My Week with Blue Apron

A Muppet fansite I used to frequent often did "My Week" series. For example, they'd do "My Week with Fraggle Rock," where they'd watch an episode of Fraggle Rock every day for a week and then give a snarky review at the end.

I regret to inform you that because of the way Blue Apron works, I'm unable to cook a recipe from them every day for a whole week, so I don't have seven snarky reviews for you. I do, however, have two reviews to share!

The two recipes that I chose from Blue Apron for this week are Shanghai Kung Pao Chicken with Stir-Fried Peas, Sweet Peppers, & Bird's Eye Chile and Seared Steak with Roasted Potatoes & Caper Aioli.

First Impressions: I think it's a requirement that you feel a rush of excitement when you open a box from a subscription service. I certainly did when I opened my Blue Apron box. All of the food was cold and packaged nicely, and I was able to recycle a lot of the packaging.

The best part, though, was the recipes. They're presented so prettily on nice paper! Also, I was pleased to find a bonus recipe in the box. Do they put a bonus recipe in every week? Dunno, but it was a nice touch. This bonus recipe was for Wild Alaska Pollock Au Pouvre. Obviously, they didn't put ingredients in the box to make the bonus recipe, but I look forward to trying it sometime. 

I sorted the ingredients by recipe, put them in the fridge, and waited for Monday night to try my hand at cooking with Blue Apron.

My understanding of Blue Apron is that the business model is geared towards: 1) people who don't know how to cook but want to learn, 2) people who know how to cook but have more money than time, and 3) people who know how to cook but struggle to find new recipes.

I fall mostly under categories 2) and 3). I fall slightly under category 1) in that I don't know how to cook certain things and would like to learn. Three of the four recipes I chose featured entrees I'd never cooked before.

I started by trying the Shanghai Kung Pao Chicken with Stir-Fried Peas, Sweet Peppers, & Bird's Eye Chile! This was a special Air BnB-partnered recipe. I make rice dishes with veggies and chicken all the time, so it wasn't a big stretch for me. I chose it because it looked tasty and because I'm always looking for a good rice dish.

The ingredients!

First off, Blue Apron markets their meals as taking less than an hour to make. However, this recipe required the chopping of no less than five items, along with some other prep. I am a meticulous chopper; also my mind tends to wander while I chop, so I knew I would not be able to make the dinner that quickly. The chicken was pre-chopped though, which I liked.

The recipe mostly involved sauteing assorted veggies. The recommended heat settings proved to be much too vigorous for my stove/pan/altitude/something. The garlic burned slightly, as did, well, pretty much everything.

Once the veggies and chicken were sauteed and the rice was sitting on the stove, it was time to add the kung pao sauce. I was annoyed to discover that the mixture included mirin (alcohol). Cooking with alcohol doesn't necessarily violate my religious health code, but I prefer not to use it. I wish I'd had a heads-up!

After everything had cooked together, I performed the last step of fishing out the bird's eye chile (which actually burned my hands while I was chopping it because it was so spicy; it was clearly not edible unless you are a maniac). Then I dished up a bowl, noting with pleasure that there was enough food for three servings rather than the two Blue Apron advertises.

The Verdict: I liked the mix of veggies! I'd never cooked with snap peas before, and they were very good. The food was pretty spicy...almost too spicy...on account of the chile. My main complaint, however...well, I don't think I've ever had kung pao chicken, so maybe this was my fault, but I was not expecting it to taste so strongly of soy sauce. When I picked the recipe, I thought the sauce would be sweeter.

What I'd Do Differently: I'm planning to make this again sometime, but I've already found a honey-based sauce to use instead. Also, since I don't think my grocery store sells bird's eye chiles, I might have to leave it out or use a more mild chile for the flavoring instead.

Next up was the Seared Steak with Roasted Potatoes & Caper Aioli. I make steak for myself a couple times a year, but always in the oven, and it's never as good as I want it to be. I've also never made kale, roasted potatoes, or aioli. I was excited to try!

This recipe actually did take under an hour! The preparations were minimal. I had to chop the kale, the potatoes, and the capers.

AWKWARD MORMON GIRL: Who chops capers?!

I repeated this several times while I was, yes, chopping the capers. It was difficult, and I'm still not convinced it was entirely necessary.

I also had to chop and mash the garlic "into a paste". I usually just use pre-chopped garlic, but I didn't have it on hand this time. Also I wanted to see what this paste thing was all about. However, I was unable to make a paste. I just ended up with flat bits of garlic.

First I mixed the aioli (which had sherry vinegar...again with the alcohol). This aioli consisted of mayonnaise, the vinegar, some of the garlic not-paste, and the capers. I was curious how that was going to taste. I coated the potatoes in oil, salt, pepper, and a Blue Apron-provided seasoning blend that smelled like spicy nutmeg and Old Bay Seasoning. Then, while the potatoes were roasting, I seared the steak.

The first thing I thought when I unwrapped the steak was "Hey, that's a pretty nice piece of steak!"

You may be thinking, "Awkward Mormon Girl, that's not that nice of a steak! I eat steak like that at home all the time." Well...I don't. I always do the flatter steaks that are about as cheap as they can possibly be while still being steaks. I never cooked a New York strip steak so fat and juicy.

The last step was cooking the kale. I was skeptical of the kale. I'm not a big kale fan, and there was a lot of it. However, I was happy to give Blue Apron a chance to prove me wrong.

So. Much. Kale.

Once again, I was able to get three servings out of the meal (though I had to be miserly with the steak). Everything looked very beautiful plated.

The Verdict: The steak was amazing! So good! I've been converted to pan-seared steak for sure. The potatoes were a bit underdone (maybe should have been chopped smaller or cooked longer or both), and the secret spice blend Blue Apron provided to season them didn't impress me. The kale was way better than expected, but it was still kale. Blue Apron didn't specify what the aioli was for—the steak? the potatoes? the kale?—so I just put it on everything. It was delicious! I especially loved it on the steak.

What I'd Do Differently: Find a different potato spice blend. Maybe even skip the potatoes in favor of a different type of potato? Swap the kale for spinach, which I still don't love but which I think is more palatable than kale. Try a different vinegar in the aioli if I can find a viable substitute.

I sure had fun trying this out! I'm looking forward to one more week of Blue Apron.