If you aren’t close enough for the fresh meals, the frozen meals are a delicious, nutritious choice. The meal plan is fully customizable, allowing you to swap unwanted meals for more favored choices. And the fact that many of the meals are accompanied by side dishes that fully complete the meal makes the plan more economical than I first thought. If you were to purchase a week of the three-meal-a-day plan, you would need nothing from the grocery store other than any beverage choices you might make. It is definitely more cost effective and much more nutritious that visiting fast food restaurants for your dining options.

The meals ranged from Italian to homestyle American and Indian, and I don’t think you would ever have the opportunity to grow bored. It is nice to be able to go to the freezer and grab a meal for my husband to take for lunch and not worry that he has to supplement it with a hamburger (true story!) because he’s still hungry. The portions are large enough to fill even the most hungry appetite, and every meal was well seasoned and not at all bland. In fact, the portion size is a great reminder of how much food one actually should be eating at a meal – a portion size refresher course, if you will.

My one thought for improvement is the amount of starchy food offered for breakfast – many pancakes, french toast and muffin options, and I’m more of an egg, oatmeal, yogurt and fruit kind of girl. Those foods are offered, so the option to customize is key here. I give Diet to Go two thumbs up. It’s a delicious, convenient, non-stressful way to plan your meals and stay within your selected calorie range.

Try Diet to Go for yourself and Save $20 on your first order!

While Diet to Go provided Carmen with sample product, this review is her own opinion and was not influenced or sponsored in any way.

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Diet to Go Review: The Final Word

The meals arrived packed on dry ice and very cold, and I popped them right into my freezer. The portions seemed to be quite large and I looked forward to being able to sample them. Much of the food was vacuum packed and all of it appeared to be very fresh and appetizing.

The first meal I sampled was turkey Salisbury steak with gravy, mashed potatoes, and whole green beans. I microwaved it and within five minutes I was sitting down to a hot, fresh, perfectly seasoned meal that completely satisfied me. It was filling, and in fact, I didn’t even finish the potatoes. My usual meal choices might involve a Lean Cuisine or other frozen meal, and I’m often left still hungry and scouring the kitchen an hour later. The Diet to Go meal removed that action from my life.

Diet to Go meals: Beef short rib with green bean blend

Other meals of mention include the Tuscan potato boats, which were offered with a low-fat drinkable yogurt, and the blackened turkey loin with carrot chipotle puree. The curried shrimp with basmati rice was especially memorable, with large shrimp in a more than adequate quantity. I’m not a fan of chicken Brunswick stew, but even with a meal I didn’t especially care for, I was impressed with the quantity of high quality meat and the size of the ingredients. No minced meat, no veggie shreds. While some meals contained whole vegetable chunks and large pieces of easily recognizable meat, the veggie portions on others were sparse.

One caveat: all of the meals contain directions to microwave, but a few of the meals would have been much tastier had they baked in an oven. The veal cutlet in particular, and the veggie pizza had excellent flavor but the texture of the meal suffered in the microwave. I learned my lesson and the next meal I prepared, the stuffed shells, surpassed my expectations. I’d really recommend taking the time to defrost the meals in the refrigerator, as the site recommends, and then taking the time to bake them. You’ll be glad that you did.

I neglected to mention in my prior review one of the small details that impressed me with Diet to Go meal delivery service. Each meal container was marked with a motivational thought – and more than a few of those motivational thoughts have stayed with me. A little philosophy makes a meal that much more enjoyable.

All in all, this week of frozen prepared meals was just as enjoyable as the fresh prepared, and I’d highly recommend the purchase of them. It’s nice to know that your meal is both tasty and healthy, and convenient to boot.

Try Diet to Go for yourself and Save $20 on your first order!

While Diet to Go provided Carmen with sample product, this review is her own opinion and was not influenced or sponsored in any way.

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Diet to Go Review: Frozen Meal Delivery Service

My Diet to Go meals were delivered packed in a bag, as the meals are delivered fresh. Everything was packed tightly together and all of it was very cold. Unpacking the bag I noticed that the meals were much bigger than I’d anticipated, and everything looked absolutely fresh and delicious. I couldn’t wait to get started!

