My fiancé and I do not argue over much but meal time was something we used to fight about all the time. Before I moved to Seattle, I went into the office every day and my company provided free breakfast, lunch, and dinner so it was an adjustment when I relocated and worked more from home. As a program manager, I usually had meetings all morning and then by lunch time, I was starving but had no time to make a good lunch. Sometimes I only had 30 minutes for lunch so I didn’t want to spend all that time cooking.

On the other hand, my fiancé can’t cook so we tried many things to solve our issues:

Meal prepping did not work for us because I do not like to eat the same thing two meals in a row nor did we want to spend our weekends cooking up meals. I also continuously struggled with food waste because we would have leftover ingredients and not be able to fully use the rest for another recipe. So then we tried using UberEats and DoorDash. Sometimes, our orders came too late, cold, or not at all. Costs were adding up fast even with UberEats gift card deal at Costco. It also became too hard for us to plan ahead and sometimes we were ordering right before lunch because we forgot to order the night before. We also tried Costco meals but that got old fast since they have the same pre-made meals and it would take us days to get through one of those with just two people.

When it comes to mealtime, we kept thinking, is there other options that would be more affordable, fast, and give us variety? That’s when we discovered Tovala and Suvie. We ended up choosing Tovala (save $300 with my referral link for Tovala) and we love it! We highly recommend it to all of our friends who also looking for an easy way to make meals during the work week.

Tovala vs Suvie – which is right for you?

I think that both Tovala and Suvie have benefits and its worth having a discussion about both. Great technology and more people need to know about it! For us, Tovala Oven Pro made the most sense but we would consider Suvie if our circumstances changed (both cost the same, $12.99/meal). Here’s the key differences, with clean-up and variety being our decision makers:

• Technology: Suvie has superior features where you schedule your meals. That means you can prep in the morning, have it refrigerate until your set cook time, and the food is ready hours later. Great if you prep in the morning, go to work, and then want dinner ready when you come home. Also the Suvie screen is nicer and shows more information
• Clean-up: Suvie delivers the ingredients in bags and customers will dump the ingredients into metal bins. Those metal bins need to be washed which means that you need to run your dishwasher after lunch and before dinner. That was too much clean-up effort for us.
• Surface Space: Suvie requires more space so if you have a smaller kitchen or limited counter space, Tovala might be better option
• Capacity: Suvie can cook more food unlike Tovala which is limited to two meals at a time. While Suvie’s larger capacity is great, their options when ordering meals is more geared towards 2+ people. Tovala is single serving where you can order two of a recipe if you are a couple, allowing more flexibility.
• Variety: based on research and also reviewing both company’s current meal options, Tovala has more variety and more ethnic foods. Suvie has more American style food options and less options overall.

Review of Tovala Smart Oven Pro

No meal service is perfect so after several months, here is the things we like and don’t like:

Pros

• Ability to filter for allergens and those settings persist (we have a severe nut allergy) – however there is no way to note it on your profile so if you forget to order your meals, then it automatically orders you whatever. This shouldn’t be an issue for most because you can set your meals up to one month in advance so you have plenty of time to order or skip
• You are getting a very nice 6-in-1 oven for $50 (after the promo offer is completed)! It works standalone without the meal subscription; it can bake, steam, air fry, reheat, toast, and broil.
• How fast and easy it is to prepare. Prep takes 1-3 minutes for two meals
• Portions are good
• Every week, they have meals for two-person or four-person that is more affordable (as low as $8.99/meal)
• Transparency – shows which meals require extra prep, extra charges, how many meals fit in the oven
• Prices are reasonable, even the extra charges for premium protein options are in line with cost of premium protein
• Add-on per meal allow flexible for those that need more food
• Flexible meal plan: 4-16 meals options
• All meals 15-25 min cook time and prep is only 1-3 min unless otherwise stated
• Customization to partially/fully season and add or not include ingredients to match taste preference
• It’s a multi-purpose mini oven so you can use it for more than Tovala meals, we have warmed up food in it, used it to air fry, bake, and cook our own recipes. It has now replaced our Ninja Air Fryer we used to have because its more versatile
• Customer service – I have had three issues so far and customer service has taken care of me each time: 1) chipped baking tray, 2) ripped bag of protein, and 3) quality issue with shrimp
• Push notification on your phone when the food is ready so that it doesn’t overcook (oven turns off once the timer ends but there is residual heat)

Cons

• Shrimp only lasts 2-3 days upon receipt so recommend to limit your shrimp orders or freeze some of your shrimp
• Limited vegetarian options and recipes repeat – we are not vegetarians so not an issue
• Protein and steak options cost more. For some, a filet mignon meal for $20 might be considered too expensive – when we compare how much we spend to eat out, we found that even premium meals with Tovala is cheaper
• Max two meals can be cooked at once for most. On Oct 15, 2025, they announced meals for families (4 people), but we have yet to try it!
• Some meals only fit one in the oven – although we have never had issues using the air fryer tray and putting some food at the top shelf
• Delivery options only Monday or Thursday; cannot have both days in a week
• $10.99 delivery fee – flat fee regardless how many meals you order, similar for other meal plans
• There’s a bit of packaging so people into sustainability might not enjoy the individual waste
• While they have ethnic food options, some might not find the recipe completely authentic. They have some common base ingredients they use across recipes. For example, we ordered a Singapore noodle bowl and normally that is made with glass noodles, but they used egg noodles. For Asian bowls, they use basmati rice whereas some Asian cuisines use jasmine or long grain white rice.

If you are interested in Tovala, save $300 with my referral link for Tovala. And checkout Tovala Meal Ratings page for which recipes I have tried and my rating of each.

Kitchen Tools You Will Need with Tovala

• Kitchen Scissors
• Oven Mittens or Silicone Finger Mitts
• Aluminum Foil – get the roll that is 12 inches wide, fits perfectly with the Tovala tray
• Oil Spray – I love this specific one because it is high quality and refillable with whatever oil you want to put in there
• Tongs
• Trivets