June 24, 2026, 5:05 a.m. ET
- Balanced Bites, a new healthy meal prep business, has opened in Danielson, Connecticut.
- The business offers a weekly rotating menu of macro-friendly meals for online order and pickup.
- Founder Maegen Zach plans to soon expand to offer indoor and outdoor dining options.
- The business has seen rapid growth, doubling its meal production in one week and gaining a strong social media following.
- A grand opening and ribbon-cutting ceremony is scheduled for Friday, June 26.
After cooking healthy meals for her friends for two years, Balanced Bites Founder and Head Chef Maegen Zach realized she could help so many more people with their diets.
And when the storefront at 113C School St. in Danielson, which was previously occupied by Moon Magick Café by Chey, opened up in January, Zach knew she had the perfect spot to house her business. She chose that location, as she likes the size of the building and its location in Danielson, which she believes is up and coming.
“I thought this year back in January when this spot came available, what am I waiting for?,” Zach said. “I might as well just open this as a business and be able to help tons of different people with their nutrition and also give them healthy meal choices.”
Balanced Bites serves balanced, healthy meals and offers a menu that changes every week. For the week of June 21, the business is serving cookies and cream overnight oats and protein waffles for breakfast and turkey chili, barbecue chicken and sweet potato nachos, as well as a Mediterranean chicken and potato bowl for lunch/dinner.
The business’ model
Since May 18, Zach has been meal prepping Balanced Bites’ menu items and customers have been making their orders online and picking them up in the store on Tuesdays. All meals are designed to feed one person and all that customers need to do once they get home is heat up their orders.
Within the next few weeks, Zach said she plans to open Balanced Bites during the week for indoor and outdoor dining.
“I’d like people to be able to come in and grab a healthy lunch and sit with some friends or grab dinner to go,” Zach said.
Zach added that there is not another business quite like hers in eastern Connecticut.
“I think there’s a need for this in our area. There’s nothing like it around,” Zach said. “I mean there’s other restaurants that have healthy options, but there is no place that does meal prepping around here.”
Positive response
Zach said business is booming for Balanced Bites. For the week of June 15, Balanced Bites made more than 200 meals, which is double what they made the previous week.
The restaurant has also built a strong following on social media. As of June 23, the Balanced Bites Facebook page had 1,700 followers and the business’ Instagram had 350 followers.
Customers appreciate that the amount of protein, carbohydrates and fats are listed on the restaurant’s menu, so they know the nutritional value of each meal. Balanced Bites has already received several positive Facebook reviews, which have spoken about the high quality of the food. Zach is pleased with the start Balanced Bites has gotten off to, as she takes great pride in the meals she makes.
“I love things to look amazing,” Zach said. “If you go on to my social media, you’ll see this past week we did a strawberry fields salad and it was extremely colorful and had fresh strawberries on it. Everything is thought out and put together and is created in a way that the macros and all the nutrition works with it.”
Grand opening and ribbon cutting
Balanced Bites will host its grand opening and ribbon cutting at the restaurant on Friday, June 26 at 4 p.m. The event will feature free samples, which will give guests a chance to try food from Balanced Bites.
