Marley Spoon: Broccoli Pesto Cavatappi & Roasted Chicken and Beets Plus $30 Coupon Code

Today we have another episode of Mondays with Marley, where I put on my food blogger hat for you all. Marley Spoon, is a weekly food subscription service and if you’d like to give it a try for yourself, use the coupon code COOKSMART for $30 off.

My meal plan is for a weekly delivery of 2 meals (2 portions each), which costs $48.

Broccoli Pesto Cavatappi with Pumpkin Seeds & Cannellini Beans

I chose this because I’m not crazy about traditional pesto (the basil is a bit much for me) and thought a version with Broccoli and pumpkin seeds sounded great.

Our usual fresh ingredients:

This recipe called for a blender. You roast the broccoli and toast the pumpkin seeds.

You cook the pasta and throw in the drained beans at the end. You make a pesto with garlic, herbs, pumpkin seeds, half the broccoli, olive oil, pasta water and salt.

You mix it all up…

And then you have this:

Taste: Bad News, friends, Bad News
I wanted to this to be good, but it was not. It was so heavy and I couldn’t make a dent in a bowl of it. A few forkfuls was more than enough. My boyfriend didn’t care for it either and most of it ended up in the trash. I feel like if we omitted the beans entirely and thinned out the pesto more it could be better, but as it, it’s just no Bueno.
Portion Size: Generous
Good for Entertaining?: Nope. Not with friends, not with thieves, not with Walking Dead zombies. No one. Never. NOPE.

Roasted Chicken and Beets with Horseradish Yogurt & Croutons

I chose this because I really liked the flavors of the recipe.

More fresh ingredients:

This recipe calls for us to use the beet greens and roast the beets.

We salt and pepper the chicken and brown it in a skillet.

Afterwards, we add it to our sheet pan of beets to cook.

Then we make croutons that we also add to the at same sheet pan.

We mix up some the horseradish sauce and cook the greens in a skillet for a couple minutes and now we have all our pieces.

This recipe called for me to create a platter by layering the items. First the yogurt sauce, then the greens, then beets, chicken and croutons.

Portion Size: Generous
The flavors on this were great and I though the recipe itself was really straightforward. I loved the yogurt horseradish sauce and I think it would be amazing with beef or lamb. It’s just Greek yogurt with horseradish mixed in – so super easy and healthy too. The chicken was really flavorful and I think that’s a testament to the quality of meat Marley Spoon supplies.
Good for Entertaining?: Yes!
Rather than layering this as instructed, I’d serve it on a large rectangle platter in rows (so a line of roasted chicken, then beets, then greens, and lastly sauce.). I’d also serve a family style pasta dish alongside, most likely the Whole Wheat Pasta with Cauliflower, Walnuts and Ricotta Salata from Alice Waters’ cookbook Chez Panisse Vegetables. It’s tasty, easy and has flavors that would complement the chicken dish. For a starter I’d keep it simple with an anti-pasta platter with cheese, meat and marinated veggies plus some crusty bread. For a drink, I’d probably buck tradition and go with a red wine to match all the earthy flavors. Dessert would be a rustic tart – maybe plum, apple or pear.

OVERALL
Verdict: Like
Even though I hated the Broccoli Pesto recipe, I appreciated the creativity of the dish. I think with some tweaking the recipe could work. I also liked that this batch of recipes was a lot easier than some of the previous ones I received. The chicken was super tasty and I discovered an easy flavorful sauce that I can use with other dishes.

Have you ever tried a fresh meal subscription service? If so, what did you think?

THE BACKSTORY

Marley Spoon creates delicious, easy to follow recipes.
They deliver fresh, pre-portioned ingredients and you select your recipes from their changing weekly menu.

They are dedicated to sourcing organic and sustainable whenever possible. Building relationships with environmentally aware farms and producers ensures that the highest quality ingredients arrive at your door each week.

Using trusted delivery partners, your Marley Spoon boxes come insulated and chilled, staying cool for 30 hours! After delivery, all the ingredients are guaranteed to stay fresh for up to 4 days – allowing you to decide when to cook.

Marley’s Spoon donates any leftover ingredients to City Harvest. City Harvest exists to end hunger in communities throughout New York City through food rescue and distribution, education, and other practical, innovative solutions.

Each week you’ll automatically receive great dishes, but as a flexible subscription, you can skip a week or pause your subscription anytime. You can also change delivery frequency, recipes, and the number of portions you’d like to receive.

Marley’ Spoon delivers to the mid Atlantic and New England regions: most of New York, New Jersey, Connecticut, Pennsylvania, Rhode Island, Massachusetts, Delaware, Maryland, West Virginia, and Washington D.C.

Monthly Cost:
Varies by number of servings and number of meals.
Check here for the configuration of your choice

COUPON CODE: COOKSMART

Author: Writer Preziosi

Once upon a time, long, long ago, Lisa attended Syracuse University where she studied singing in a giant castle surrounded by ice and snow. After she earned her music degree, she headed to the island of Manhattan, down to the West Village, to a place called the New School. There, she earned another degree in the great art of writing stories for children. She currently works on that same island trying to help real people, while making up stories about imaginary ones. Her first book, “The Ice Maiden’s Tale,” a fairy tale adventure, was released on May 30, 2017 and is up for sale on Amazon. View all posts by Writer Preziosi