As a Dietitian and Experienced Meal Delivery Tester, I’ve Tried Most Services — Find Out What I Think About Provenance

For those of us with busy schedules, it can be tough to handle the planning, grocery shopping, cooking, and cleaning required to get meals on the table every night — let alone ensure that the meals are healthy. That's where Provenance comes in, with single-serving, fully prepared meals made without gluten, dairy, and refined sugars. Basically, they’re the equivalent of having your meal prep done for you.

I hadn’t heard of Provenance before this opportunity to review the company, but I was excited to try the meals because I’m always on the lookout for a meal delivery service that will make my life easier. Although I’m a dietitian and cook, I struggle like everyone else in deciding what’s for dinner and then actually getting it on the table. Unfortunately, I often can't find a prepared meal delivery service that I’d actually order myself (or recommend to my clients), since very few of them make good on the promise of health while also remaining edible. I like my meals to have a mix of macronutrients — carbs, proteins, and fats — plus fiber and as many veggies as I can get.

I tested Provenance for one week, trying an assortment of breakfasts, savory entrées, and add-ons. Here’s how my experience went.

Signing up for Provenance couldn’t be simpler, but it’s easier to navigate if you know what the platform offers ahead of time.

Provenance has two plans: a six-day cleanse or à la carte meals. The cleanse provides six days of food, including breakfast shakes, lunches, and dinners, plus herbal teas and a daily schedule to follow. The other option is flexible about what meals, and how many, can be ordered.

Those interested in the six-day cleanse can sign up through a tab at the top of the homepage. I wasn’t interested in this program, so I headed to the meal delivery tab.

I entered a little bit of personal information to preview the menus, including my name, email, and delivery ZIP code. I proceeded to the menu and could choose 2, 4, 6, 8, 10, or 12 items for my delivery. Provenance delivers two days per week; mine were Wednesday and Saturday, with separate menus for each. I could select delivery on either or both days, but I could not request delivery on any other day of the week.

After picking eight meals for my preferred delivery day, I was taken to the checkout page, where I could indicate whether this order was one-time only or a weekly subscription. I chose the subscription, and I was all signed up — so easy!

Choosing the Meals

Exploring the meals is the fun part of any meal delivery service. I like to dig into the nitty-gritty of how much of the menu would be appealing to people with different dietary needs. Provenance has a lot to choose from, with about 60 items listed for each menu.

There were a few breakfasts, most of which involve eggs, but the majority of the menu was lunch or dinner entrées and add-ons. The nearly 50 entrées featured an assortment of proteins. Pork, chicken, beef, and vegetarian or vegan choices were broadly available, plus a few seafood options.

Most of the meals had an international flair in seasoning but otherwise were often fairly simple, such as Chinese Five-Spiced Pork With Peppers, Onions, and Squash, and Lemon Caper Chicken With Roasted Tomato and Kalamata Olives.

The menu appeared to be broadly healthy at first glance, which is in line with Provenance’s “clean eating” messaging. For example, the pumpkin pie used a gluten-alternative pecan crust, and entrées used ingredients like spaghetti squash in place of pasta or cauliflower rice in place of other grains.

Add-ons were mostly family-style sides like beans, lentils, gluten-free pasta, yams, and potatoes, as well as cooked proteins (meat and vegan alike) and a small selection of bone broths and desserts.

I would have liked more information on the ingredient sources for individual meals, such as whether proteins were grass fed or produce was organic. My assumption is that if it’s not labeled, it’s conventional. The only information I came across was the occasional “no antibiotics ever” label on certain meals with animal proteins.

Menus rotate week to week, but when I looked several weeks out, I did notice repetition.

Since the meals are prepared, there is no customization. However, with the menu filters for calories, sugar, total fat, carbs, protein, and sodium, I easily found meals for a very wide array of dietary needs, including eliminating allergens and ensuring that the meals met goals for certain nutrients. I wished there were also filters for fiber and saturated fat, but that didn’t appear to be an option.

