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How to lower the price of plant-based meat

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Re: How to lower the price of plant-based meat

#371

Post by gedy »

gedy wrote: post #206
YeGoblynQueenne wrote: post #112

Earlier quoted context omitted.

>> Malnutrition from people eating fake meat? So far, not a problem. Because there aren't that many. For people eating a vegetarian or vegan diet, keeping well-fed is a real concern and not everyone is pulling it off. For example, the following article is about infant nutrition but some of its comments apply to adults: Vegetarian diets in childhood and adolescence : Position paper of the nutrition committee, German S…

Yeah I was raised (American) vegetarian from birth, and my parents did not consider the nutrition I needed when they cooked and I had anemia, underweight, etc. I was healthier after starting to eat meat at age 14

LOL that this personal fact was downvoted.

Re: How to lower the price of plant-based meat

#372

Post by nradov »

ookdatnog wrote: post #318
scottLobster wrote: post #237

Earlier quoted context omitted.

As an avid meat-eater (because nature almost by definition is living things eating other living things and humans evolved to be omnivorous for various nutritional reasons), my answer to the animal cruelty argument is just to buy the top-shelf, pasture-raised meats. It's better for my health and much better for the animals. Obviously I have no control over where restaurants source their food from, but I try to prefere…

> because nature almost by definition is living things eating other living things and humans evolved to be omnivorous for various nutritional reasons This is such a non-argument, and I'm saying this as a(n occasional) meat-eater. > nature almost by definition is living things eating other living things The default state for most living beings is scarcity. I think we all intuitively judge the morality of people's acti…

From a strict evidence-based medicine standpoint we don't have clear evidence for or against vegetarian diets. But if you look at elite athletes whose livelihoods depend on keeping their bodies in peak condition the vast majority consume at least some animal products. So empirically that should tell us something.

Re: How to lower the price of plant-based meat

#373

Post by beervirus »

ksec wrote: post #306

> With an impending global financial recession He didn't word it as "likely", or "may be". This reads to me as it will definitely happen. While I am not completely against the idea and certainly feel the real possibility of happening. It doesn't give a hint as to why.

If COVID didn’t do it, I’m not sure what will.

Re: How to lower the price of plant-based meat

#374

Post by omgwtfbyobbq »

gherkinnn wrote: post #264
WaitWaitWha wrote: post #143

A tangential topic - I really think that in general calling plant-based things "meat", a terrible idea. It does not promote plant-base diet or meat consumption reduction. It is trying to be what is not. I think it pushes away those who are on the cusp of moving towards plant-base foods. Why? Because the consumer is told it is "meat", so they will compare it to meat. They will compare these patties to a real, prime An…

I agree. As a meat eater, these recreations are a joke. They can just about compete with chicken nuggets. I don’t like nuggets. So I’ve come to regard them as inedible. Same goes for vegan “cheese”. Bleurgh. And the thing is, I love falafel. There’s bound to be plenty more plant-based patty things. Veggie dishes that don’t pretend to be something they’re not are delicious. Give me baked onions, baba ghanoush, and cel…

It could be. I eat meat, and my guess is that manufacturers label things as "meat", "milk", and so on, is to imply they can be used as replacements for those in certain circumstances.

I can also see why some people wouldn't like them. Take almond milk. To me, it's pretty good as a milk replacement in most cereal, but there are some where it kinda tastes off and dairy milk tastes great. I imagine veggie meat is similar.

YMMV of course.

Re: How to lower the price of plant-based meat

#375

Post by swixi »

BlargMcLarg wrote: post #334
ookdatnog wrote: post #318

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> because nature almost by definition is living things eating other living things and humans evolved to be omnivorous for various nutritional reasons This is such a non-argument, and I'm saying this as a(n occasional) meat-eater. > nature almost by definition is living things eating other living things The default state for most living beings is scarcity. I think we all intuitively judge the morality of people's acti…

>I am irritated by the weak justification though Pot, kettle. >Humans evolved the ability to eat meat because it increased their chances of survival in a hostile environment with scarce resources. It doesn't stop there. Humans have subsequently evolved to thrive on fatty foods. Our understanding of nutritional evolution is incredibly weak. Despite agriculture predominantly giving us access to carbohydrates, human bra…

>Many of today's health epidemics are linked to a lack of fat and an excess of carbohydrates.

I'm genuinely curious as to what you're getting at. When you say "excess of carbohydrates", are you referring specifically to processed foods or refined sugars?

>Try finding fatty fruits and veggies: they were incredibly scarce for most the human population until the last 100 years.

Maybe fatty fruits and veggies were scarce for most humans 100+ years ago, but I highly doubt nuts and seeds were. But that doesn't really matter if we're talking about what we can do today. Things like avocados, olives, coconuts, and the above-mentioned large categories of nuts and seeds, are readily available for most people making these sorts of arguments. Plus, if you're vegetarian and not vegan, then you have access to cheese, yogurt, milk, and eggs. It's easy to eat high fat and low carb while avoiding meat, so the argument for eating meat to be healthy on these grounds seems quite weak to me.

