Methodology Five-Day Reset Review

If someone offered you a week-long food "reset," what would you picture? Perhaps days of pained starvation, drinks that replace meals, and sluggishness mixed with dissatisfaction. Prepared meal delivery service Methodology wants to rewrite that narrative. The California-based brand's five-day resets are designed to provide fresh, filling, nutrient-dense meals to folks across the country, improving gut health and overall well-being.

This goes far beyond the average prepared meal delivery service experience, with dishes curated by Michelin chefs and beautiful packaging in glass jars and reusable containers. But does Methodology's high price tag match its value? Our team tried it to find out.

About Methodology

Founder Julie Nguyen established Methodology after learning first-hand about the health effects that food can have on your body.

Nguyen was largely raised on American fast food by her mom, a Vietnamese immigrant, who believed in assimilating with American culture through food. Over time, though, she realized the consequences that her diet had on her body and her life: She struggled with gut health, eczema, and asthma for years, and noticed how drastically her symptoms improved once she altered her diet.

Eventually, she hired a personal chef that would address all of her dietary needs, and had some of her friends join in on the meals. Then she realized how this idea could work on a much larger scale—and Methodology was born.

The service has been available in California for several years as a full prepared meal delivery subscription service. Building off of this long-time success, Julie wanted to expand Methodology’s impact and launch a version that is available nationwide. The signature five-day reset—available as either a Meat + Seafood or Vegan plan—is what we tried.

All of the meals offered are free from gluten, dairy, and refined sugar. The majority of ingredients are grown on a dedicated farm in California that rotates produce based on its seasonality, and almost everything is organic and sustainably sourced.

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What we tried

There are two options for Methodology's five-day reset: Vegan and Meat + Seafood. Our Kitchen and Cooking team's editor and staff writer each tried one to get a feel for the variety of dishes and ingredients offered by the brand.

In both options, the five-day reset consists of two hearty meals a day with snacks, matcha packets, and flavored apple cider vinegar included. The reset encourages intermittent fasting—which explains the omitted breakfast—but the plan also offers healthy breakfast suggestions for anyone who prefers not to fast.

The menu is constantly changing, but here's what we sampled over the course of our testing:

Meat + Seafood:

• Omega-3 rich salmon niçoise salad
• Wild cod cakes + toasted sesame butternut squash
• Italian roasted antipasto salad + prawn scampi
• Pastured buffalo chicken rainbow kale salad
• Al pastor pastured pulled pork taco bowl
• Goan black cod curry + blue coconut rice
• Vadouvan lobster truffle "Parmesan" risotto
• Ukrainian borscht: a melting pot of antioxidants
• Grass-fed beef bolognese + sprouted walnut pesto pasta
• Pastured tsukune chicken meatballs + roasted garlic cauliflower fried rice

Vegan:

• Minted satsuma mandarin roasted beet salad + braised tempeh
• Poblano & zucchini cakes + smoky almond romesco
• Wildflower & wild rocket arugula salad + vegan porcini-lentil "meatballs"
• Vegan Moroccan roasted carrot & quinoa wild rocket salad
• Vegan buffalo cauliflower kale salad
• Ginger-coconut sweet potato & kale stew + curried caviar lentils
• Green chickpea + tomato camu camu superfood stew
• Thai holy basil tofu + maca curry kabocha squash (Not delivered—more on this later)
• Greek avgolemono immunity plant-forward soup
• BBQ tempeh + herb-roasted marble potatoes

Both meal plans also come with daily servings of protein truffles, bottles of flavored apple cider vinegar shrubs (to aid digestion before meals), and single-origin ceremonial matcha packets.

What we like about the Methodology five-day reset

The meals are exceptionally fresh, tasty, and filling

We've tried our fair share of prepared meal delivery services—including from plant-based, chef-curated, and fitness-forward brands. But none of them compared to what we tried from Methodology.

Dishes like the salmon niçoise salad felt like sitting down at a nice restaurant. The presentation was stunning—even after being shipped across the country. The herb-crusted salmon was delicious, and the texture of the soft-boiled egg was impressively jammy and intact.

The vegan meals were also extremely satiating and unique. Protein-packed add-ins like porcini-lentil "meatballs" and barbecue tempeh were inventive, tasty, and filling. We sometimes even struggled to finish full servings of meals (including salads!) because they were filled to the brim with healthy, satisfying ingredients.

Ingredients are unique and high quality

Methodology makes it a priority to introduce its consumers to unique foods that they may not be used to seeing or buying from an average grocery store.

Nguyen collaborates with farms to grow custom produce that's seasonal and brings unique flavor to customer meals. We're talking ingredients like Common Ice Plant, which we had never seen in a salad before (and, candidly, had to Google to find out what it was). Turns out, it's delicious!