Eventually, I picked six entrées:

• Chicken Chorizo con Papas With Scrambled Eggs and Salsa Rojo
• Grilled Steak, Roasted Spring Veggies, and Lemon Aioli
• Green Harissa Chicken With Lemon Herb Potatoes
• Pork Carnitas With Pickled Cabbage and Sweet Potato Mash
• “Whole” Macrobiotic Bowl
• Roasted Salmon With Curried Cauliflower Rice and Basil Sauce

Add-Ons

Provenance's selection of add-ons in the weekly menus was small compared with the abundance you see with some other services. There were a few desserts, prepared proteins, and vegetables. Some add-ons were a single serving and some family size (four servings). But if you’re looking for a few simple additions, Provenance add-ons could fill some gaps in a flexible mix-and-match way.

I ordered two add-ons:

• Brodo Chicken Bone Broth
• Chocolate Chunk Tahini Cookies

Most meal delivery boxes arrive in a standard cardboard box. Provenance meals, however, came in a soft-sided, zippered, insulated tote bag with some ice packs but no additional packaging. While this was certainly sufficient for maintaining a cool temperature with our evening delivery, it’s hard to say if this style of delivery would be functional for hotter climates or if your delivery would survive as well if it sat outside on a hot day — my guess is no.

My meals arrived in tip-top shape, with no spills or open containers, and everything was nicely chilled. I was a fan of the reusable bags, which can be left for collection at the next delivery so they can be reused. Accumulating those totes could become troublesome after a while, so I would definitely make use of the bag pickup if I ordered on a regular basis. But for a one-time user like myself, I’ll definitely put the bag to use for my groceries or a beach trip.

Cooking and Preparing the Meals

Simplicity seems to be a theme with Provenance meals, and cooking is no exception.

Everything I ordered came with easy microwave-only instructions or was meant to be eaten right from the fridge. Each reheatable meal had the same guidelines: Remove the lid and any sauce or toppings, cover the container (the instructions didn’t specify with what, but I used a paper towel), and microwave in increments of one to two minutes, stirring between, until an internal temperature of 165 or higher is reached and the meal is steaming hot.

I followed this procedure for everything except the cookies, which I ate straight from the fridge. Instead of keeping the broth add-on in its container, the instructions had me heat it in a mug to sip out of. I warmed up the remaining broth this same way later in the week and then used it in a soup recipe of my own.

All of my meals reheated pretty well. The steak and salmon cooked a touch past where I like them, but the macro bowl, both chicken entrées, and the pork all reheated evenly.

Tasting the Meals

Flavorwise, I quickly learned that if the website says something is spicy, it’s best to believe it. I’m no slouch, but the breakfast chorizo and egg bowl was definitely true to its spice warning. Most of the heat came from the salsa, which is what made this dish one of my favorites.

I also really enjoyed the steak, which was toothsome if a little overcooked, but the sauce was a nice complement. I liked the pork carnitas, too. Some in my household didn’t love the sweet potato mash, but I liked the savory-sweet combo.

The harissa chicken was very moist, and the green harissa sauce could have been spicier for me, but it brought a lot of freshness to the dish. The salmon was a little overdone by the time it was warmed up, and I didn’t particularly care for the cauliflower side, which didn’t have much of the curry flavor it promised. This was one of my least favorites. I didn’t love every element of the macro bowl either, though the sauce added a lot to the dish.

However, the chocolate tahini cookies were delicious straight from the fridge. I especially liked the sprinkle of salt on the top, which really set off the dark chocolate. I’m very familiar with broths from the Brodo brand, and I thoroughly enjoyed this add-on for sipping and cooking.

Overall, my Provenance meals were mostly hits with two misses. I would definitely order the harissa chicken, steak, pork carnitas, breakfast bowl, and cookies again. The portions felt generous, and the flavors and textures rival a lot of what’s in the marketplace.

