Is anybody else feeling like time is passing incredibly slowly, and yet at the end of each day, I think - oh my, it's been another day already?
I start this post in this way because I have just finished my week of Soulara home delivered meals, and yet I feel like I have been on this meal plan forever.
If you missed my previous blog post where I reviewed a couple of the meals and provided information in cost, delivery method and packaging,
here it is.
Now let's get back into reviewing the food.
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| Sunset Mwanga Stew |
Promising to "take your taste buds to Africa", this is a West African peanut-based stew filled with kale, butter beans and coconut cream, and served with sweet potatoes and quinoa. I enjoyed that I got two types of complex carbs and I really think Soulara nails the quinoa-cooking. The stew has a great texture with little bits of crunchy peanut, but I found this dish strangely sweet. I got behind it after a couple of mouthfuls, but it was a bit of an acquired taste. This Mwanga stew gives you 502 calories split into 17g protein, 42g carbs, 28g fat (10g of which is saturated fat), 17g sugar and 530mg sodium.
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| Juan's Mexican Red Beans and Rice |
I don't know who Juan is, but I like his beans and rice. The protein in this dish is seitan, which is a meat-substitute made entirely of gluten from wheat. I have never tried before, but I really enjoyed the texture! It reminds me of some tofu products in Chinese cuisine, it has a kind of slightly chewy, mildly rubbery texture (but in a good, interesting way). The best thing about seitan is that it really takes on flavours particularly well. I also enjoyed how goodies-packed this bowl is: carrot, lentils, tomato, kidney beans and tofu accompany the seitan. One serving gives you 368 calories consisting of 15.8g protein, 47.4g carbs, 9.4g fat (1.4g of which is saturated), 7g sugar and 335mg sodium.
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| Palak Tofu and Tumeric Rice |
I thought this was one of the more interesting-sounding meals. Described as creamy tofu with tumeric rice pilaf topped with spiced roasted cashews, I had been looking forward to it. It was actually not very enjoyable. First, the tofu had barely any flavour - they came in large chunks so the middle is completely bland, but the sauce tasted like dirt anyway. The tumeric rice had an overpowering sourness which I simply couldn't learn to love. Not even the cashews could cheer me up, so despite the small portion size, I didn't end up finishing this. 542 calories worth of regret with 24g protein, 51g carbs, 24g fats (8g being saturated fat), 13g sugar and 741mg sodium.
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| Jalapeno Mac & Cheeze |
I was very curious of this, because I had never tried vegan "cheese" before. All the vegan influencers rave about how tasty nutritional yeast is, and i know it is very nutritious (as its name suggests) because it is filled with Vitamin B12, but I had never been brave enough to fork out the bucks to buy nutritional yeast - I mean, what if it tasted like vomit? Well, fear not, because it doesn't. The dish smells a lot like those tuna in mayonnaise tins that gets served on crackers - a familiar, childhood lunch box scent. The jalepeno gave it a good kick, and you know what, the vegan cheeze is actually pretty good. The pasta is overcooked and floppy which is a bit of a shame, but overall, very enjoyable. 441 calories consisting of 23g protein, 43g carbs, 17g fat (4 of which is saturated), 9g sugar and 278mg sodium.
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| Marrakesh Magic |
Moroccan style lentils with dukkah spice millet and ras el hanout roast pumpkin - definitely one of the most exotic descriptions I have seen in a while. For something that has such exciting description, it is oddly a pretty mild plate of food. The mint and coconut dressing is beautiful tart, and my overall impression is that this is an interesting and tasty meal. Coming in at 398 calories, there are 15g protein, 41g carbs, 17g fat (4g saturated fat), 10g sugar and 616mg sodium.
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| Golden Coconut Dhal |
A creamy and deeply comforting lentil stew with tomato and capsicum, dotted with shredded coconut and pumpkin seeds which added some wonderful texture, and served with broccoli pilaf - just the stalk of broccoli chopped into little pieces. I am mindful of food waste these days - and it's such a shame that some of the "woody" parts of vegetables such as broccoli gets no love. This is a great way to make use of these bits which may otherwise go to waste. A wonderfully satisfying dish coming in at 370 calories with 16g protein, 23g carbs, 20g fat (13g saturated fat), 9g sugar and 423mg sodium.
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| Mother Earth's Mujadar |
Described as a Middle Eastern brown rice and lentil dish topped with caramalised opinion and coconut mint dressing (the same as used in a number of other dishes), I really disliked this. It was a very filling and carb-heavy dish, yet I felt oddly dissatisfied at the end of it because the flavours were so one-dimensional. The description "taste a bit like dirt" once again comes to mind - must be a particular spice blend Soulara deploys that loses all lustre once the sodium content is reduced to health-claim-friendly levels. It gives you 509 calories, 20g protein, a whopping 60g carbs, 17g fat (6g saturated fat), 6 g sugar and 561mg sodium.
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| Mushroom Bourgignon with black garlic mash |
This, my friends, was a particular kind of evil. First, look at that unnatural blob of mashed potatoes - it is supposedly a black garlic mash, but it tasted of nothing. The mushroom is cooked with red wine and accompanied by a couple of carrot chunks, but if I had to describe the taste, the words "rancid wine" comes to mind. It was oddly sour and deeply awful. This is also one of the least nutritious meals Soulara offers, coming in at a measly 233 calories with only 7g protein, 29g carbs, 6g fat (1g saturated fat), 9g sugar and 449mg sodium.
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| Sunkissed pesto |
We end our Soulara journey on familiar territory. The packaging specifically promises that the penne pasta would be al dente but alas, it is not. Perhaps it is only to be expected for microwave meals, but the pasta is pretty floppy. The flavours, on the other hand, are pretty great: comfortingly familiar. This is one of the most calorific meals offered by Soulara (not that this means anything - as I will come to), coming in at 629 calories, with 17g protein, 70g carbs, 30g fat (5g saturated), 2g sugar and 194mg sodium.
The Good
There are quite a number of things I enjoyed about Soulara meals. First, I liked that they took inspiration from all over the world, and I got to try dishes I would never have tried otherwise. Second, I learned that I do not have to over-salt everything to make things tasty, nor do I need to rely on sugar to give me energy. Third, I liked how Soulara made vegan food genuinely interesting: sometimes there would be a wide variety of textures and flavours in one dish, so that certainly busts the myth that you'd have to eat like a rabbit to be vegan. Fourth, the convenience factor is pretty tempting, particular at a time when going to the supermarket feels like an act of heroism (I exaggerate, of course). Fifth, even though it is pretty expensive, it is still cheaper (and healthier) than ordering takeaway.
The Not So Good
Apart from some of the dishes ranging from bizarre to awful, I would say that my biggest gripe with Soulara is that you are paying a lot for very few calories. Each Soulara meal averages about 500 calories, with breakfast items averaging about 300 calories - that means if you were relying on Soulara meals alone, you would only get about 1300 calories per day. That is definitely not enough for a person of average size, and most definitely not enough for men, even if we are holed up at home and reducing physical activity during COVID19. That in turn means you would have to spend more money on snacks when Soulara meals are already pretty expensive.
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