The best sustainable food delivery services

I've always felt a little guilty about my addiction to sustainable food delivery services. I mean, can online food delivery truly be sustainable with all that shipping and packaging? Turns out, the answer is yes when the service truly reduces food waste according to Why Meal Kits Aren't as Bad for the Environment as You Think by Time Magazine. Here are a few of my favorites food delivery services and meal kits.

Imperfect Foods ugly food delivery service

Imperfect Foods* has been my go-to delivery service for years. They deliver "ugly produce" that grocery stores don't want because the fruit, veggies, eggs, and other foods are oddly shaped or otherwise imperfect. Those oddly shaped apples and carrots are often wasted because stores and consumers don't want those weird-looking goodies either.

We're used to seeing food that looks the same, but that's not how nature works. This desire for perfectly shaped produce causes a lot of food waste. Food waste is responsible for up to 8% of global emissions, according to Drawdown.org. That's a major environmental issue!

A third of the food raised or prepared does not make it from farm or factory to fork. Producing uneaten food squanders a whole host of resources—seeds, water, energy, land, fertilizer, hours of labor, financial capital—and generates greenhouse gases at every stage—including methane when organic matter lands in the global rubbish bin."

- Reduced Food Waste, Drawdown.org

Imperfect Produce delivers farm-fresh groceries for about 30% less than you pay at a retail grocery store. That's an awesome discount when you consider how expensive fruits and veggies can be at the grocery store. But if you've been following the blog for a while, you know that as much as I love a good deal and my mission is supporting sustainability-minded companies, my number one priority is keeping my family healthy.

Imperfect Produce makes it easy for me to always have fresh fruits and veggies to cook for dinner or just to eat as a snack. Honestly, some days I'm so busy (especially now that the kids are home all the time due to the quarantine) that I literally just have time to grab a carrot, and then it's back to homeschooling!

Learn more about the Imperfect Foods* online delivery service.

Misfits Market ugly food delivery

Misfits Market* is also an ugly food delivery service. They deliver organic produce and sustainably sourced pantry staples while also preventing food waste and saving you up to 40% off grocery store prices. I haven't used their service because it's not available in my area (San Jose) just yet. However, I'm including them here because it does seem like a good alternative if Imperfect Foods is not available where you live.

Good Eggs

Good Eggs* is a San Francisco based, local food delivery service that I've come to love over the course of the pandemic. I always want to support local farmers, and Good Eggs offers an easy and convenient way to do that. They deliver meal kits, local wines, fresh produce and meat, and pretty much anything you could want from a regular trip to the grocery store. There's no subscription fee or monthly delivery obligation. You simply buy what you want when you want it, and if you order before the cut off time, they often deliver the same day you order it. If you're tired of standing in long lines outside the grocery store, you could consider a delivery service like Good Eggs. The only problem with Good Eggs is that they only serve the San Francisco Bay Area so far.

Daily Harvest smoothie and soup delivery

I didn't want to love the Daily Harvest* online delivery service! My friend recommended it and I waited for weeks to try it. But after I found myself scrambling for breakfast at 10 am one morning I realized it was time to give it a try. I'm so glad I did. This is my latest obsession and I'm afraid this addiction will last for a long, long time.

Here's the thing. The Daily Harvest is a sustainably-minded food delivery service that sells pre-packaged smoothies, soups, harvest bowls, and other fruit and veggie-based foods. I hesitated to subscribe because, seriously, I can make my own smoothies! I mean, it's just a combination of frozen fruits, veggies, and seeds. Yet for some reason, when I'm in a rush I simply can't pull it all together and I end up binge eating bread and butter. So I gave it a try, and it's made a huge difference for my blood sugar levels and overall health and happiness every morning.

If you're trying to incorporate more fruits and veggies into your diet (or trying to eat fewer eggs and bacon for breakfast) Daily Harvest makes it easier. Did I mention that much of the produce is organic and frozen at the source? Yes, it is.

Crowd Cow sustainable meat delivery service

Finally, a sustainable meat delivery service has arrived. Crowd Cow* sells meat from a variety of farms using sustainable and regenerative farming* practices. The company also offsets 100% of its carbon footprint* through a partnership with the Arbor Day Foundation according to its website. It arrives in 100% recyclable and compostable packaging. In fact, the packaging material literally melts in water. My 8-year-old daughter and her friend had a grand time watching the packaging dissolve in a bucket of water.

Your Crowd Cow order arrives frozen in perfectly proportioned sizes ready to be thawed and ready for dinner in a few hours. You can pick from a large selection of meat on the website, and get it delivered whenever you want it.

Having meat in my freezer means I always have something to make for dinner. Although I'm a proponent of eating less meat and more vegetables, I still serve meat with dinner at least a few nights per week. Crowd Cow is exactly what I've been looking for since I started learning about regenerative agriculture a few years ago. If your aim is to live as sustainably as possible, but you're just not ready to give up meat, Crowd Cow is the best option I've found.