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Vegan cheese has quietly but steadily infiltrated mainstream supermarket shelves

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Re: Vegan cheese has quietly but steadily infiltrated mainstream supermarket shelves

#311

Post by hjek »

cheese_goddess wrote: post #288
screwt wrote: post #271

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Easy! People have lots of different reasons why they may choose not to eat meat or dairy. "Not liking the taste" is one possible reason. If that particular one isn't your reason, then you may still miss the taste/texture of certain foods, so having a substitute helps.

Who said anything about liking or disliking the taste of meat? If you're vegan, you don't want to eat meat, for whatever reason. What sense does it make to then pretend to eat meat anyway? If you like meat so much you just have to have it, then what sense does it make to be vegan? Be flexitarian. Eat meat once a year, every Easter Sunday. Eat vegentarian. I don't know! But at least accept the fact that you can't stan…

> For me, anyone who eats pretend-meat or pretend-dairy is a pretend-vegan.

I love that you can get all the taste without the violence and suffering. Eating is not always a single-person activity, so having vegan substitutes for meat and cheese is great when eating together with non-vegans who may be wary of falafels.

There are very few vegans who are vegans because of taste. Many are worried about the environmental impacts of mass animal agriculture killing trillions of animals every year.

The most prominent and outspoken animal liberation advocates — Ali Tabrizi and Ed Winters come to mind — are strong proponents of vegan-dairy, vegan-seafood and vegan-meat. It really doesn't make sense to call those people "pretend vegans". Check their talks and films[0][1], they aren't "making a joke of the whole idea of being vegan".

I don't get why carnists place such importance on real suffering and real death. Is it not real Adidas shoes if it isn't made by slave labour or something? Is it not a real car if it's not guzzling diesel? Why not cut down on causing harm when it's so easy? I don't get it.

[0]: Earthling Ed vs Infowars: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ScbeMdYkKDc

[1]: Land of Hope and Glory: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=RF3VOpa3a7c

Re: Vegan cheese has quietly but steadily infiltrated mainstream supermarket shelves

#312

Post by proc0 »

whimsicalism wrote: post #303
proc0 wrote: post #212

Earlier quoted context omitted.

We have blood sausages, why wouldn't we drink some animals milk. Humans have been also eating entrails and brains for a long time, so milk is just another ingredient in the omnivorous diet of humans. You point out the for-profit incentives of dairy industry, but surely you don't think that it is much different for non-dairy/vegan products. Of course they are also pushing for same kind of acceptance at societal level,…

> for-profit incentives of dairy industry The fact that demand for dairy was "manufactured" is somewhat orthogonal to whether or not it is for-profit. Vegan cheeses aren't subsidized at 73 cents on the dollar, dairy is.

Ok, I can grant dairy should not be subsidized. It would make it more expensive but that would be fair, and eating cheese would be something a bit more special, as it should.

Re: Vegan cheese has quietly but steadily infiltrated mainstream supermarket shelves

#313

Post by dukeyukey »

fader wrote: post #208
js2 wrote: post #81

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I tend to agree with this. I'm not a vegetarian, but if I were, I'd wouldn't eat imitation animal products anymore than I'd drink non-alcoholic beer. I'm happy to eat vegetarian food. It stands on its own as delicious. One of the best "burgers" I've ever had was made with black beans and wasn't trying to imitate meat. (It was at The Vortex in Atlanta years ago.) Imitation products that I've tried have always just lef…

I hear this sort of thing a lot but don't quite understand it. I've been a vegetarian for eight years, but I eat meat substitute products. I have ethical issues with eating meat and I feel considerably better physically when I don't eat meat, but that doesn't mean that meat doesn't taste good. I'm quite happy to be able to pop some Quorn mycoprotein into a casserole and eat comfort foods of my childhood without havin…

For me most imitation meats just don't hit the same notes. One of the mainstays of my childhood was a lamb and leek stew called cawl. I've tried different meat substitutes but none get the right flavour there. Ironically, the closest I've gotten is to skip meat replacements and just put some butter in, it produces the same creamy, fatty taste lamb meat does.

Re: Vegan cheese has quietly but steadily infiltrated mainstream supermarket shelves

#314

Post by tpoacher »

JoeAltmaier wrote: post #279
tpoacher wrote: post #180

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I don't mind people calling something "vegan cheese" or "vegan milk" or "milk alternative" etc. But I do mind people calling it "cheese" or "milk" intentionally when it's a vegan alternative, revelling in the confusion, just to give the impression that they're interchangeable and it's really no big deal if you get the vegan version instead. Like, wtf is almond milk? When I was a kid, almond milk was super tasty, and…

Huh? Almond milk goes back 500 years and has always, always been made of only almonds. It would be very strange to rename it after 200 generations and several civilizations have come and gone.

