear off as many leaves of lettuce that you’ll need for the night and repeat until you’re looking at an empty plate!

Is it just us, or are there certain meals we just don’t attempt to cook at home? No matter how simple they may be to prepare, it never crosses our mind that we can actually cook them ourselves. In these situations, we need someone to hand us a piece of paper with an elementary breakdown of instructions and feed us words of encouragement.

Home Chef pretty much checks all those boxes with their Tonkatsu Pork Chop recipe (though we’re still waiting for that motivational speaker to show up at our door to talk us through it). This Japanese twist on an American-style pork chop creates a dynamic flavor profile that you thought could only be found at your favorite restaurant. This recipe will require a bit of preparation—about an hour total—but the taste is well worth the effort.

We could all use some more veggies in our lives, and stomachs. Vegetarian options are a must for many of us, and for non-vegetarians, having a few meatless meals throughout the week never hurts. (Plus, overcompensating with cheese isn’t the worst thing either.) This meal is a staple for us since it’s so quick to prepare; we get our veggie-vitamins in, and cleanup is three dishes at most—pot, pan, and plate. If you’re feeling adventurous, try consolidating into a one-pot pasta for an extra easy meal.

It can be fun to experiment with new ingredients that we otherwise would have steered past in the grocery store simply out of habit (and a little bit of intimidation). Sometimes cooking something for the first time can be nerve-wracking, but after you make it once you start questioning why it took so long to try it. That’s how we feel about these spicy plantain and black bean tacos. The crunch that the plantains deliver is truly unparalleled and an experience that taco-lovers should not overlook. And they’re just as easy to cook as anything else you’d saute. Easy, new, and exciting—we’re here for it.

Anything that can be easily customizable based on mood, available food in the fridge, dietary preferences, or any other variables is on our yes-list. Stir-fries are perfect for that. You can throw pretty much any combination of veggies and protein in a pan with this sweet chili sauce and be confident that it’ll satisfy the buds (both taste and friends). Ready to go in less than 15 min, this meal leaves time for other activities in your night.

Picadillo is a traditional dish in Latin America and the Philippines, and Home Chef put its own spin on it to craft a filling and sensational experience. With a high-grade spice rating, this meal isn’t for the faint of palates; but for the spice fanatics or bold eaters, it’s sure to impress.

This meal starts with baking a split poblano pepper and ends with a melted cheesy mixture that seamlessly blends spicy with savory. It’s hard to beat when you want to turn up the flavor.

The shelf-life of these meals will vary meal-to-meal, but in general, there shouldn’t be anything too different from what would be recommended for other grocery-store produce. Dairy, meats, and fresh produce should be stored in their original packaging until ready for use. “Staple” produce including potatoes, root vegetables, grains, etc., should be stored in a cool, dry place.

If you’re familiar with the basics of food health and safety already, Home Chef meals should be pretty intuitive. Each recipe card will also list a recommendation for the number of days the meal should be cooked after delivery to help steer you in the right direction.