Dietitian-approved fresh meals are delivered to your home. Customers pick their daily calorie intake, ranging from 1,200 to 2,100. There is a five-day option for people who like to cook on weekends and a seven-day option. Good Measure Meals has a dinner-only plan. Customers can save money by picking up their meals and by signing up for several weeks at a time.

We tried: Good Measure Meals and Fresh 'n Fit Cuisine. Prices from both services start at about $100 for five days of food, plus delivery charges. www.goodmeasuremeals.com; www.freshnfitcuisine.com.

Chris Gyoury / Special (ENLARGE)

Brent McIntire is executive chef for Fresh 'n Fit Cuisine.

AJC (ENLARGE)

Robby Cantrell of the Better Health Tryout Team wasn't crazy about Fresh 'n Fit Cuisine.

Becky Stein / Special (ENLARGE)

Good Measure Meals' chicken dishes and breakfasts got good ratings from our tester.

AJC (ENLARGE)

Dora Burke of the Better Health Tryout Team gave Good Measure Meals high marks.

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Robby Cantrell, 30, Cumming

Fresh 'n Fit Cuisine is a local food service that offers healthy meal plans with four options. I chose the 1,200-calorie plan for five days.

Let me start with the positives of this program. The food is fresh and not something that is prepared and frozen like some of the more well-known similar programs. I also like the flexibility of being able to choose between the frequency of the meals and options for the calorie count.

Unfortunately, my list of negatives far outweighs the positives. For my area, the plans start at $105 a week for the five-day 1,200-calorie program and go up to $150 a week for the seven-day 2,000-calorie plan. Depending on the program, that's at least $7 per meal for just one person. Another huge downside is that the consumer has no choice as to what meals he receives. The company prepares a menu in advance and posts it on its Web site. Which means if you do not like what it makes, then you are out of luck.

Of the breakfasts, I liked all of one, a scrambled-egg dish with a whole-wheat bagel. But others had muffins with raisins, and I don't eat raisins.

For the lunches and dinners, I would have liked most of the dishes, but someone must have told these people meals must be cooked with onions, and I do not like onions. There was a chicken salad with grapes and walnuts, but it had green onions. There was a Jamaican jerk chicken that was spicy and really good, but it was served with rice with onions. There was a good tilapia fillet — I liked all the seafood — but again, the side rice dish had onions.

The last issue I had was with the delivery. The timing of the delivery is not well-communicated, and subsequently I had perishable food left in a plastic bag on my front door one morning at 8. I was never told what time my food was going to be delivered; I was just told my next delivery was on Thursday. Thankfully, I was home but just not able to get to the door when she arrived. Had I not been at home, I would be seeking my money back or another delivery.

They really need to find ways to communicate better and make some weekend deliveries instead of just Mondays and Thursdays when people are out of the house more often. I also suggest they place the food in some sort of disposable cooler in case they have to leave it.

Robby's rating: 2 Stars (grin and bear it)

Dora Burke, 37, Atlanta

I tried Good Measure's five-day delivery meal plan. I love everything coming pre-measured and delivered to your home. Nothing could be more convenient or priced more reasonably. I sampled Good Measure in 2003 and since then, both food and menu have improved. I do not like the fact that you cannot pick and choose menu items, but that is just part of their business.

The program is endorsed by the Atlanta Bariatric Center, and some of the items do taste a bit like hospital food. My biggest complaint was I wish the ingredient list was on each package; I like to know what I am eating. And some of the food choices were disappointing.

If you are going to serve fish twice (which I think is a great idea — especially to get more people to eat fish), make it high quality, fresh fish. Both fish dishes were tasteless. Also, if there is fruit or vegetables, make them fresh — one side item was pineapple and it was from a can, another was flame-roasted peppers and they were soggy. I will say that I did like the two chicken dishes — both were grilled. One came with a nice bulgur with raisins and walnuts; the other with chili and fresh oranges.

The breakfasts were pretty good. There was a scrambled-egg dish I liked, and some peaches that were canned but still good, topped with granola.

Overall, I was shocked at the small volume; I now know what my portion sizes should be. I should say the portion size was perfect — it was clear that the meal sizes were the amount you are supposed to eat. I would recommend Good Measure; the good outweighs the bad.

Dora's rating: 4 stars (Worth a try)