Hi! I am new to this forum. I have found so much wonderful information on all of the delivery services. I recently ordered the low fat menu from Diet To Go (before I read this forum). I was also planning on ordering a week of Diet to Your Door (BistroMD) next week. Has anyone had any long term success with either one of these programs? I read about great success with NS (I tried that one twice and couldn't stand the food, LOL ...it is the only one I have ever tried), JC, and ediets express. Most people say that NS and JC food isn't very good and I was wondering why people have so much more success with those than with DTG or BistroMD? I would like to lose 60 or 70 lbs. The plans are basically 1200 calories and that would leave me starving. I can add some snacks of my own but I was wondering how many calories I can eat and still lose weight? I'd like to gradually wean down to 1200 calories so that my body doesn't get stuck at a certain weight and then I would have to cut my calories even more to lose more weight.

I don't know... I think maybe Nutrisystem and Jenny Craig have been more popular long term because they are cheaper and probably easier to afford for those that have a lot of weight to lose. That's just a guess. Diet to Go and BistroMD are definitely higher quality and better tasting. But they also cost more. DTG offers both a 1200 and a 1600 cal plan.

BistroMD is also available through SamsClub at a discounted rate.

You are probably right! The cost of doing one of the more expensive plans for 8 months (just a guess at how long it would take to lose 60 or 70 lbs) is thousands of dollars. BistroMD would cost almost $5000 without snacks! JC seems to be about the same price as ediets and DTG (if you were to buy the good frozen food). I can't decide if I should try BistroMD or ediets next. Did you find that BistroMD or DTG tasted better than the other one? You had great reviews of both of them.

Thank you so much for your help

When I tried BistroMD, I wasn't vegetarian, so I didn't mind eating so much chicken. And you better like chicken on this diet At least it was real, not McProcessed. They also include some seafood, pork, and beef, but chicken is the most popular ingredient. They were very creative, and it was all delicious. Each meal came in a large bag containing smaller individual bags because each component was wrapped separately. Some things needed to cook longer. You could use the microwave or drop the bags in boiling water. The vegetables all tasted like they were just picked from the garden and nothing was overcooked.

DTG meals were usually packed in one container that resembled a large lean cuisine black plastic baking dish. I chose the vegetarian meals, so I had various casseroles, burritos, and that sort of thing. Everything was really delicious (except those nasty soy meals), but heating them up was a little tricky because they didn't include directions and I didn't know which resulted in best quality - microwave, oven, or what. One of our members chose DTG with regular foods, not vegetarian, and she said they were fabulous and she couldn't believe they were diet food.

Fortunately none require a long term commitment, so it's easy to cancel or put them on hold while you try another service. I recommend trying them all before deciding. There's also no reason to stick with just one for the duration of the diet, especially if you are picky or get bored easily like me

We also tried the 3 Hour Diet which was really good! We won't put up a review yet, we're waiting for Jennifer to try it. Their foods were fresh, not frozen. FYI- the 3 Hour Diet and the eDiets meals are made by the same company. The main difference between them is that with the 3 Hour Diet, you can pick and choose your meal choices from the very beginning. eDiets makes you take a preselected menu for your first week (or maybe two?) so if you have any dietary restrictions, then you are out of luck.

I'm on Week 7 of the BistroMD food delivery service. I was quite successful losing weight through Jenny Craig, but after two years of Jenny Lasagna and Pesto Pizza, I needed a change. I also wanted the convenience of home delivery, which JC doesn't offer in my area. I tried DietToGo for 1 week, but became quickly frustrated with the lack of proper heating instructions. My meals were inconsistently labeled, which wasn’t helpful. I did like the breakfasts (much more so than the BistroMD options) and thought the dinners were pretty good. I did not like the lunches and didn’t think they included enough vegetables with them. So I moved on to BistroMd. I intentionally passed on programs like Seattle Sutton and the 3 Hour Diet because I like the flexibility that comes with having a frozen food over fresh food service.

