That's really cool. Although I wish there were more vegan food that didn't try to replicate non-vegan textures and flavors. Imitation can only be playing catch-up. The best vegan and vegetarian food does its own thing.
You know, I'm not a vegan, nor even a vegetarian. But as I've gotten older (I'm knocking on 52 - and god damn used to love a nicely cooked fillet steak!) I've found my eating habits tending more towards vegetarian. The last red meat I ate was a year ago...not through health reasons, but because I've kinda gone off it. I still eat some chicken, but even then it's a dwindling part of my diet.
I'm not an extremist, but as I've gotten older, I've begun to find the idea of eating another living being more than slightly repugnant. It's not that I've succumbed to vegan ideology, but I kinda got here by myself. I'm lucky to live in a rural area and bump into cows and sheep all the time. This may sound a bit odd, but I see them and interact with them and one day thought what nice affectionate(?)/curious animals and then, boom! would I kill and eat my cats?
I even recently realised that most of the clothes that I wear are mostly synthetic or cotton based, even the boots I wear. The thought of walking around in another being's slaughtered and dead skin kinda irked me for a few years so I try to buy "man-made" foot wear now.
I think the trick with becoming vegetarian (a starting point) and onto becoming vegan (though I still love eggs; if we treat egg layers nice, and if we treat cows nice can't we still have eggs and milk for a while?) we need to learn how to season and spice our meals to make them appealing.
I'm about 85% of the way there were it not for some dairy products, and in a rural area having better availability to a wider range of vegetables - which believe it or not doesn't happen. And also where I can buy individual carrots, onions, sweet potato by weight....etc (I'm single - don't need a bag of 20 carrots!).
I'm also not sure, philosophically, about the idea of creating synthetic meats to remind us of what it was like to eat a factory slaughtered animal - it seems like creating a video game to satisfy some needs to be 18th century slave owners.
If we had better knowledge about how to make vegetables more inviting, and more available, we wouldn't need this. I ate a vegetarian lasagne the other day, it was glorious. Sure some dairy products were involved but no cows died upside down in a factory being bolted through their skulls...but yes I am aware of the factory farming of milk cows to the tremendous detriment of their health and comfort.
Becoming vegan is a hard thing. I still crave Gressingham "chinese duck", pancakes and hoisin (I use my own, their's is shit).....but I am striving towards this. I genuinely don't think synthetic meats aid this cause.
I am also trying to become a better human and not exploit other living beings for my tastebud sensory gratification.