I was sent a variety of different meal choices, mostly lunches and dinners, but I was also sent two breakfast choices. Every meal that I ate exceed my expectations. I’ve gotten into the habit of purchasing a Lean Cuisine or a similar frozen meal for lunch, and these prepared meals blew those away. Typical frozen meals are often not enough to satisfy my appetite, and I often add a piece of fruit, a side of vegetables or a salad to keep me full longer than an hour. That was absolutely not necessary with the Diet to Go meals.

For example, let’s talk turkey. Specifically the turkey dinner, which contained two very thick slices of white meat turkey, a small amount of mashed potatoes, gravy over both, and not quite 1/2 cup of green beans. It was perfectly seasoned and so full of flavor that I had to double check that it was a “diet” food.

Other meals eaten this week included Tuscan potato boats with a yogurt smoothie, turkey Swiss sandwich with terra chips, curried shrimp with basmati rice, whole grain French toast with mango cranberry syrup, whole grain pancakes and sausage links, egg and broccoli pie with apple juice, Michigan turkey salad with a dakota roll (what seemed to me to be a whole grain, palm sized nugget of goodness).

I have to call special attention to the Turkey Salad. So often, prepared turkey or chicken salad is merely pulverized meat, but this was comprised of chunks of meat, mixed with fruits and diced celery. It was outstanding and extremely tasty. In fact, I found myself scoping out the other meals, to see if this was repeated. Alas, it was not.

I found the entire week of food to be outstanding in quality, taste and convenience. Many times, meals were accompanied by a piece of fresh fruit, a prepared yogurt smoothie, a roll, coleslaw, applesauce, or terra veggie chips. This truly led me to believe that if I were purchasing a week of food to be delivered to my house there would really be no need to visit the grocery – literally everything is contained in one inclusive package.

With five weeks of meals offered, there is no thought that you’d get bored. In addition, if there is a meal that you don’t care for, you can substitute from an extensive list, in order to truly customize the meal plan to fit your life. If you don’t think that you’d eat an entire week worth of food, you can customize the plan by only purchasing a smaller Midweek plan with fewer meals. The average customer, according to Diet to Go, spends $85 a week. Meal plans range in price from $32/week for the dinner-only three-day plan to $124.99 for the 1200 calorie seven-day plan.

I think the meals offered by Diet to Go are a delicious, nutritious and convenient option, and one I think would fit into a healthy living plan.

Check back with me next week as I review the mail order option of meals. If they are anything like the fresh option, I think I’ll be pretty happy – and full!

Try Diet to Go for yourself and Save $20 on your first order!

While Diet to Go provided Carmen with sample product, this review is her own opinion and was not influenced or sponsored in any way.

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Diet to Go Review: Meal Delivery Service Makes Healthy Eating Easy

Healthy Pantry's Meal Kit

It’s Tuesday evening,  your family’s stomachs are growling and you haven’t a clue what to do for dinner. Sure, you could order a pizza with pepperoni AND extra veggies to bump up the nutrition factor or in the same amount of time, you could simmer up a pot of Indian dal or grill a round of wild Coho salmon patties.

If the nutrition and yum factor on the latter option sounds a bit more appealing to you then check out The Healthy Pantry, a company that creates “meal kits” that take just a few minutes to prepare and include delicious, natural, organic and whole food ingredients so that the whole family (or just you) can feel good about eating and you can still have time for that after-dinner walk to the park.

Created by a working dad who had a wake-up call when he saw his health profile calculated in a few alarming numbers (think almost 200 pounds and a 260 total cholesterol) and a professional chef/nutrition consultant, The Healthy Pantry features pre-packaged meal kits with all of the shopping, measuring, and chopping done for you. All you have to do is supplement with your own store-bought items, like lean ground turkey meat and eggs for their signature Asian Turkey Burgers, and turn the dial on the stove or oven for a complete and nutritious meal for the whole family.

