I have also gotten The Fresh 20 meal plan (through a Groupon for half off). To be honest the recipes are high calorie, somewhat involved and the shopping list prices they have are...not at all what the stores in my area offer.

That said, it has made me better at weekly meal planning without actually using the service itself for more than three or four weeks.

I'm not sure I'll keep up with their recipes, but the skills I learned are invaluable.

i use plan to eat - which works well for me as i build my own mealplan and can use recipes i find/ones that i already love! for me the calendar functions and the ability to store all my recipes in the same place makes it worth the yearly fee...

Orange Pomegranate is a free do it yourself meal planning and recipe website. You can add your own recipes which can be shared or kept private. There's a meal planning calendar which you use to print out the recipes and shopping list for your chosen time frame.

I've just done two weeks of the Fresh 20's vegetarian meals, and I'm thrilled. Quite a few of the recipes have impressed me with their simplicity, ease of preparation, and flavor. I may not use the service every week, and I may not use it forever, but when you just can't make time to plan out meals, it's a godsend. My one complaint might be that the portions are occasionally kind of small - we're two small adults, a toddler, and a baby, and a couple of times we've eaten the whole dish.

(Oh, I'm also impressed that since the recipes are seasonal, there's quite a lot of overlap between the shopping lists and the veggies we're getting from our CSA!)

I've yet to find the right site that does everything I want so I do it on paper and Excel. I've been collecting recipes in my Google Reader and recently took all the links from various blogs and sites and made them into customized ebooks on Readlists.com. I can use in iBooks on my ipad (works with epub and other platforms) I'm constantly updating and adding recipes to my readlists.

I keep inventory of what I have on hand, essentials I need to buy, and then pick out one or two more involved recipes that will produce leftovers to freeze/take to lunch. I add any items I'm missing to that list. I use Any.do to make my lists, one for Shaws, Trader Joes, and I even have a list for stuff I'm running low on/not sure I have.

Then I just map out the week on an excel template. I have to plan both lunch and dinner because my office has no microwave, just a fridge. As for breakfast and desserts, if I see something appealing (TJs Angel Food cake I'm looking at you) I grab it and add it to my breakfast/dessert rotation, which is a list of simple easy stuff I almost always have on hand.

It seems extensive, but it really only takes about 15 minutes once you've got a template and actively keep track of what needs replenishing it's quite simple. None of those sites ever work for me.

I just started a meal planning newsletter that gives people plans but also a sense of creative freedom (and lots of cooking tips) so they can substitute and still learn and not just follow someone else's instructions. My hope is that it gives you the tools to learn how to meal plan better and cook more confidently and then you won't need the newsletter anymore! The latest one is here. Would love feedback from folks that have been using other meal planners!

Thanks for the responses. I am actually doing the Fresh 20 vegetarian plan. This was our second week--so far have cooked several delicious meals. We are also 2 adults and 2 small children, and have found a few times that we end up with enough for lunch for the adults. And agree with @Queensbee that at least one of the weekly vegetarian meal seems like it needs another course.

I do like the fact that the recipes are seasonal. I also like someone to send me a shopping list and a plan for the week--I have no difficulty being inspired by food, but it's harder for me to figure out what to make when. I'm hoping this will cut down a bit on my tendency to buy vegetables and then run out of time to cook them!

I'm not sure what plan N. Leigh is on but my The Fresh 20 meals have been super easy and I save money at the grocery store every week. To me, the calories are low (around 480 per dinner) and my husband and I have even lost weight.

I tried other services, but there was too much processed food and frozen dinner suggestions. I hated cooking but we look forward to our kitchen time now.

Fresh 20 saves me about 2 hours per week in planning. I'd say, "Worth it!"

I use eMeals and like it so far. I started using it because I needed to switch to gluten free and it can be hard to plan meals at first (because you're focused more on the "can't haves" than the "can haves").

We use The Fresh 20! We've been using the menus for about 8 months now. I don't think we've had a single meal that was disliked, and we're a family of 5 (4 of us who eat, 1 is too small). My husband has loved the leftovers and with their lunch plan, I'm sending some pretty good stuff to school with our oldest. I've told everyone I know about the menus and have a couple of friends who signed up recently and are just as pleased. We love The Fresh 20!

I want to clarify my original comment, and these are items I have let The Fresh 20 know I am concerned about.

I am vegan. So when I saw the Groupon that offered The Fresh 20 services and they had a "Vegan/Vegetarian" menu and a statement that said, "Our vegetarian plans are not 100% vegan, but can often be customized to fit a vegan lifestyle. We use eggs and dairy (lacto-ovo) in some of the weekly meals," I was pretty excited. They do not have a sample menu available without sending a request (and I don't know how long that takes to receive). The Groupon was about to expire- so I went for it!

I've been using the service since late July. I've make probably 60-80% of the recipes each week, depending on what days I'm home, etc. I cook for myself (as a vegan), my friend (who is on Weight Watchers) and my boyfriend (who is an ominvore).

I went through a huge weight loss journey that I finished just over three years ago. I lost 110 pounds and am very careful about what I eat. I stay in shape and take care of my body. Most of these meals come in at 400-500 calories. That's nearly 33% of my daily intake. Additionally, in this week's meal plan alone there are 4 out of 5 recipes that call for multiple types of cheese/cream- none of which I can use. The replacements are infintely more expensive than their dairy based counterparts and there is no "low fat" version of them, which raises my calorie count even more.

I like The Fresh 20. I believe it works for a lot of people and I support the movement toward a healthier lifestyle for everyone. There are families for which this is a wonderful tool. It has not worked for me quite the way I wanted- but I'm glad I did it.

To answer the original question posed: Meal planning services are a great way to learn how to eat well and shop smart. But it's just a tool. You have to take the knowledge into your life and make it your own.

I hope that makes more sense.

I didn't want to pay for a meal planning service so I started a blog that offers a weekly meal plan free of cost instead. It includes five meals per week and has a color coded shopping list that is easy to use. Please check it out at rainbowdelicious.com. Good luck finding an avenue that works for you and your meal planning :)

Great question! I love the recipes here at the Kitchn, huge fan. For those who are Gluten-free, check out www.realrecipeplans.com The recipes are simple, and naturally-gluten free, which means that they are seasonal and use real ingredients. Let me know how you go! Thanks again for maintaining such an awesome website.

If you're in need of super simple meal plans that don't require any food prep in ahead of time, check out www.mealime.com. I realized how difficult it was to find recipes online that suited a busy lifestyle, so I co-founded Mealime. We've put a lot of work into creating recipes that have basic ingredients, easy instructions and take less than 30 minutes to make. Our recipes and shopping lists integrate so you don't end up with any wasted food. They also cover dinner as well as the following day's lunch :)

If you have any questions or would like to talk about meal planning, I'd love to hear from you!