Heather's Choice is not freeze dried, it's dehydrated, which IMO is superior to freeze-dried because it packs smaller. The downside is it does take longer to rehydrate.
The other plusses, it's real food, not so much sugar or salt. High quality protein sources. The calorie count is also higher than ones like Mountain House.
In my experience Peak Refuel is pretty good, but I haven't tried a ton in the Mountain House category.
When you say MRE - I immediately think Meal Ready to Eat which is (to me) a military heavy weight meal (that I regularly eat in the mil).
And if you want that advice - then I like Chicken, Egg Noodles, and Vegetables or the Spaghetti. I’m usually so hungry that I generally like just about all MREs (prob my desperation).
But maybe you meant lightweight freeze dried meals like Mtn House, Peak, or others.
I have eaten a few of the readywise meals that I got for around $5 a meal and am not super impressed. Mtn house, peak and backpackers pantry taste much better but at over twice the price I don't mind eating the ready wise while in the Backcountry.
The one your stomach can handle and you can eat for days on end- very person dependent. Go try a few and see where you land. Single serve packets of hot sauce/salsa and a foil pack of protein can be a big help in palatability.
Good:
Peak homestyle chicken and rice
Mountainhouse biscuits and gravy
Mountain house beef stroganoff pro-pak
Pack packers pantry granola w/banana and milk
Mountain house chili mac
Peak chili mac
Peak breakfast skillet
Not great:
Heather's choice Shepard pie
Bad:
Alpine beef stew
Heather choice chicken and rice.
Not any specific meals, but I prefer backpackers pantry to MH. I basically just choke them down, so I don't really go out there and sample them. With any meal, I typically rehydrate potato buds and maybe a ramen pack in the bag at the same time just for the calories, so I have never focused much on taste. That said the chili recipes tend to lend themselves to that.
MH Biscuits and Gravy
Peak Strawberry Granola
MH Beef Stroganoff
MH Chicken and Dumplings
I tried a bunch of the Peak meals after reading a ton of hype and thought they were okay, but I like MH more and didn't notice a difference in how I felt after eating either one.