I tested Frive meal prep service – here are my honest thoughts

JUMP TO: How we tested Frive | How does Frive work? | How much does Frive cost? | What types of meals does Frive deliver? | Is Frive healthy? | What delivery options are there for Frive? | Does the refrigerated food stay cold? | Is the packaging sustainable? | What are the recipes like? | Who is Frive most suited to? | Are there any negatives to Frive? | Is Frive worth it?

Life feels very busy at the moment, doesn't it? Many of us are feeling the time squeeze at work and trying to balance summer plans alongside already bustling calendars. Often, the first thing that slips in these moments is our wellbeing - particularly our nutrition.

As a health and wellbeing editor and foodie, I'm very into food that tastes good and makes you feel good. But when I'm time crunched, I find myself turning to any food I can eat quickly. I'll cobble together a lunch of pitta and humous with a protein shake on the side, eaten between taps on my keyboard, rather than taking the time for an actual meal. And while there's nothing wrong with a bread and dip concoction, I know that my body needs (and deserves) more.

So, when I was given the chance to try Frive on one of my busiest months of the year, I signed up straight away.

Frive is a meal delivery service that used to be known as Lion's Prep. Unlike other meal delivery options like HelloFresh, Frive doesn't just give you ingredients - it creates, cooks, stores and delivers the meals ready to eat. And the USP of the brand is that all meals are well-balance and healthy, so you know that even in a rush you'll be getting goodness in.

But how good are Frive's meals, really? Can Frive ever replace your own home cooked, balanced meals in taste and nutrition? And is the meal prep delivery service worth the cost?

Frive at a glance:

• Price: Around £50 for six meals.
• Pros: Well-balanced, tasty meals ready to eat in your fridge.
• Cons: Not necessarily cheaper than a takeaway or less nutritious ready meal.

I tested 12 meals from Frive, including breakfasts, lunches, dinners and snacks. With my fridge fully stocked, I used them just as anyone who subscribed to the meal service would - warming up the meals and digging in at designated meal times. When reviewing Frive, I considered everything including:

• Cost: how much is this per serving, and is it worth it?
• Effort: how much easier/more affordable would it have been to make this myself, and is it worth it?
• Flavour: arguably the most important thing to consider with food is - does it taste nice? Would you eat it again?
• Ease: how easy was the delivery, storage, reheating and recycling?
• Sustainability: is it a sustainable option for my diet in the longterm, both in terms of nutrition and the planet?

Frive is a fully prepped meal delivery service, meaning all your meals come cooked. All you need to do is pop them in the microwave (or, as I discovered worked best for some ingredients like potatoes, the air fryer).

Frive is great for all dietary requirements and the food selection process is very thorough. To start, all meals are free from gluten and dairy. Then, you select whether you want meat, fish or a fully vegan menu. You can also select any individual ingredients you are allergic to or wanting to avoid. Then you’ll be given the suitable meals for the week, from which you can select either a ‘balanced’ version - around 450-600 calories per meal with a balance of macronutrients - or a ‘low carb’ alternative.

The menu changes every week, giving fresh and tasty new options every week. That's great for people who order regularly and don't like eating the same thing over and over again. As well as main meals, of which you can order up to four a day, you can also order breakfast dishes and snacks.

For a full menu of four main meals and snacks, Frive would cost around £71. That would serve two people, but you’d need to add your own breakfasts. You can also choose to simply buy a few meals for the days that you know you’ll be too busy to cook, or you could purchase one meal a day to have a prepped lunch or dinner while home cooking the other meals.

Each meal works out at around £7-10.

The meals really vary, with Frive taking inspiration from all over the globe. For instance, I tried meals such as:

• Beef Massaman curry,
• Chicken Katsu curry,
• Beef burger with roast potatoes and coleslaw,
• Rosemary chicken with crushed potatoes and broccoli,
• Shoyu chicken thighs with rice and pineapple chutney,
• Mediterranean Turkey stuffed peppers.

