Frequently asked
Questions,
answered.Most-asked questions about Sous Chef — how it plans, how the trial works, what makes it different from meal kits and recipe apps.
The basics
What is Sous Chef?+
Sous Chef is a personalized meal planning app that learns your household through conversation and builds a full week of dinners and lunches tailored to your family's tastes, dietary restrictions, and schedule.
How is Sous Chef different from a recipe app?+
Sous Chef doesn't give you a library to browse — it builds a plan for your specific household. It knows your members, their dietary restrictions, what cuisines you love, and how much time you have on weeknights. The plan changes every week based on what you want and what worked before.
How is Sous Chef different from a meal kit like HelloFresh?+
Meal kits send you a box of pre-portioned ingredients with recipes. Sous Chef plans your meals and grocery list — you shop how you want, including farmers markets and specialty stores. There's no box, no packaging, and no rotation of the same six proteins every few weeks.
How long does it take to plan a week?+
Five to ten minutes for the conversation, plus about a minute for Sous Chef to build the plan. After the first time, planning a new week takes about three minutes — Sous Chef already knows your household.
Household, dietary, and family
Does Sous Chef handle dietary restrictions?+
Yes — per household member. Sous Chef tracks allergies (with severity), intolerances, religious restrictions, and medical dietary needs for each person in your household. It never suggests a meal that conflicts with a stored restriction.
Can I plan around picky eaters and kids?+
Yes. You tell Sous Chef who's at your table — adults, kids, even babies on solids — and it weights recipes accordingly. It also generates a per-recipe "kid strategy" with simple swaps that keep the meal usable for the whole table.
What if my household changes — new partner, new baby, kid moves out?+
Update your household profile in settings. Sous Chef adjusts immediately: portion sizes, restrictions, and the planning prompt all reweight around the new lineup.
Does Sous Chef learn what we like over time?+
Yes. Every meal can be rated — grand slam, hit, good, miss, disaster. That feedback feeds into a per-household preference profile that shapes future plans. The longer you use it, the more accurate the plans get.
Pricing and trial
Is there a free version of Sous Chef?+
Yes. Your first two full weeks of meal planning are free — no credit card required. This is the complete product experience, not a limited demo.
What does Sous Chef cost?+
Sous Chef is $12.99/month billed monthly, or $99.99/year (which works out to $8.33/month — save 36%). Your first two weeks are always free.
Can I cancel anytime?+
Yes. Cancel from settings at any time. If you cancel an annual plan, you keep access for the remainder of the year you've paid for.
How the plan works
Where do the recipes come from?+
Sous Chef writes the recipes itself for each plan, based on your household profile and what's in season. They're not pulled from a library — that's why your plan changes every week and is built around the people at your table.
Can I shop wherever I want?+
Yes. The grocery list is yours to shop however you like — supermarket, warehouse store, farmer's market, butcher, specialty grocers. Nothing about Sous Chef ties you to a delivery service.
What's the "efficiency map"?+
Each plan includes an ingredient efficiency map — a per-ingredient breakdown of which recipes use it. It's how Sous Chef makes sure that 4 oz of fresh thyme you bought gets used up across multiple meals instead of dying in the back of the fridge.
Will I ever get the same plan twice?+
No. Sous Chef rebuilds the plan each week using your latest household state, your meal feedback, and seasonality — so the lineup keeps moving even when your tastes don't.
App and platforms
Is there a mobile app?+
Yes — iOS and Android. The web app and mobile app share the same household and plan history, so you can chat with Sous Chef on one device and cook from another.
Does Sous Chef work offline?+
The mobile app caches your latest plan locally, so you can pull up your recipes and grocery list on weak signal at the grocery store. Building a new plan still requires a connection.
Still curious?
The best way to know is to try it.
Two full weeks free — the whole product, your real household.