In addition to the nutrition facts for calories, fat, and saturated fat, the meals disclose allergens, which comes in handy if you want avoid certain ingredients. However, since fish was not included in the “ingredients to avoid” filter, not all of the eight recognized major allergens are represented, so those with fish allergies should use caution when ordering. One odd filter called “soy at all” is unclear in its meaning. I recommend looking through the allergen statements and ingredient lists for each meal if you have a food allergy or intolerance.

Unfortunately, from a recipe development perspective, it’s pretty difficult to create the flavors that people have come to expect from professionally cooked meals without higher levels of sodium. Even when the meals are advertised as healthy, there tends to be an expectation of restaurant-quality flavor. Provenance did well in creating meals with solid flavors and without nutrition issues like high sodium or significant saturated fats.

Provenance doesn’t make specific nutrition claims about how its meals impact health, but it leans toward more ambiguous, less measurable claims like sleeping better, reducing inflammation, and supporting a healthy gut. All of these can be impacted by food, but it’s tough to say if eating Provenance meals would in fact have those results. It’s possible that Provenance meals could support this journey, but making a change like “balance blood sugar” (another claim on its front page) would be very much influenced by what you specifically choose off the menu. Not every meal would be appropriate for all individuals seeking some of these outcomes. Though from a standpoint of helping people manage allergies, eating on a regular basis, and optimizing protein intake, Provenance meals are a worthwhile option.

In pricing and dietary accommodations, Provenance is the most similar to Territory Foods. Meals from both companies are a single serving, cost between $15 and $21 each, and are at baseline free of dairy and gluten while offering additional diet options like vegan, vegetarian, and many more. The menus are practically identical as are the ordering systems, so the only real differentiator is that Provenance has a cleanse while Territory does not, which could sway you if you’re interested in that.

The gluten- and dairy-free baseline of Provenance’s menu is also similar to services like Methodology and Sakara (which is totally vegan), but Territory offers a more functional and flexible à la carte ordering structure, whereas the others require a subscription or enrollment in a program that does not allow for meal selection.

Compared with Methodology and Sakara, Provenance has better-tasting food based on my experience trying them all. However, if you’re after a nonprepared meal and want to get involved in cooking yourself, the meal kit service Green Chef is the most similar to Territory, with a lower cost.

While Provenance almost certainly fills a need for many who want easy, somewhat healthy on-the-go meals, it’s a bit too expensive for me. The meals are relatively tasty and generously portioned, but the price doesn’t work for me without the justification of organic produce or sustainably sourced protein.

Still, the service would work well for busy singles or couples who have the budget, want to keep their protein intake up, and like a mix of meat and veggie options. Provenance also makes sense for those who need or want to avoid dairy and gluten, or who have limitations with the physical demands of cooking.

This service could be useful to a variety of people because there is so much variety. However, I’d encourage anyone considering the service to review the nutrition for each menu item, especially if you’re managing nutrients like protein, carbs, or sodium for conditions like kidney disease, diabetes, or cardiovascular disease.

If the prices were a bit lower, I could see myself purchasing a box here and there to help out during busy weeks, especially for breakfast or some of the plant-based entrées. The service is so easy to use that it would be a breeze to incorporate on an as-needed basis.

Our Everyday Health writers and experts have tested over 50 meal delivery services to determine the pros and cons of each and help our readers make informed choices for their health. Each service has been individually evaluated by journalists and in consultation with dietitians to evaluate the following factors:

• Sign-up process
• Menu variety
• Add-ons
• How the meals arrive
• Packaging and sustainability
• Flavor and quality
• Cost and value
• Nutritional value
• Competitor analysis

Tori Martinet, RD, is a culinary and intuitive eating dietitian with over 10 years of experience in food and nutrition. She is broadly published on the topic of meal delivery, reviews food and culinary products and services, and has written for publications like Eating Well, U.S. News 360 Reviews, Food & Wine, and more.