I’m Not a Keto Guy, But If I Were I’d Order Trifecta Meal Plans on Repeat
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There are thousands of diets out there nowadays and, thanks to the spoils of 21st century capitalism, a proportionate number of companies willing to mail you pre-made, diet-specific meals. One of the most popular companies is Trifecta (spotted on Netflix’s You are What You Eat: A Twin Experiment), and one of the most popular diets is keto, and to no one’s surprise Trifecta makes an extremely popular keto meal plan. But is it any good? I tried it for a month to find out.
Looking for more keto meal plans? Check out our guide on the subject. Every option has been tested, reviewed, and compared against the competition.
Why You Should Trust Us
Hone Health is a team of health-obsessed journalists, editors, fitness junkies, medical reviewers, and product testers. Before writing this review of Trifecta meals, I ordered, ate, and logged meals from the company for more than a month.
What Are Trifecta Meals?
Trifecta Nutrition offers paleo, vegan, vegetarian, Whole30, and other meals plans, but its Keto plan is its most popular.
The company is fitness-forward, to be sure, especially compared to most other delivered meal plan makers. Its marketing material is full of fitness influencers and famous partners like four-time Mr. Olympia winner Jay Cutler, bodybuilder Dana Linn Bailey, and strength athlete Brian Shaw.
This all means the brand is very clear about nutrition, which is nice to see when many brands make it a chore to find that information.
What’s Good About the Trifecta Meals?
Very clear nutritional info
All diets require a degree of nutritional precision to execute properly, but Keto and other diets that restrict certain food types (or a specific macronutrient consumption, more accurately) elevate that need. Trifecta’s meal plan and meal kit pages are extremely clear on this subject. Macronutrient makeup, caloric load, and a full ingredient list are printed on the label of every meal you receive.
Though fudging or missing nutritional information isn’t a feature of most big-brand meal plan providers, you will find some newer organizations that make it more difficult than it should be to find the most basic information regarding a meal’s design.
Excellent customer service
When reviewing any product I tend to take a question I have about the thing to the company’s customer service division as a means of gauging their response time and helpfulness. I had an issue with delivery that needed addressing, as well as a question on ideal reheating methods. The website’s live chat responders were quick to reply to both inquiries, as were the people manning the customer service email.
This may seem like a small thing, but at a time when many newer companies are growing leaner to shave down costs, it’s common for customer service departments to be the first to fall. In short, you want to be able to complain to someone if you need to, and Trifecta is still doing it the old-fashioned (and objectively better) way.
Taste is acceptable (and that’s a good thing)
To be clear, I tested Trifecta’s meal plans, which are pre-made and only require reheating to eat.
If you’ve not had pre-made meals, I’ll keep the meta analysis brief: most suck, terribly. Trifecta’s don’t suck, and that is enough for me.
The meals are seasoned reasonably well (though I am one to squirt some hot sauce to change things up), prepared reasonably well, and most important of all are very consistent. No, they do not look like fine dining on the plate (see photos above for example), but they don’t need to.
My only qualm regarding taste was the overuse of cheese. I know cheese is a very common way for keto dieters to up their caloric intake in lieu of high-calorie carbs, but throw in some nuts or something instead. There are other calorie-boosting, keto-friendly foods out there—use them.
What’s Not Good About Trifecta Meals?
Pricier per meal than most
After taxes, delivery, and food costs my Trifecta kit came out to $16 per plate. This is a shade higher than most keto plans, which float between $13 and $14 a plate, and significantly higher than something like Fresh N Lean, which charges just $12 a meal.
Now, even $12 a meal is a lot considering the normal cost of whipping something up with groceries, though you’re obviously paying for convenience as well (reheating in the microwave takes 2 or 3 minutes at worst). It’s difficult to justify $4 more than that per meal for many people, including myself.
Texture turn-offs
I think the food tasted good, but it didn’t always feel good going down. The meals arrive in vacuum-sealed plastic trays and the food is ready to eat after a couple minutes in the microwave. But I wouldn’t recommend preparing it in this manner because any vegetables and some of the proteins come out oddly chewy and slimy. Instead, I started taking the meals and tossing them in a non-stick pan to reheat them. This way the excess moisture from the vacuum seal is eliminated and the food is mostly indistinguishable from a normal meal.
Lack of choice
While Trifecta provides a great many options in number of meals, delivery days, frequency of delivery, and so on, it doesn’t offer a means to select (or deselect) meals. This is a significant negative, in my mind, and one that doesn’t make much sense. In the few weeks I ate Trifecta meals, I only had a handful of repeat meals. I was on a breakfast, lunch, and dinner plan and there were a number of meals I wished I was able to nix from my next order and other I enjoyed quite a lot. Given how much you can customize your meal plan before the food gets sent out, the lack of meal-specific selection just seems like a blunder.
The Competition
Fresh N Lean
If you’re looking for value and decent keto grub, Fresh N Lean is the choice. Our team reviewed several of the most commonly recommended keto meals, and Fresh N Lean stacked up favorably against all of them. The food is solid, the price per meal ($12) was the lowest, and the plan has more flexibility than its competition.
Factor 75
Gaining popularity through social networks and ads, Factor 75 was the best-tasting keto plan we tried, but it’s pricier per meal on average than Fresh N Lean (price varies state-to-state). We liked it, but it’s probably best for people who refuse to settle for less on food quality.
Diet-to-Go
Though fairly popular, our reviewer didn’t love the experience with Diet-to-Go’s meal plan. Ignoring a number of shipping issues, the plans don’t offer the flexibility of their competitors, and the food isn’t significantly better or worse to make up for that.
The Bottom Line
Trifecta is a solid keto option for fitness-minded keto diet followers, but it’s not perfect. The price per meal is higher on average than most of its competition, and it would be nice to easily drop a meal you don’t like from an order, but the food tastes good and the customer service is excellent.
