ONCE a Week FAQ

What is ONCE a Week?

ONCE a Week is a CSA (Community Supported Agriculture) share style distribution of cooked food, prepared in one day by a team of chefs, from locally grown ingredients, to be picked up or delivered to you to support your meal needs throughout the week.

It makes a great alternative to dining on take out a few times a week, and is an excellent solution for new parents, busy professionals and slammed students.  Regular members have reported that they feel better and even lose unwanted weight when eating our food.

How can I sign up?

Please click here to use our online ordering system.

Alternately, email This e-mail address is being protected from spambots. You need JavaScript enabled to view it with your name, address and contact phone and email, and we will contact you to make payment and delivery arrangements.·

Where do you cook?

We rent a commercial kitchen.  Cuisine en Locale is a licensed caterer and our chefs hold managerial level ServSafe Certification.  We carry the insurances and licenses required to cook food and sell it – personal chef to you.

Who is actually cooking my food?

There is a solid team of people who cook regularly, once a week, just for this program.
The members remain fairly consistent, and on any given week we are made up of a couple of experienced chefs, accompanied by a few excellent pairs of prep hands.

What does one share look like?

A share is usually in one brown paper,  grocery sized bag, and contains 7-10 containers, including pints, quarts and aluminum trays.
The average share weighs in at 8.5 lbs.

But how much food is that?

We have found one share to be enough food for eight average sized meals when used with fresh salad, rice, vegetables etc…
That could mean a lot of lunches and a few dinners, or vice versa, for one person. Or it could mean 2 meals for a family, or a pot luck dinner party for eight! It is up to you to use the food however it works best for you.

Is all the food savory? 

Most of the food is savory, but we do include the occasional baked item, when it makes sense to us, just to mix it up.  Since we use honey and maple to sweeten food, it is never as sweet as a typical dessert.

Why can't I find next week's menu?

The neat thing about what we do is that it's  incredibly fresh.  We get food directly from local farmers the weekend before we cook.  Our chefs brainstorm during the weekend, but the menu doesn't even exist until the morning we fire up the stove.  It's finalized and sent out only after the cooking is complete.

Why can’t you accommodate dietary restrictions?

Our price point  is startlingly low for locavore fare specifically because we cook all the food together.
If we start to break shares apart we run into problems.  We hope you will share with friends if a dish does not suit your tastes one week.

Why don’t you offer a vegetarian option?

We absolutely recognize a desire for a vegetarian share, and take that very seriously, but when we did offer a vegetarian share there were never enough orders to make it work.  If you want a referral to a vegetarian or vegan personal chef, please feel free to contact us, we are happy to point you in the right direction

It seems like a lot of work, why do you do this?

We believe that healthy food should be an easy thing to find, ready for you when you want it, and that it should not be exclusively people with the time or inclination to cook who can eat fresh, local food, that isn’t full of preservatives, fats and salts.  We hope that you enjoy the Shared Food Program in the eating, as much as we do in the cooking.

If it isn’t fun, it’s not worth doing, and we find it very, very fun indeed!

Can you explain the pricing?

We sell individual shares for $145 a week, packaging and delivery within Cambridge and Somerville.
If you are going to order four shares, we recommend signing up for a ‘month’, for $520, including delivery.
We also offer a buy 12 get one free plan for $1700
Delivery outside of the Cambridge/Somerville area is $20, within 8 miles.  Please contact us for details.
Our packaging is reusable, and it is BPA free.

Where do you deliver to?

Cambridge, Somerville and the closest parts of Boston are included in the cost of the share.  Beyond that there is a fee- we are happy to deliver to you if you are within the metro area.  Please get in touch with us if you have a question about the delivery fee.

When do you deliver?

Home deliveries arrive between 10am and 6pm on Tuesdays.  

Our JP Centre Yoga pick-up can be retrieved between 5:30pm and 9pm on Tuesdays. 

What if I'm not home?

If you won't be around to receive your home delivery, you can leave out a medium-sized cooler with ice packs in a designated area for us to leave your food. 

Alternatively, you can schedule to pick up your share at JP Centre Yoga (670 Centre St, 3rd Floor) in Jamaica Plain.

Where can I see some past menus?

Right here: ONCE a Week Menus

Can I try it once to see if I like it?

Yes, absolutely.  We always offer single shares.

Thank you!  We can't wait to feed you - CeL