Behind the Blue Apron: Like a Cooking Class in Your Home

[The Late Night Gourmet]

The final selection is Spicy Korean Style Chicken. When I opened the chicken, a gating issue with me using this service occurred to me. It's clear that the idea of Blue Apron is that you get a meal package on Friday, and you prepare and serve them Friday, Saturday, and Sunday. I didn't have time to make the last one until a week after I got it. It was vacuum sealed, and that was in turn placed in a zipper-sealed bag. But, the chicken was just at the beginning stage of smelling...off. If this were headed anywhere but my cast iron stomach, I would have thrown it out. I probably still should have, but I decided to proceed. The finished product tasted good, fortunately.

I'm happy to say that this one put me back on the track that the fish/squash/date meal threw me from: 1) I discovered an ingredient I'd never used before, aoki mushrooms. Their flavor is rich and wonderful, and I now know that I need to visit an Asian market to find more of them, 2) I learned a technique that I had, frankly, always avoided: cooking the chicken with the skin on to crisp it. I always remove the skin for health reasons, but I may reconsider in the future. 3) everything was very good. And, look how pretty this is:

Spicy Korean Style Chicken

Ease of Preparation: 8 (nothing someone with a little experience can't handle; this is consistently the case for all 3 of them)
Taste: 8 (really good throughout)
Wow Factor: 7 (nothing really made me think "wow", but everything was so good. And, then there are those aoki mushrooms)
Likelihood to Make Again: 8
Value: 6 (good overall value)

Modifications Needed: The dish didn't live up to the the "spicy" part of the title. Gochujang is provided with the notation to use as much as you like to "depending on how spicy you want the dish to be", but it just wasn't. The instructions were to just remove the chicken from the sauce and serve, but I saved the sauce for tomorrow. It's a minor point, but one that I will adjust.

Overall: 8

Composite Score: 7.5 (all dishes combined)

So, what does all this mean? It's so hard to justify the cost, especially since the experience with the second dish is something I'm likely to see again from time to time. It certainly is cheaper than going out to eat, but I also have to consider whether I can make the meals quickly enough with my schedule so they're still fresh. The cabbage also started to "age", but cabbage is easy enough to trim. Old chicken, on the other hand? Not so good.

 

[ElizabethB]

Is that a chicken breast? I don't cook breast that often - we both prefer dark meat. I do like to cook skin on chicken, especially if it is browned in a pan. I use a dry skillet and start browning skin side down. The fat quickly melts providing enough oil to finish the process. Flavor, flavor, flavor.