PROS
The BistroMD dinners/lunches are tasty and creative. It is a meat-centered program. The vegetables taste very fresh and are part of almost every meal. The food is pretty bland in the spice department, but that isn't a huge concern for me.

I think the best thing about the BistroMD plan so far is that these meals actually fill me up. The calorie count of the meals are higher than the JC meals, Whenever someone sees me eating one of these meals at work, I get comments like "Wow! That's a lot of food!"

ISSUES
I am not impressed with the breakfasts whatsoever. If there was an option to do so, I would take off breakfast altogether. They send a week of hot chocolate (with aspartame) to supplement some of the 100 calorie breakfast options (sad bagels, 100 calorie muffins, cardboard chocolate breakfast biscuits. I think this is lame way to supplement a low calorie food item. And does the doctor think aspartame should be part of someone’s daily diet? I do like their waffles; it is one of the few breakfast options that is over 150 calories and doesn't require the hot chocolate calorie supplement.

I did not sign up for their snacks, figuring I could come up with more creative snacks than what seemed to be on their menu. A daily snack choice on their menu seemed to be this "fruity shake". This seems to be a more calorie-dense type of food that will still leave me hungry. For a morning snack, it seems like a high-volume food choice would be better for dieters. A shake just doesn't fill me up. I’m sure it’s tasty; I just think BistroMD could have provided a better snack choice.

BistroMD at Work
If you are used to popping a JC lunch into the microwave at work, be prepared to do some higher level of prep with the BistroMD meals. You can't just pop frozen BistroMD meals into the microwave. You have to soak the meals, drain extra water, remove the food from the supertoughbags, and then finally, eat the food!

Ordering Food
The BistroMD website is very 1990's. They clearly do not know what "usability" of “data driven” means in terms of website design and development. If you sign up for the 5-day plan, be prepared to select from a 7-day plan. There is no way to submit substitutions except through phone or by email.

The Price
It isn't cheap, but cheaper than things like the Zones Chef Delivery Service. You can buy it through Sam's Club at a significant savings. However, I wanted the flexibility to make substitutions, so I'm willing to suck it up.

Weight Loss
But at the end of the day, what do we care about? Weight loss! After 7 weeks on the plan, I have lost 7 pounds. That feels pretty good!

CONGRATULATIONS on your weight loss! That's great!!! It seems like every delivery program has pros and cons about it. I am excited about my DTG delivery this week. One thing I noticed is that they want you to order for the next week by Friday. I might not get my order until Thursday so I won't know if I like the food yet. I have gone over all of the menus and BistroMD sounds the best, but the one that is the closest to how I usually eat is DTG. I just eat fattening dinners and desserts instead of healthy food. If I can stick to it - it could help me learn to eat the right portions and much healthier at night. The BistroMD has too much lean protein and veggies for me right now. I am not used to eating like that all the time. It reminds me of the Atkins diet. I have tried to eat like that before (alot of lean protein and veggies) and I start to shake and get headaches. My whole family gets like that. All of the delivery programs sound good but based on what I think might be an easier transition compared to how I eat now... I think DTG is a good choice. It sounds like the biggest complaint is the lack of reheating instructions. I hope I don't get frustrated with that. I will probably get bored with the 4 weeks of food and then it repeats. I will probably switch to another delivery service. It is nice that we have that option. I never had any idea that so many of these services existed until I came here! I love this forum!!! Even though you are on BistroMD and I am getting DTG ... it would be nice if we could still support each other and cheer each other on I would love to have a diet buddy or buddies (if anyone else is interested).

Suzanne, thank you for your help too

I had to stop JC because it was too expenisive for me, and maybe I could have stood it longer, but the frozen food was just getting to me. But having someone cook for me and deliver it to me? If I could afford it, I would probaly try it.

I understand where your coming from! We just moved into a nicer house and we are at the end of remodeling it. My husband isn't used to the bills and everything yet (much higher than our last house). He is not very thrilled about me spending $500+ on food a month just for me. I think he is hoping it will be like when I tried Nutisystem for two weeks and quit. I have heard that Diet to Go is MUCH better so I am hoping that it is the perfect solution for me. Have you tried Nutrisystem? I believe it is much cheaper than JC.

