A meal prep chef plans a week of meals around your household, shops for the ingredients, cooks everything fresh, and brings it to you portioned, labeled and ready to eat. On a Tuesday night, dinner is already made.
Our chefs do this for households across South Jersey, Philadelphia and the Main Line, under the name Classic Meals.
What a meal prep chef does each week
- A first conversation about your household. What everyone loves, what nobody will touch, and how many nights you need covered.
- A menu built with you. There is no set menu to choose from. We send a first week over for you to react to, and if something is not right, we adjust before we shop.
- Fresh shopping and cooking. Ingredients are shopped fresh and the food is cooked that week.
- Portioning and labeling. Meals are portioned into containers and labeled with what they are and when they were made.
- A set drop-off day. We arrange the drop-off details with you ahead of time.
Classic Meals starts at $410 plus groceries
That is the base price for our weekly meal prep. The cost of groceries is added to it and moves with the menu, which usually changes from week to week. What you pay depends on how many people you are feeding and how many nights you want covered.
On a first call we work out what a typical week costs for your household.
How a meal prep chef compares to a meal kit or a delivery service
Meal kits ship you ingredients and a recipe. Many prepared-meal delivery services ship chef-prepared meals from a set menu. A meal prep chef cooks for one household, from a menu built with you. These are the typical differences between the three.
| Meal kit | Prepared-meal delivery | Meal prep chef | |
|---|---|---|---|
| Who chooses the menu | You pick from the company’s menu | You pick from the company’s menu | You and the chef build it together |
| Who cooks | You | The company | The chef |
| What arrives | Ingredients and a recipe card | Finished meals | Finished meals |
Who a meal prep chef suits
A weekly meal prep service suits households where dinner has become the hardest part of the week.
- Families who want real dinners without deciding what to make every night.
- Couples who would rather spend weeknights together than at the grocery store and the stove.
Meal prep with Modern Classical Chefs
The chefs who cook for you work to a standard Chef Dan Ninerell sets. We have over 120 five-star Google reviews, nothing below four stars, and every one of them answered.
For a week from start to finish, see how our weekly meal prep works. We also have pages for personal chef service in Philadelphia, personal chef service in New Jersey and meal prep in Villanova. Planning a single evening instead, like a dinner party? Our guide to what a private chef costs covers that side.
Questions about hiring a meal prep chef
How much does a meal prep chef cost?
Our weekly meal prep, Classic Meals, starts at $410 plus the cost of groceries, depending on how many people you are feeding and how many nights you want covered.
Is a meal prep chef the same as a personal chef?
A meal prep chef is the ongoing side of what we call personal chef service: cooking for your household week to week. A private chef, by our usage, is booked for a single occasion like a dinner party or a celebration. We do both.
How is a meal prep chef different from a meal kit or a delivery service?
A meal kit leaves the cooking to you, and a prepared-meal delivery service typically sends finished meals from its own menu. A meal prep chef cooks for your household from a menu built with you.
How many nights a week can a meal prep chef cover?
That is part of the first conversation. Tell us how many nights you need and we build the week to match.
Tell us who you are feeding and how many nights you need covered, and we will build your first week for you to react to.
