Plant-based meat is turning out to be a flop • Hacker News Board

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

#511

Post by aradox66 » Thu, Jan 19, 2023, 3:29 PM UTC

jononomo wrote: post #463

hannob wrote: post #146

How strange, we massively subsidize meat production, we don't even consider letting meat producers pay for the externalities they cause, and then plant-based alternatives have a hard time competing. It's a real mystery.

The externalities of a plant-based diet are enormous, from the use of pesticides which then leads to the decimation of the bird population to the massive amount of fossil-fuel-based fertilizer, to the explosion in the rate of obesity and diabetes -- at least grazing cattle is good for the land and leads to carbon sequestration.

Most plant agriculture is used to feed livestock. Consider how eating higher up the food chain requires about an order of magnitude increase in inputs. If everyone ate plant based diets, the agricultural footprint would go down dramatically.

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

#512

Post by bartvk » Thu, Jan 19, 2023, 3:29 PM UTC

brodouevencode wrote: post #382

bartvk wrote: post #92

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I'm very disappointed in the cost as well. It hasn't come down at all. Not just the fake meat, but even tofu. But the cost isn't the main issue to me anymore, over the years I've come to realize I don't want to support the meat industry where profits rule everything. So I grudgingly pay the higher price of Beyond Meat. And to be honest, it's not that much more expensive, for my particular budget. Two Beyond Meat burg…

> I don't want to support the meat industry where profits rule everything. So I grudgingly pay the higher price of Beyond Meat. BM is largely driven by the profit motive too

My problem is profits in relation to the treatment of animals. I don't care if someone profits off the mistreatment of pea proteins.

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

#513

Post by Camus134 » Thu, Jan 19, 2023, 3:29 PM UTC

navierstokess wrote: post #469

jononomo wrote: post #455

Earlier quoted context omitted.

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Some vegans believe that it is unethical to kill animals, and that they should have the same rights as us. Of course, they're wrong because animals aren't able to think. Others believe that meat is bad for the environment, however I don't know if that is correct as I haven't done any research on the topic.

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

#514

Post by pjmlp » Thu, Jan 19, 2023, 3:29 PM UTC

yreg wrote: post #186

pjmlp wrote: post #177

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Agreed, I am not vegetarian, but when I want to eat vegeatarian dishes the last thing I ever want to get is fake meat.

These are not supposed to substitute the vegetarian dishes you eat, but the meat dishes you eat. It works for some people, e.g. me.

When I want meat, I eat it, no need to have a fake version of it.

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

#515

Post by Moldoteck » Thu, Jan 19, 2023, 3:30 PM UTC

serial_dev wrote: post #337

Moldoteck wrote: post #29

Maybe unpopular opinion, but for me, best plant based patties are those that do not try to replicate meat taste. I much prefer patties made from actual plants&vegetables/mushrooms/chickpeas/beans like potato, carrot, some spices and so on. They have like actual 'natural' flavor, almost like something homemade. Those that add a ton of additives often taste awful, even beyond/moving mountains...

I was a vegetarian for years, and I totally agree. People always recommended me these awful veggie/vegan alternatives to meat, and they were all disgusting. Fake bacon, fake meat, fake sausage, fake ham, baloney, all ended up being stomach turning. Interestingly, only people who recommended me these still ate meat, never vegetarians. The thing is that there are many alternatives (falafel, all kinds of different chees…

oh god, i adore falafel. I found some frozen falafel made in my town that didn't have additives at all and it was just .... I can finish a 400g package at once))

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

#516

Post by nicbou » Thu, Jan 19, 2023, 3:32 PM UTC

maury91 wrote: post #429

I'm not a fan of plant-based meat, this is most likely because of my culture ( I'm Sardinian ), we do have many meat based dishes and many plant based dishes, and honestly I don't see the need to cook the meat based ones with processed food that tries to replicate the taste and consistency of meat. I believe that if you don't want to eat meat there's a world of recipes that do not involve meat and are made to elevate…

I second this. I cut meat by cooking better vegetarian recipes, not by finding better meat substitutes. Asia has no shortage of excellent dishes, as does Italy. I'll take a good pasta dish over a fake sausage made of mystery ingredients any day.

Tomatoes are nearly fungible, but meat substitutes are not. Potatoes are cheap but meat substitutes are not. Carrots are easy to find anywhere but meat substitutes are not.

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

#517

Post by 29athrowaway » Thu, Jan 19, 2023, 3:32 PM UTC

Most fertile soil is used for cattle. It has a large environmental impact.

If we want to preserve trees and let the biosphere heal and conserve animal habitats, we need to stop the expansion of the meat industry, or even reduce it.

Fake meat is comfort food not healthy food. Health-wise, it can be worse than meat.

3D printed meat sounds promising to me (real meat without the suffering).

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

#518

Post by edgyquant » Thu, Jan 19, 2023, 3:32 PM UTC

anonu wrote: post #491

maury91 wrote: post #429

I'm not a fan of plant-based meat, this is most likely because of my culture ( I'm Sardinian ), we do have many meat based dishes and many plant based dishes, and honestly I don't see the need to cook the meat based ones with processed food that tries to replicate the taste and consistency of meat. I believe that if you don't want to eat meat there's a world of recipes that do not involve meat and are made to elevate…

I second this sentiment. General advice is to avoid things in boxes and bags: aka highly processed foods. The ingredients list on the beyond meat website looks like this: Water, pea protein*, expeller-pressed canola oil, refined coconut oil, rice protein, natural flavors, dried yeast, cocoa butter, methylcellulose, and less than 1% of potato starch, salt, potassium chloride, beet juice color, apple extract, pomegrana…

I don’t see anything glaringly bad here

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

#519

Post by honkler » Thu, Jan 19, 2023, 3:32 PM UTC

spaniard89277 wrote: post #17

scantis wrote: 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…

Turns out beating nature is pretty hard. Cows look basically like processing plants. They produce food, fertilizer and energy (biogas).

there is no bird that flies faster than a boeing. Nor a bird that flies higher than a rocket.

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

#520

Post by lukeschlather » Thu, Jan 19, 2023, 3:33 PM UTC

Swizec wrote: post #479

maury91 wrote: post #429

I'm not a fan of plant-based meat, this is most likely because of my culture ( I'm Sardinian ), we do have many meat based dishes and many plant based dishes, and honestly I don't see the need to cook the meat based ones with processed food that tries to replicate the taste and consistency of meat. I believe that if you don't want to eat meat there's a world of recipes that do not involve meat and are made to elevate…

Fake meat feels similar to my Slovenian eyes. There's a whole world of recipes that just don't include meat and are delicious. It wasn't until I moved to the USA that I even realized those are "vegetarian" ... to me they're just regular foods and recipes. Lots of cottage cheese hearty meals with high protein content. It helps that traditional (100+ years ago) Slovenian culture was that you rarely eat meat because mea…

Vegetarian/veganism is not a fashion choice, it's a moral one. It's like asking why a Muslim prepares a dish that's traditionally prepared with pork but instead substitutes lamb. I'm not sure what more explanation you require.