Yes you're right that was a bad example. My bad choice of specific example shouldn't dismiss the more general point though.

Re: Vegan cheese has quietly but steadily infiltrated mainstream supermarket shelves

#315

Post by gbrown »

fader wrote: post #208
js2 wrote: post #81

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I tend to agree with this. I'm not a vegetarian, but if I were, I'd wouldn't eat imitation animal products anymore than I'd drink non-alcoholic beer. I'm happy to eat vegetarian food. It stands on its own as delicious. One of the best "burgers" I've ever had was made with black beans and wasn't trying to imitate meat. (It was at The Vortex in Atlanta years ago.) Imitation products that I've tried have always just lef…

I hear this sort of thing a lot but don't quite understand it. I've been a vegetarian for eight years, but I eat meat substitute products. I have ethical issues with eating meat and I feel considerably better physically when I don't eat meat, but that doesn't mean that meat doesn't taste good. I'm quite happy to be able to pop some Quorn mycoprotein into a casserole and eat comfort foods of my childhood without havin…

I’ll chime in as a long time vegetarian and former meat eater. The more realistic an imitation meat product is, the more it creeps me out. I lost the taste for meat, and I’m no longer used to the texture, and I find it disgusting.

Imagine my disappointment when all the restaurants in my area replaced their excellent vegetable burgers with things like Beyond and Impossible. To each their own, but it’s not just a rational issue of “is this an animal”, but also a subjective question of taste.

Re: Vegan cheese has quietly but steadily infiltrated mainstream supermarket shelves

#317

Post by laplacesdemon48 »

jjcon wrote: post #2

> Vegan Cheese Is Ready to Compete With Dairy. Is the World Ready to Eat It? I’m vegetarian and my partner is vegan - I’ve tried every vegan cheese on the shelf. The answer is no because it’s not even close to ready. It might pass an initial taste test where you say, that’s not so bad, but then you pick up on all the things it’s missing. Sometimes the aftertaste is terrible, sometimes the texture or versatility. Mayb…

Have either of you tried Pleese? I believe they're mostly selling to pizzerias now [1] and not supermarkets. They aren't able to scale up mass-production quickly because they use a different approach/ingredients - "proprietary blend of bean and potato proteins" [2].

I eat regular cheese and have tried several vegan brands, this seems pretty close to me. But I'm no cheese connoisseur.

[1] https://www.pleesefoods.com/availabilty

[2] https://www.pleesefoods.com/products

Re: Vegan cheese has quietly but steadily infiltrated mainstream supermarket shelves

#319

Post by tpoacher »

whimsicalism wrote: post #304
csours wrote: post #228

Earlier quoted context omitted.

This is what I'm more interested in: Don't try to replace animal foods directly, create great plant based foods. I'm not vegan or even vegetarian, but I am interested in reducing my animal consumption.

I mean, ground nuts are a classic "replacement" for cheese, so I don't really see how this is at all different from what the vegan cheeses are doing.

Presumably the person you replied to means they'd prefer healthy plant-based flavours that shine as flavours in their own right, rather than synthetic imitation foodstuffs that just happen to be vegan-compatible.

Re: Vegan cheese has quietly but steadily infiltrated mainstream supermarket shelves

#320

Post by cheese_goddess »

thehappypm wrote: post #218
jjcon wrote: post #2

> Vegan Cheese Is Ready to Compete With Dairy. Is the World Ready to Eat It? I’m vegetarian and my partner is vegan - I’ve tried every vegan cheese on the shelf. The answer is no because it’s not even close to ready. It might pass an initial taste test where you say, that’s not so bad, but then you pick up on all the things it’s missing. Sometimes the aftertaste is terrible, sometimes the texture or versatility. Mayb…

On the contrary to most of these opinions, there's one vegan shredded cheese out there that makes delicious nachos. I can't recall the brand but it takes just like the gooey nacho cheese of my youth. Probably low-end nacho cheese didn't have any dairy to begin with :)

Nacho cheese is dairy. It's processed cheese so it's made with bits and pieces of real cheese mixed together, and with emulsifiers, colourings and flavourings to cover the fact that you're eating melted cheese scraps.

Another reason for all the additivies is to make nacho cheese melt and run like a thin sauce, in a way that cheese doesn't. But with normal cheese you get other desirable organoleptic qualities that can't be reproduce with additives.

For an example of the organoleptic qualities I'm talking about, watch this video:

https://youtu.be/4CVzqJWkodA?t=834

Look at how elastic the texture of that alpine style cheese is. Slices a few millimitres thick can be rolled into a cigar without breaking. That kind of texture cannot be reproduced artificially. And it can't be reproduced by "vegan" cheesemaking either. You need milk proteins for that and you need milk to be coagulated by rennet enzymes and the enzymes released by starter culture and ripening culture lactic acid bacteria while the cheese ages.

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