Re: How to lower the price of plant-based meat

#376

Post by Sevii »

danShumway wrote: post #367
ascar wrote: post #354

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It's a reasonable argument that government subsidies for farmers reduce prices for the consumer, but I don't think it's necessarily a correct assumption. Subsidies help the local farmers to compete with farmers in low cost countries. Transportation costs are usually insignificant. So without subsidies the consumer might pay the same price, but the store just ends up sourcing the product from a different country. Howe…

Taking your argument at face value and assuming you're right, I still want to point out that those subsidies are applied primarily to a subset of foods, especially feed crops for animals. Our government isn't spending nearly the same amount of time and money trying to subsidize fruits and vegetables. Shouldn't we be just as worried about those products being sourced from other countries? Why are we treating animal fe…

From a strategic perspective grain is the most important thing in a food shortage. People can live a year or two without fruit or vegetables, but without the calories in grain things will get violent fast.

Re: How to lower the price of plant-based meat

#377

Post by FalconSensei »

hunter-gatherer wrote: post #205
henrikschroder wrote: post #164

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> I think it pushes away those who are on the cusp of moving towards plant-base foods. I think you are completely wrong. People eat meat because they like the taste and the texture, but at the same time everyone knows that meat is produced by killing animals, and that it's much less sustainable than vegetarian food. If you want to get people to switch to meat alternatives, you have to keep everything that's great abo…

> People eat meat because they like the taste and the texture, but at the same time everyone knows that meat is produced by killing animals, and that it's much less sustainable than vegetarian food. I think this is too generous. Maybe I'm reading it wrong, but the implicit message here is that people actually care about the animals and sustainability of meat farming. My spouse is vegetarian and I'm whatever. I don't…

> Maybe I'm reading it wrong, but the implicit message here is that people actually care about the animals and sustainability of meat farming.

Given what I see people saying and doing - in person and online - seems that too many people don't even care about other people. People don't want to raise minimum wage because a burger would cost a few cents more. I have a hard time imagining them giving up their burgers because of the animals.

Re: How to lower the price of plant-based meat

#378

Post by lhorie »

singhrac wrote: post #368
lhorie wrote: post #356

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I agree. Back when I was young, my mom was talking to a friend about food and tofu came up. They had never heard of it and asked what it was like. My mom said it was kinda like cheese. Fast forward to the next time the friend was over, and they related that they had tried buying some tofu and hated it. Why? Because they figured to try to use it like they use cheese, and tried to put slices of tofu in a sandwich... Ca…

My disagreement with your comment is based on the words “veggie patties”, which I don’t think really capture what’s going on with “fake meat”. These are not boca burgers, mushroom burgers, or black bean burger (which I eat a lot of), but something that actually (afaict) tastes like meat.

I think there's definitely a gradient in terms of how "meat"-like veggie patties can be. What I take issue with is that instead of offering products for what they are and letting people build their culture around them, it feels like the food industry is essentially operating in tunnel-vision mode and perpetuating what IMHO is a pretty mediocre culinary culture.

So while you may get spicy veggie cake hotpots elsewhere in the world, in the US you get... air quotes burgers? To really understand what I mean, it would likely be eye opening to see what american fast food chains look like in Asia: they have an insane amount of variety that makes their counterparts in the US look like bad jokes. It took ages for McD to wake up to breakfast culture, and likewise for Lays to pick up on mexicans' taste for spicy snacks and now these are huge segments for them. I'm still dumbfounded that food company execs don't see the lost opportunity of not introducing more variety rather than trying to make everything conform to pre-establish molds.

Re: How to lower the price of plant-based meat

#379

Post by philliphaydon »

Tade0 wrote: post #242
curiousllama wrote: post #188

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The place you’re right is in the “slab of meat” category: the only thing that’ll replace steak is lab-grown meat, and then only partially. And I agree that, eg bean burgers do well to market themselves as different. It’s a legit point. But this new fake meat stuff reduced my meat intake significantly. It’s is FANTASTIC for replacing low-quality meat in a lot of cases. I have no need for ground beef/turkey/pork if I h…

I remember trying a Beyond Burger for the first time. Overall impression was that had some fastfood chains replaced their patties with this, not only nobody would notice that what they're eating isn't actually meat, but also they would be happy with how the quality improved. There's of course the question of price, but I'm sure with adequate scale it can be brought down.

I’m not sure “nobody” would notice. I’ve had impossible meat burger and beyond meat burger. The beyond meat was disgusting. It wasn’t even slightly convincing. Impossible was more convincing texture wise but taste wise it makes you look at what you’re eating cos it’s like “huh it feels like meat but doesn’t taste like it...”
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