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Bloody Plant Burger Smells, Tastes and Sizzles Like Meat

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Re: Bloody Plant Burger Smells, Tastes and Sizzles Like Meat

#231

Post by fakemeatsubs »

ZenoArrow wrote: post #226
bradbeattie wrote: post #68

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I'm in the same camp as you. Vegetarian since 1989, vegan since 1999. I can certainly say that the quality of fake meats has drastically improved in the past 10 years (see https://gardein.com/ , http://fieldroast.com/ , and http://beyondmeat.com/ as examples), but the stigma surrounding them persists. Short anecdote: There's a donut shop in my town that sold vegan and regular donuts in adjacent but separate displays.…

From a marketing perspective, I'd suggest the way to shift perceptions would be to run taste test challenges similar to the ones Pepsi ran back in the day. If the burgers are as close to meat versions as they say then it could be good to have people who are reluctant to try it to at least give it a go. Even if they can still tell the difference, the difficulty in telling them apart may be enough to change the percept…

ones Pepsi ran back in the day

Werent those shown to be flawed? My source is Gladwells books, but the pepsi vs coke taste test favoured pepsi because it was sweeter. But in drinking the full can people found pepsi overwhelmingly sweet and coke was more popular. My guess would be a similar thing would happen. You could optimise to appeal to low-quantity taste tests. but as a full proper meal a lot needs to be done (imo)

Re: Bloody Plant Burger Smells, Tastes and Sizzles Like Meat

#232

Post by fakemeatsubs »

pvelagal wrote: post #204
wil421 wrote: post #92

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Not a vegetarian but I do go out with many Indian colleagues who are vegetarian and have family members or friends who dont eat meat. I do agree with the assumption that western vegetarians tend to want meat replacements. The biggest difference for me was seeing how a lot of Indian cuisine is actually unhealthy. Most everything is fried in oil or has so much clarified butter its unhealthy. The Indian diet (at least t…

Many Indian restaurants try to focus more on taste of the dish and hence the dishes tend to be not-so-healthy. But, traditional Indian cooking doesn't have the same levels of oils or clarified butter. The dishes are pretty healthy and filling too. Things have gotten bad only since the past 2-3 decades with the adoption of hydrogenated oils, refined grains.

My experience runs slightly against yours. Yes the restaurant food is more on the tasty but unhealthy. But even in general I've found the vegetarian indian diet to still be high in fats and sugar. Empirically (I havent checked the data on this) theres a lot of diabetes (related to carbohydrates) and cholesterol problems in india (related to fats, kind of). my call is despite being vegetarian, the typical indian isn't any more healthier than say the typical american if we're just looking at diet alone.

Re: Bloody Plant Burger Smells, Tastes and Sizzles Like Meat

#233

Post by lambda »

bradbeattie wrote: post #68
ergothus wrote: post #26

I've been a vegetarian for the last decade and change, and I simultaneously think that finding a cheaper, appealing alternative to meat is both a fantastic opportunity for the world and a really difficult thing. I used to love meat when I was a meat-eater, and I'm a fairly picky eater that dislikes many vegetable options. (Green peppers are nasty and food-destroying in my opinion, which immediately removes over half…

I'm in the same camp as you. Vegetarian since 1989, vegan since 1999. I can certainly say that the quality of fake meats has drastically improved in the past 10 years (see https://gardein.com/ , http://fieldroast.com/ , and http://beyondmeat.com/ as examples), but the stigma surrounding them persists. Short anecdote: There's a donut shop in my town that sold vegan and regular donuts in adjacent but separate displays.…

Yeah, I've worked next to a lunch place that describes itself as "plant inspired" rather than "vegan." It turns out that everything they serve is vegan, and they'll confirm it if you ask, but by taking the word "vegan" out of anything public-facing, it's a lot easier to get people to be interested in eating there.

I personally eat a low-meat diet (no more than 3 servings of meat a week), but don't generally feel the need to eat any kind of meat-substitutes; there are plenty of delicious, already vegetarian or already vegan foods. It does help eating only vegetarian and not fully vegan; cheese and eggs are good sources of both flavor and protein, and make a good "center" of a dish or "main course" of a meal that is sometimes hard to do with purely vegan food without substitutes, but I've also had plenty of delicious fully vegan meals without meat substitutes.

And even when getting closer to meat base dishes, I'm personally more likely to order a "black bean burger" or "chickpea burger" than a generic "veggie burger"; it helps to know what I'm getting, while a lot of the meat substitutes are complicated and processed. And for those processed items that do more often act as a stand in for meat, I generally prefer the more minimally processed ones like seitan, tempeh, or tofu, rather than a "tofu burger" that has a whole bunch of other things in it to make it more similar to a hamburger.