Breakfasts included:

• Banoffee overnight oats,
• Strawberry and lime posset with coconut yoghurt,
• Cherry chia pudding,
• Turkey bacon, beans, eggs and mushrooms.

Frive’s goal is to certainly focus on delivering healthy food that allows the customers to eat well without wasting time. The meals contain no artificial ingredients, preservatives or flavour enhancers and I was pleasantly surprised by the ingredient list when looking at it.

Whether the food is ‘healthy’ depends on what health means to you and what you’re looking for from your food. I like that you have control over how many boxes you get a day, making the service less prescriptive for those who want to have flexibility in their diet (a key element of health). The meals all contain a decent amount of veg and protein which are two important considerations for living a healthy life.

For people who have specific health goals, Frive meals can ensure you're hitting your macronutrient and micronutrient requirements without stress.

Frive can be delivered twice a week (Wednesdays and Sundays) and the food lasts for around three days in the fridge. If you live within the M25, Frive will be delivered by Hive couriers and if you live outside of the M25, your parcel will be delivered by DPD couriers. Both of these are trackable deliveries so you should get a rough estimation as to when your box is arriving.

Keeping fresh food, especially that without preservatives, cold is vital. Frive is delivered with ice packs which, when delivered to my door, were still frozen and keeping the food chilled.

Your Frive meals are delivered in a cardboard box with paper from added padding which is all fully recyclable.

The food itself comes in paper bowls with a plastic seal. The plastic isn’t sustainable or recyclable, but the bowls can be recycled with soft plastics. The ice packs can be also reused - I’ve stuffed mine into the freezer ready for a summer picnic - or emptied and recycled.

I have to confess - I love cooking and can sometimes feel funny about pre-prepared food, especially if it’s sat in my fridge for more than a day or so. So I was pleasantly surprised with the Frive meals, which all stayed perfectly fresh and tasted just-cooked when reheating.

As mentioned, I used my air fryer rather than the microwave to reheat some ingredients like potatoes and any meat that wasn’t covered in sauce to keep things crispy (I simply removed them from the Frive packaging and placed them in an air fryer at around 180°C, keeping a close eye on it until it was piping hot). But even the foods that were microwaved were delicious and, crucially, not soggy.

I liked that there was a load of variation in the meals and that all elements of the dish had been considered - for example, most came with a perfect portion of sauce. It's all well seasoned and the flavours are brilliant: I'm someone who always adds more salt and pepper, hot sauce or squeeze of lemon to most meals but didn't feel the need to add any extra zing to my Frive meals.

Frive can be for anyone who wants to eat well without cooking. I shared one of the meals with my CrossFit-ing boyfriend with a big appetite and the portion sizes weren’t enough for him (we cooked some extra rice to serve his with), but for me, a small but very active woman, they worked well.

Frive is also a great option for anyone who simply wants to look after their health but feels too busy to consider their nutrition.

Personally, I love cooking, so I wouldn’t want to eat Frive for every meal, all of the time. I can imagine some of the recipes may get a bit same-y too - a lot of the food is meat and rice, albeit with different sauces and veggies - so it’s worth keeping in mind if you are someone who loved variety. But these things are only minor complaints, and I enjoyed eating all of the meals.

The only other negative is that my first box was delivered to my block of flats and seemed to go missing. This might be due to chancing neighbours whisking the box away or a lost delivery driver, but it's something to keep in mind if you live in a flat.

Whether Frive is worth it or not depends on your income, how hard you find cooking fresh food and what healthy means to you. The meals are pretty expensive per portion, but that price also factors in a chef preparing them and the delivery, so the cost does make sense.

If you’re someone with spare income who lives a busy life and wants to eat well without effort, it makes total sense to order Frive as a long term solution. Alternatively, if you’re someone who doesn’t have a load of spare cash but wants a few meals ready to support your health to eat throughout the week, a smaller Frive order would work.

After more content like this? Read our honest HelloFresh review and our honest Gousto review.