Thanks for the support. I'm very excited about the weight loss. I certainly hear you about the differences between Diet-to-Go and Bistro MD. I really didn't have a big problem with the Diet to Go food...I seemed to remember they had a very tasty tuna melt, but I did not like having directions. But I think with these plans, there is only so many menu options that they can possibly rotate. I have a feeling I'll be trying all of them, just for the variety. I'm sure that in a few months, I won't want to see any chicken! I've never tried Nutrisystem, mostly because my friends who were on it weren't able to stick to it. I did actually like the Jenny Craig food...but I just tired of it.

Sam's Club sells the Bistro food at a discount. Though it isn't cheap, I justify the expense by firmly believing (and convincing myself) that this is a small price to pay for health. I think that it is very expensive (social cost/health wise/emotionally) to be overweight in this society. So well, that's how I say, "I deserve this!" Perhaps my credit card won't agree, but it's my self-talk...

http://www.samsclub.com/shopping/nav...=5&item=348106

Kerfuffle,
I completely agree about how you justify spending your money on a personal chef. I was just telling my friend the other night that if I was going to spend money on anything it should probably be my health. We all spend money on so much junk (cars, homes, plastic surgery, hair, nails, spa treatments, clothes, etc). It makes much more sense to spend it on getting healthy.

It does take a huge toll on us to be overweight in this society. I hate going out to any place that I might see someone I know from the past. How sad is that? I live on the coast in a resort area and there is alot of competition to stay thin because of bathing suit season. I lived in St. Louis for a while when I was a teenager and it was not like that at all. To make things worse - I used to be a model in my 20s and now I have gained so much weight that people don't even recognize me. I just can't take the look of shock on their faces when I run into people. I hate it. Anyway - I received my DTG package this morning. They tell you to start with dinner on the first day, but I started with breakfast so that I could have my calories counted for me today. So far I have had breakfast and lunch and they were really good. Dinner and dessert is where I fall off track everyday so I am a little nervous about tonight.

Hi! I just finished my first week on DTG and I have lost 4 lbs. I still have a really long way to go! It was pretty easy on DTG. I was hungry at night since I usually ate the bulk of my food for the day at night. Wow, were my portions out of control! It brought back memories of when I really used to eat normal sized portions that looked like the DTG portions. I am getting used to eating like this. The nice thing is that I don't feel deprived. The food is really good! I haven't had any trouble with my meals so far. They do include reheating instructions. My husband was jealous of my meals so he had me order him a week of just lunch and dinner in 1600 cal. They did a good job of making the changes he requested, but they sent him the same size meals that I order on the 1200 cal. 3 meals a day. That is only 700-800 cal. in his 2 meals for the day. Not enough for a man! Now I am having trouble getting through to customer service. He wants to cancel. They also sent a notice that stated that they will be raising their prices on July 10. I don't think it will stop me from sticking with it as long as I continue to lose weight How is everyone else doing?

I have thought about trying DTG, but I need to eat dinner with my family. I wish you could just get the breakfast and lunch portions of it.

OK, after I posted this I called DTG and asked them about just breakfast/lunch and they do not do that because it isnt feasable (profitable) for them. So what I did is order 1 week of the 3 meals per day. So I will eat breakfast every other day and lunch every day with thier food, on the odd day when I do not have thier breakfast, I will just have a bowl of cereal (I like my cereal anyways) then save my dinners for the next week and use them for lunch. This way I get 2 weeks worth of food for the price of 1 week. I will just have to make sure I be VERY careful at dinner time with my family. Anyone have any thoughts on this?

It sounds like a good plan to me! I hope you do well! If it works..... it will probably cost less than any other plan you could try.

To answer your question about the taste of the food..... I think it is personal preference. It depends on what you are used to eating and what you expect. I think the food is really good. I have only tried Nutrisystem and that was terrible. I am on my third week of DTG and haven't had any trouble sticking to it. The good thing is that if you don't like it..... you can cancel.

Do they pack this food in ice?