Featured foods follow natural seasonality and are multi-dimensional—don't expect regular romaine and kale salads. There was a wide range of textures and colors in every dish we tried, including ingredients we'd never expect to see shipped to our door.

The meal plan is easy to follow

Once you place your order for the five-day reset, you'll receive an organized meal plan chart via email that maps out exactly what to eat and when, making it very easy to follow the plan. The chart lays out each meal under each day of the week, guiding you from breakfast to dinner to make sure you eat the most perishable meals first (and never skip out on snacks).

We found this to be a huge plus for the reset, taking the question mark (and stress) out of meal planning for a week.

Premium details add to the experience

In addition to every meal looking and tasting restaurant-quality, Methodology has also clearly honed in on the little extras and details that make its service feel especially premium.

From the coordinating silverware set—complete with chopsticks—to the branded reusable containers and inspirational messages on the packaging, there's a thoughtfulness that runs through every aspect of the delivery.

All those little details, along with the quality of the food, add up to a premium feel that justifies the splurge. The extras make it feel like Methodology is really taking care of you.

What we don't like

Customization is limited

As of right now, Methodology's full prepared meal subscription service—where you can shop for prepared meals along with individual proteins, sides, breakfasts, and drinks—is only available in certain areas of California.

The only service that's available nationwide is the five-day reset, which doesn't allow for any customization (apart from choosing between protein sources and the "standard" and "large" portions). That means that folks who are picky or have specific preferences might have a hard time feeling comfortable shelling out several hundred dollars without any control over featured ingredients.

One caveat is that Methodology will ask you about any dietary restrictions or allergies before signing up for the reset, so you shouldn't have to worry about coming into contact with harmful ingredients. And Methodology plans to expand their nationwide delivery of the full subscription service, so more customization will be available in the future.

One meal and some helpful info was missing from delivery

From such a luxurious service that offers features like glass jars, durable utensils, and Michelin-inspired meals, we expected every part of our experience to be perfectly seamless. Unfortunately, there were a couple of hiccups.

One of our Vegan meals—the Thai holy basil tofu + maca curry kabocha squash—was missing from our box. When we reached out to the Methodology team to let them know, they apologized and mentioned that this had been a common problem due to its recent expansion into nationwide shipping.

This wasn't a major issue for us, of course, but the common consumer paying hundreds of dollars for a standard number of meals might have been disappointed by a missing meal. This is especially true for anyone looking for the full "reset" experience, who would then have to stray from the diet and find a healthy meal replacement on their own.

We also had trouble finding the printed information in our delivery as it was tucked under the insulation material. This left us wondering things like whether or not to refrigerate the truffles. (Which you should, by the way. We checked with the founder.)

We also would have liked to see detailed ingredient information printed in the delivery. We were able to find it all after some online digging, but given the overall attention to detail, this one seems like a miss.

The vegan meals were somewhat repetitive

The meals offered on the Meat + Seafood meal plan were delightfully diverse, with options ranging from salads and bowls to pasta and risotto. So even though we were on a strict meal plan, there was enough variety to avoid boredom (and the feeling of a traditional "diet").

But the Vegan plan was different. We found ourselves eating a lot of raw vegetables and salads that week, without anything like a comforting pasta dish to break up the monotony. And it didn't help that the Thai tofu dish, which may have offered a bit more diversity, was missing.

It's pricey

We've mentioned this a few times already, but it's worth noting that this service is premium, which means it comes with a premium price tag.

The five-day reset starts at $419 and goes up to $444 for the large-portioned option. That's more than a typical weekly grocery bill, although you don't have to spend time, planning, shopping, cooking, or cleaning up.

Of course, this reset isn't designed to be consumed on a weekly basis. Instead, founder Nguyen describes it as a good way to reset your digestive system and overall health after a vacation, a stretch of unhealthy eating, or when kicking off a new wellness plan.

Should you try the Methodology five-day reset?

Yes, if it's in your budget and you value a premium pre-made dining experience at home

If you love the idea of exploring new, healthy meals with premium ingredients—but can't be bothered to do the meal planning and cooking yourself—Methodology could be an amazing way to treat yourself.

We didn't have any qualms about the flavors or portions of the meals we tried, and it was great to be able to enjoy delicious, nutrient-dense, expertly crafted meals for a week without any work. (And we should admit we felt pretty good afterwards.)

But it's hard to ignore that Methodology has its downsides. The five-day reset is the only service that's currently available nationwide, which means that most folks will have to commit to a very specific, week-long meal plan to give it a try. It's also much pricier than most standard prepared meal delivery services on the market.

If you're into the idea of fresh, fully cooked meals shipped to your door (and not too fussy about premium ingredients) consider browsing CookUnity's hundreds of weekly offerings, which are equally tasty and more affordable.

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