A few months ago, my best friend sent a link to free meals from Gobble. We all know the drill—try the free meals, cancel the subscription. I’ve tried Hello, Fresh and at least one other unremarkable meal in a box service, and that’s how it went down because the food wasn’t that great. The service was pricey for what we got. I could make better meals in less time from scratch. I expected my experience with Gobble would go down the same way.

The First Order—We All Make Mistakes

The free meal deal situation is that Gobble will send you six free meals. Six meals is not the same as six dinners. Each dinner comes with a minimum of two meals. Somehow, I didn’t understand this and doubled my cart with the free offer plus an additional $78.93 worth of food (i.e., another six meals).

When I got billed, I contacted the company, and they kindly explained the mistake to me and offered to make changes, to cancel the order, etc. Gobble allows you to change an order or to skip a week eight days before your food ships. Because of communication, I missed the deadline, and was shipped all of the meals.

The Tandoori Salmon with those extra two salmon filets getting ready to go into the oven with the seasoned cauliflower.

When they arrived on their scheduled delivery date via FedEx, as I unpacked the box, I realized there was a mistake. They’d sent the wrong ingredients to pair with the cilantro pesto salmon. I contacted them, and they refunded me for the four meals because of the mistake (that was nice). I put the salmon in the freezer (four pieces in total) to save for another occasion. (I used two pieces last night with the Tandoori Salmon meal.)

Despite my total irritation at the mistakes—mine for spending $80 on something we were testing and theirs for not sending the right sides, the food and the ease of making it was enough to get me to order again. The first dish I made was the Quinoa Vegetable Chili, and it was amazing. The one-pot dinner that required nothing more labor intensive from me than putting seasoned garlic butter on bread and toasting it was rich and flavorful. Despite being ready in under half an hour, it had robust flavor and character.

The Ordering Process

I decided to order more. Gobble requires orders to be in by the Wednesday prior to a shipment (as noted). You can plan meals up to a month in advance.

You simply go to your account and view the week’s meals. They’ll automatically pick some options for you, but you can take them out of your cart and add new things. You can add as many meals for a dinner as you want. Bear in mind that they only allow you to add or to subtract in increments of two.

There is a minimum threshold for ordering ($62.95). This week, I have two dinners (four meals in total). One is the Szechuan-Style Pork Dandan Noodles with Baby Bok Choy; the other is the Thai Turkey Burger with Lemongrass Roasted Yams. If you’re not feeling it or want to skip a week, you can scroll to the bottom of the page and choose to “skip this week”. Just make sure you do it by Wednesday. It helps that they send a text on Tuesday reminding you, “dinner hero”, that you only have one more day to make changes to your order. (I am a hero, dammit, is what I think every time I get that text. And then my kid asks me to come wipe her.)

Unboxing the Gobble Meal

When your Gobble box arrives, it recommends you open and refrigerate the contents immediately. The bottom of the box is layered with ice packs to keep your food cold and fresh. I’ve never had a problem with freshness. Everything is swaddled inside of an insulated silver foil bag that is taped shut.

Open your box & the insulated bag.
Pull out the recipe cards. Do as I do and lay them out on the counter like some kind of food porn spread. My husband likes this.
Take the meal kits out of the box. The veggies, grains, sauces, and sides are all in one convenient labeled clear, sealed plastic bag. Refrigerate.
Take meat out of the bottom of the box. Depending on what I’m cooking when, I usually put meat right into the freezer.
The box can then be recycled, or you can give it to your kids, so they can put it on their heads and run into walls. Either or.

Proteins can be ordered separately to supplement a meal. This helps to make these deals customizable or to ensure someone with an extra-healthy appetite gets plenty to eat.

Gobble Likes & Gripes

So, hopefully I’ve explained how it works. I’m going to be honest about what I like and don’t like. Honestly, there’s not much I don’t like. They communicate, have good customer services, and the food is yummy. I do wish I could order an odd number of meals. What’s wrong with one, or three, or five? What’s the beef with odd numbers? Asking for myself. Anywho, here’s what I really like and why I’ve been a consistent customer for months now.

We are abstemious eaters, so two dinners is actually enough to feed all five of us—my husband, me, our 5YO, our (picky) 3YO, and our 1YO. The 1YO can out-eat both of her sisters. Use your judgement based on how much your family eats or if you want leftovers. My husband is going through chemo right now, and his dietary guidelines from MDA Anderson recommend not eating food that is over two-days old.
The food is fresh, grass fed, organic, etc. in many instances.
There’s a huge variety of flavors that I don’t usually cook with such as Indian, Thai, Korean, Middle Eastern, etc. but that I really enjoy. (There are also plenty of American dishes and flavors in case exotic isn’t your jam. I’m always delighted, though, when my daughters like something I’m unsure of. For example, my 5YO LOVED the Tandoori Chicken dish.)
There’s an option to order additional proteins on the dinner page, so I can order an extra pack of chicken for $2.99 per serving, salmon for $6.99 per serving, or USDA High Choice Filet Mignon for $8.99 per serving.
You can view the meal cards, ingredients, and number of calories ahead of ordering.
Meals are identified by dietary needs (i.e., dairy, contains eggs, gluten free, vegetarian, etc.)
The site offers breakfast items (I’ve yet to try this.)
They have a “lunch box” plan that sends you ingredients to pre-make your week’s lunches. I have yet to try this, but it works the same way.

The more you order, the lower your per-meal cost is. (We usually try two-to-four dinners a week.) I still like to cook on weekends, and when the Fresh Market meal deal is good (it’s fajitas this week), I get that one of the days. The reality is that mom life is hard enough. As a work-from-home mom who’s taking three classes and is teaching and who also wants to go for the occasional run and spend time with my kids while keeping the house from falling down but also keeping the laundry monster from getting too big, I need support. And Gobble works for me.

My Gobble dinner picks for next week makes me want to eat my screen.

But About That Giveaway

So, I was thinking that if Gobble works for me, it might work for you. I have 10 (TEN!) boxes of free meals to send out. No, this isn’t some influencer or affiliate thing. It’s just a way for me to share the free meals that I’ve been given AND to help out other tired, oversaturated moms who barely have time to wash their hair but who still wanna to take care of their families by making a nice meal (paired with a Mickey Mouse cup of wine) without feeling like they’re dying. Simple dreams, am I right?