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Plant-based meat is turning out to be a flop

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Re: Plant-based meat is turning out to be a flop

#122

My wife is vegan, so we eat a lot of vegan food at home. One of the treats of being in the UK is the huge variety of vegan products at the supermarket. Fake bacon, fake chicken, fake cheese, UK supermarkets seem to have an endless variety. None of these items are made by Beyond or Impossible, though.

Yup - I go back to my native London from eastern Europe once a year, and it's frustrating not to have access to an oven or hob, when I am suddenly surrounded by so much vegan choice (compared to Bucharest, which is still way better than the rest of Romania in this regard).

Re: Plant-based meat is turning out to be a flop

#123
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> it is no surprise, that people aren't willing to pay more for an inferior product You hit the nail on its head. I think there's still hope for meat substitutes if they can improve their flavor while also lowering their price. But I'm not holding out hope for that.

Not sure where you're located, but in the UK the supermarkets stock stuff like this: https://groceries.aldi.co.uk/en-GB/p-plant-menu-ultimate-no-... https://www.trolley.co.uk/product/linda-mccartneys-2-vegetar... They taste delicious and are absolutely competitive with meat burger prices.

Aldi sells minced beef at literally half the price of the veggie burgers you linked to: https://groceries.aldi.co.uk/en-GB/p-ashfields-25-fat-britis...

Re: Plant-based meat is turning out to be a flop

#124

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Water, soy protein concentrate, coconut oil, sunflower oil, natural flavors, 2% or less of potato protein, methylcellulose, yeast extract, cultured dextrose, food starch modified, soy leghemoglobin, salt, mixed tocopherols (antioxidant), soy protein isolate, zinc gluconate, thiamine hydrochloride (vitamin B1), niacin, pyridoxine hydrochloride (vitamin B6), riboflavin (vitamin B2), and vitamin B12. This is the list of…

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What looks reasonable to you might not look reasonable to someone else, like someone that strives to avoid seed oils and other industrial products and live above 90 years of age.

Re: Plant-based meat is turning out to be a flop

#125

I've been vegetarian (99% vegan food intake) for five years, and the main reason I regularly buy so few of these products is that most of them are absurdly expensive, and most of the ones that aren't are not very nice to eat. Also turned off by gimmicks clearly not aimed at me, such as 'beetroot blood', and other nonsense. I don't know whether the economy-of-scale issues are what make these products so expensive, or…

I eat meat, and am also turned off by these products. They are a facsimile that just doesn't sit well.

However, I would eat this if it was blended/bulked out a real meat product. Like a burger that was 50% "real" beef and 50% "fake" beef.

I think this has the big opportunity as a filler to reduce the amount of meat eaten as a whole. I don't understand who the current consumer target is supposed to be, if not meat eaters who should eat less meat (for any reason; health/environment/economoy/etc.)

Re: Plant-based meat is turning out to be a flop

#126
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If artificial meat would taste like the real thing and cost less, everyone would want to eat it: Meat eaters and poor people because it costs less, vegans because it tastes good and does not harm anyone and rich people because they feel good when saving the earth.

Given the choice between non-processed food (meat) and ultra—high-processed food (fake meat), the former is the much healthier option.

Re: Plant-based meat is turning out to be a flop

#127
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Meat and milk are basic foods.

And vegan alternatives are not? Meat was a luxury product not eaten every day for most of history and still is in most parts of the world. Given the environmental impact of Meat and Diary in terms of CO2, Methane, Water usage, and Deforestation we should heavily reconsider our nonchalant view of them as a cheap commodity.

> Meat was a luxury product not eaten every day for most of history

And nobody want's to return to those dark ages.

This devil's alliance between veganism and environmentalism is what put me off environmentalism. Climate change can be softened by banning airplanes, air conditioning, and other things we don't need, not by banning food.

Re: Plant-based meat is turning out to be a flop

#128
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If any of the planet saving meat substitute promises are true, such a fake meat patty would cost a tenth of the beef equivalent and it would dominate the market. I read somewhere you would need 25 kg of feed to produce 1 kg of beef, ergo one could potentially produce 25 times the amount of substitute. Obviously that isn't true and such a patty is a specialized product of various highly processed plant matter. It is a…

Fake meat isn't just inferior to real meat. It's inferior to just plain old vegetables.

It's a crazy product designed for a society with weird eating habits.

They're not trying to cook the best vegetable dishes. They're not trying to cook dishes that use less meat. They're not trying to expand your palettes and reintroducing liver, sweetbreads or other weird cuts.

All these "green" products convince you to not do the most important things: REDUCE and REUSE.

Re: Plant-based meat is turning out to be a flop

#129
post #93

Earlier quoted context omitted.

If artificial meat would taste like the real thing and cost less, everyone would want to eat it: Meat eaters and poor people because it costs less, vegans because it tastes good and does not harm anyone and rich people because they feel good when saving the earth.

Even if fake meat tasted better and cost less, people would still eat meat too. I like chicken more than potatoes, yet I still eat potatoes. Fake meat's best outcome would be for it to be enjoyed as much as meat, but it couldn't replace it. It would just be another thing to experience.

This. I'm not sure who expected that some "fake" meat came along and somehow everyone switched to it.

We're used to eating meat and most have been eating it their entire lives. It's unrealistic to think that most would switch in a few years.

Swapping to fake meats, even meat grown in a lab will probably takes decades at the minimum.

Re: Plant-based meat is turning out to be a flop

#130
post #7

If any of the planet saving meat substitute promises are true, such a fake meat patty would cost a tenth of the beef equivalent and it would dominate the market. I read somewhere you would need 25 kg of feed to produce 1 kg of beef, ergo one could potentially produce 25 times the amount of substitute. Obviously that isn't true and such a patty is a specialized product of various highly processed plant matter. It is a…

No, you are forgetting that meat is heavily subsidized while low-impact food is not.
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