Diet Meal Delivery Services

Diet delivery services are a trend that is here to stay. Nationwide there are dozens of companies that deliver diet food across the US via UPS or FedEx. In many major cities, there are also some strictly local options for diet food home delivery.

While using a diet home delivery service might be a bit of a stunner to the pocketbook in comparison to what it costs to shop at your local supermarket, for many busy dieters it makes the most sense. Prepared diet meals can help with portion control and they can help keep you on your weight loss journey if you are prone to just grabbing the easiest thing in the cupboard or fridge because you really don't feel like cooking.

With that in mind here's are a few of the major diet delivery services that offer home delivery throughout the United States that I have actually tried. There are a ton more out there, but I'm not sure I'll get to all of them! The types of meals vary quite a bit, so which service you choose will heavily depend on how much money you want to spend and your personal tastes.

Medifast is probably one of the most well known diet brands. They've been around for over 30 years and now you can order your Medifast meals online.

If you are looking for a diet food that frees you from thinking about food, Medifast is a great choice. They offer a meal replacement program based on shakes, bars and other items. You eat five Medifast meals per day and then make a very simple lean & green meal for yourself, consisting of fresh veggies and protein.

Medifast is a carb and calorie restricted program that works very quickly for most people. I've used it myself, so you can read my Medifast product reviews to get an idea of what their food tastes like.

NutriSystem is another big name diet brand. They advertise heavily on television and you can also order their food online. NutriSystem differs from Medifast substantially.

NutriSystem diet meals consist primarily of shelf-stable packaged meals (don't need refrigeration) that you heat up in the microwave or dry mixes that you mix with boiling water. But now they have also added a new program called NutriSystem Select which features a line of fresh frozen foods that will need to be stored in the freezer. I have not tried any of their frozen meals yet, but generally I think this is a good move and should improve taste considerably.

In addition to the NutriSystem food, you also need to add some fresh fruits and veggies to round out your meals. Compared to other diets, NutriSystem is a low fat diet. The nutritional breakdown is as follows:

The Nutrisystem meal plans provide approximately 55% of the calories from low-glycemic, "good" carbohydrates, 25% of the calories from protein, and 20% of the calories from fat.

If you are carb sensitive, then I would go with another plan. But if you prefer a low fat diet and are able to lose weight while eating carbohydrates and hate being deprived of them, NutriSystem may be a good option for you. Nutrisystem also has several different diet menus, including one for diabetics.

Diet to Go is another diet delivery service that has been around for quite some time (1991), but I actually was unaware of it until this year. They don't seem to advertise as much on television as Nutrisystem and Medifast. However, I think you'll find that Diet to Go is a significant step up from Nutrisystem when it comes to the food.

All of Diet to Go's meals are prepared fresh and then flash frozen. They are then delivered much like Omaha Steaks delivers their food to customers -- packed on dry ice and shipped using UPS.

As far as taste goes, Diet to Go food tastes quite good. The only complaint I've ever had is that some dishes can be a bit salty tasting. For the most part though, Diet to Go is definitely satisfying on the food front.

For meals, you have three different options -- low fat, low fat vegetarian or low carb. Low carb options are a bit more expensive than the low fat, but I think it is worth the extra money. Personally, I can't lose weight on a low fat diet. Actually, I can't stay on a low fat diet. It just does me in. Low carb all the way for me.

Additionally, you can also dictate the number of meals per week. They have five day plans and seven day plans. And there's a lunch & dinner option vs the breakfast, lunch and dinner.