The Healthy Pantry was generous enough to provide DietsInReview with their popular Favorites Pack for us to sample. As a working mother who often succumbs to whipping up quick omelets for dinner, I was eager to test out many of the seven meals that came in Healthy Pantry’s meal kit. The Favorites Pak includes separate meal kits for pineapple meatloaf, Indian dal, vegetable quinoa, wild salmon patties, turkey meatloaf, whole grain apple cinnamon pancakes/waffles, whole-grain banana bread and oatmeal raisin cookies.

While the quinoa had a bit of dehydrated vegetable taste the wild coho salmon patties were a dinnertime hit! With just the right amount of seasoning and spices and chunky wild Coho salmon that the Healthy Pantry provided, these heart-healthy and very generously-portioned burgers were fabulous! They are perfect for eating over salad greens, like I did, or sandwiching between a bun.

Healthy Pantry's Wild Salmon Patties

As for some of the other meals, my daughter happily gobbled her Saturday morning apple cinnamon pancakes with gusto and maple syrup and the oatmeal raisin cookies were bursting with a perfect combination of sweet, spicy and chewy goodness. Do use caution when baking the cookies: They disappeared from my kitchen within 24 hours!

One of my two critiques of the Healthy Pantry is that the nutrition guidelines were tough to understand. Each dish comes with its own label which clearly elucidates the cooking instructions, prep time, ingredients you’ll need to supply and a complete nutrition label, but there was no real way of determining what a serving size should be. The label was also unclear as to whether or not the calories, fat, sodium and protein grams were for the prepared dish or just the dry ingredients. But perhaps since this is a young company, this nutrition kink will get worked out as The Healthy Pantry grows and expands.

The other critique is that the sodium for a few of the dishes, like the vegetable quinoa, was pretty high. While it’s not uncommon for pre-packaged foods like starch mixes to be high in salt, if you are someone who needs to monitor salt intake, you may want to stay away from these select items or add more grains (and water) to dilute the sodium content.

Overall, I give The Healthy Pantry an enthusiastic thumbs up for those evenings where you just don’t have the culinary creativity (or time) to concoct a healthy and satisfying meal for you and your family. To read more about this program, here is the complete review of The Healthy Pantry.

While Healthy Pantry provided Heather with samples, her review is of her own opinion and in no way influenced by the company.

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The Healthy Pantry Makes Family Eating Easy and Healthy

While NutriSystem has previously provided diabetic-friendly meals under its other programs, like the “for women” or “for men,” this newest program won’t require any menu modifications. Diabetics can simply order from the NutriSystem D menu and trust that the meals will meet their unique dietary requirements.
Those using NutriSystem D aren’t likely to be bored with their menu choices, as there are more than 150 “restaurant-quality” meals, all of which are low on the Glycemic Index and offer “good carbs and fiber” to keep dieters feeling full longer. Meal choices might include Decadent Fudge Brownie, Cheesy Margherita Pizza or Golden Pancakes.

The program underwent clinical studies in late 2008, and found that those dieters lost 16 times more weight than without NutriSystem D. They also found that blood sugar levels reduced five times, and A1c levels lowered by 0.9.

NutriSystem D became available in April 2009.

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NutriSystem D Coming Soon for Diabetics

Jillian Michaels Meal Plan will launch in June 2008. The program is being powered by the eDiets Deliciously Yours, another quality, popular diet delivery service.

While a lot of specifics aren’t being shared too soon, we do know that Jillian worked closely with the eDiets chefs to create more than 50 meals so that you can enjoy healthy and delicious breakfasts, lunches, dinners and even snacks, seven days a week.

“I couldn’t be more excited and proud of the program that eDiets and I have created,” says Michaels. “They share my passion to provide people with powerful and cost effective solutions for living a happier, healthier life.”

Jillian Michaels Meal Plan will be free of trans-fat and preservatives, be delivered chilled and fresh, and will run about $140 per week. Learn more about it with our Jillian Michaels Meal Plan review, and trust that DietsInReview.com will share more details as we have them.

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Announcing: Jillian Michaels Meal Plan