Re: Bloody Plant Burger Smells, Tastes and Sizzles Like Meat

#234

Post by csours »

ergothus wrote: post #26

I've been a vegetarian for the last decade and change, and I simultaneously think that finding a cheaper, appealing alternative to meat is both a fantastic opportunity for the world and a really difficult thing. I used to love meat when I was a meat-eater, and I'm a fairly picky eater that dislikes many vegetable options. (Green peppers are nasty and food-destroying in my opinion, which immediately removes over half…

Someone fed me a veggie burger once, several years ago, without telling me it was a veggie burger. I insisted there was something wrong with it, but they said it was fine. They finally told me it was a veggie burger, and it all made sense.

I would MUCH rather have had a good vegetarian dish that wasn't trying to be something else.

Re: Bloody Plant Burger Smells, Tastes and Sizzles Like Meat

#235

Post by fakemeatsubs »

pyre wrote: post #136
matt4077 wrote: post #97

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Well, in Africa chicken isn't regarded as meat, to give one example from my own experience. In western countries, there's some ambiguity around eggs, fish, and possibly lard but only as far as vegetarians can't all agree on those either.

Also, gelatin is considered vegetarian by some, or at least there are some vegetarians that don't realize that gelatin is an animal product (just some sort of "mystery" ingredient, I guess).

Going by wiki, I believe there are non-animal sources or substitutes to gelatin "Partial, nonanimal alternatives to gelatin include the seaweed extracts agar and carrageenan, as well as pectin and konjac.".

Re: Bloody Plant Burger Smells, Tastes and Sizzles Like Meat

#236

Post by ZeroGravitas »

maerF0x0 wrote: post #214
pombrand wrote: post #168

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Huge problem with the vegan meat replacements is that they're a lot more expensive than beef, around $7/lb vs ground beef at $3/lb. Like with coal vs solar, for imitation meat to win the market it needs to get less expensive than real meat (and taste as good).

Or the subsidies that hide the facts. Beef is very expensive in the sense of TCO, but not that expensive at the grocery store. See: http://michaelpollan.com/profiles/the-high-price-of-cheap-fo... for a good read on the matter. a snip: "The industrial food chain does produce food more cheaply, in terms of the price you pay at McDonald’s or the supermarket,” replies Pollan, “but the real cost of cheap food is not refle…

Which is also the case for coal, which makes the original comparison very apt, though I'm not sure if that was intended.

Re: Bloody Plant Burger Smells, Tastes and Sizzles Like Meat

#237

Post by anotheryou »

pappyo wrote: post #109
anotheryou wrote: post #102

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I think they try to do something similar to what the cow does when growing muscles (chaining proteins or whatever). So I think it browns the same. Why chuck? Once this gets cheaper in production than meat burger, but still tastes exactly the same, the big fast-food chains might join the boat. So I guess they try to stay close to that.

I know why chuck, I was just being snarky. :) I'm not going to sit here and pretend to know what, the good people of Impossible Foods, are doing. Way over my head. What I do know is recreating nature is hard work, with limited success.

ah sorry :) alright. As a non native vegetarian I don't even really know what "chuck" is, haha...

Re: Bloody Plant Burger Smells, Tastes and Sizzles Like Meat

#238

Post by fakemeatsubs »

Xixi wrote: post #184
pyre wrote: post #136

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Also, gelatin is considered vegetarian by some, or at least there are some vegetarians that don't realize that gelatin is an animal product (just some sort of "mystery" ingredient, I guess).

For those who are wondering if there are alternative to animal gelatin, Japanese have been using agar [1] (they call it kanten ) for centuries to prepare sweets. It's similar to gelatin, but made from algae, so it is absolutely vegetarian. As far as I know all Japanese traditional sweets that require something gelatinous are made with it, so they are safe to it if you are vegetarian/vegan. [1] https://en.wikipedia.or…

Wow, I didn't realise that agar the same products used in science experiments/testing was also the food thing (wiki lists uses as microbiology and culinary) . I recall the smell of the agar used in the lab to be very strong and quite off putting if thought of as a food. Has your experience of the aroma of culinary agar been positive?

Re: Bloody Plant Burger Smells, Tastes and Sizzles Like Meat

#239

Post by lindseya »

As a vegan, I'm very excited by this news because it might convince others to give it a try. Today someone told me that they recently ate a chicken burger at Veggie Grill and she didn't know until later that it was not chicken. She said at the time she thought, that was a really good chicken sandwich!

Re: Bloody Plant Burger Smells, Tastes and Sizzles Like Meat

#240

Post by douche »

saynsedit wrote: post #58
sevenless wrote: post #42

Earlier quoted context omitted.

One potential problem: the heme that they're claiming gives it flavor comes from a genetically modified yeast. It's a GMO, and people who're vegan on principle often don't like that.

What does being "vegan on principle" mean here? What specific principles are you talking about? Some vegans do it because killing animals is morally bankrupt. Some vegans do it because raising livestock is unsustainable. There is not enough land on earth for everyone to have a meat diet. Some vegans do it because it's healthier. In general you can expect to ingest less toxins by eating lower on the food chain. I'm no…

A vegan or vegetarian diet (as commonly practiced, with loads of grains, potatoes, sugar, etc, etc) tends to be much less healthy than a meat-loaded keto diet.
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