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Beyond Meat fights for survival

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Re: Beyond Meat fights for survival

#431

Post by rolandog »

jebarker wrote: post #406
rolandog wrote: post #400

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Why would it have to only be ex-meat eaters? It may be just my (admittedly biased) opinion, but I think that Big Meat has managed to turn meat-eating into a quasi-religion — almost like football. I also try to not shy away from knowing where my food comes from, and how it was processed and produced; if you know about the cruel and unsanitary living conditions for cattle, the underpaid and overworked labor that helps…

I totally agree with your strong feelings on the meat industry. The reason I said the main market is ex meat eaters is because if you’re still eating meat then any craving for the taste/texture/smell of meat is at least getting partially satisfied by the meat you’re still eating. There’s definitely some market for people just trying to cut down on meat though, and that’s great too.

Thanks for steelmanning my argument.

Definitely agree that texture (and price) will play a big factor in weaning off people from authentic meat.

I hope we are able to surpass the challenges we're facing and live to see healthy food sources that are also within reach (physically and economically) for all people.

Re: Beyond Meat fights for survival

#432

Post by bartread »

xeromal wrote: post #374
UltraSane wrote: post #285

Earlier quoted context omitted.

"raised to enjoy the taste/texture of meat" Humans have evolved to enjoy the taste/texture/smell of cooked meat

Yeah, their comment gave me a chuckle. lol

Yeah. HN doesn't really have a sense of humour, which I used to find frustrating, but which (having now spent a lot more time on other forums, like Reddit), I fully appreciate the wisdom of.

I am, along certain axes, a big fan of DIY forums like the r/DIYUK subreddit, and it pisses me off to no end that when anybody asks a serious question looking for serious help the top 5 comments will, as like as not, be bullshit, cheap, obvious, "funny" one-liners from people whose sense of humour has never evolved beyond the playground and that contain zero useful information. I've even considered volunteering as a mod on that particular sub just so I can delete all of these "humorous" comments so that the actual useful information makes it to the top of the page. So, yeah, I've come around to the HN point of view on humour.

But, nevertheless, like you, I found this funny.

Re: Beyond Meat fights for survival

#433

Post by hollerith »

gruez wrote: post #421
druskacik wrote: post #321

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Okay, I genuinely thought that consuming as much protein powder as you describe would make person feel sick, you surprised me. To each his own. The fact remains, research suggests overdosing on protein supplements has potential health hazards. "According to international consensus, the daily reference intake of protein for the healthy adult population is 0.8 g/kg body weight. However, individuals who engage in physic…

Is that from the protein supplements themselves, or from consuming excessive protein in the first place? In other words if you ate the same amount but as steaks/eggs, would you feel the same symptoms?

40 g of protein per day is only 6.1 oz of chicken tenderloins (raw weight) per day which is very unlikely to cause the effect described in the paper ("hyperfiltration and increased urinary calcium excretion which can, in turn, lead to chronic kidney disease development").

People who eat a lot of protein die sooner than people who eat less, but that is probably because plentiful protein prevents the body from entering a state called "autophagy". Intentionally inducing autophagy for 5 days every other month (by using Valter Longo's protocol) while eating plenty of protein the rest of the time is probably better for most people than a consistently low-protein diet as long as one is avoiding red meat (provided the people can afford the protein which will be the case for almost everyone in the developed world).

Re: Beyond Meat fights for survival

#434

Post by anon84873628 »

giantg2 wrote: post #247
mgraczyk wrote: post #161

Earlier quoted context omitted.

What I mean is that clearly processed foods aren't harmful because they are processed. All the correlations go away when you control for basic things like sugar and vegetable consumption. The whole idea that processed foods are bad for health is a hysteria.

Do you have some studies proving out that control for vegetables and sugar is all that is needed? I am skeptical that just controlling for those would eliminate the risks with other processing ingredients such as cured meats. Edit: why disagree?

Well lumping packaged cookies and cured meats together is already part of the problem. The former is bad in excess because of the high calories and poor lipid profile. The latter because of colon cancer risk.

The problem with processed foods is not their individual construction per se, but how overall bad diets are easily enabled by them.

As far as studies go, I can't give you one that directly controls. But look at the "30 plants per week" topic, which suggests that overall diversity of fiber consumption is more correlated to health than any specific details of the diet.

Re: Beyond Meat fights for survival

#435

Post by anon84873628 »

graublau wrote: post #340
mgraczyk wrote: post #157

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Why do you believe it's not healthy? Because of the processes food hysteria stuff?

Processed food concerns are hysterical is a unique take

Many people are clearly going overboard and using processed foods as an excuse for making the naturalistic fallacy. (Or maybe today we would say that processed foods are used as a "thought terminating cliche".)

Re: Beyond Meat fights for survival

#436

Post by Frost1x »

mgraczyk wrote: post #157
makingstuffs wrote: post #129

The problem with Beyond Meat is that it is insanely expensive. I could buy a free range, organic and grass fed beef burger for the price of their ultra processed burger. Don’t get me wrong, as a vegetarian, I think they taste nice. They are just too damn expensive and not particularly healthy which goes against why I am a vegetarian. In Europe we have so many alternatives that are insanely cheaper and, as an Indian,…

Why do you believe it's not healthy? Because of the processes food hysteria stuff?

There’s not much hysteria in that highly processed foods tend to give less satiety relative to both their calorie density and nutrient content (since your digestive process and signals don’t trip the same way they do with whole foods).

That alone is a good enough reason to avoid highly processed foods in many cases. It’s not always true, but it’s more often true than not.

Re: Beyond Meat fights for survival

#437

Post by dolebirchwood »

9dev wrote: post #407
thom wrote: post #356

Hate these burgers. As a dairy-loving vegetarian, first the vegans came along and ruined everything by evicting most of the tasty options from restaurants, and then the meat eaters somehow wanted vegan food that tasted of animals and that became the default option on many menus. Vegetarians (who I grant you are difficult to pity as the centrists of the food world) got utterly screwed.

If you’re consuming lots of dairy, and became vegetarian to avoid animal suffering, you can just as well eat meat. Not much of a difference ethically.

That's cool. But "avoiding animal suffering" isn't the only reason people stop eating meat.

Sometimes the reason is as simple as: I just think meat is gross. No judgment on anyone else who eats it.

Re: Beyond Meat fights for survival

#438

Post by jfengel »

biztos wrote: post #397
santoshalper wrote: post #389

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I think the idea was that Beyond Meat would be a "transitional" product that would provide an ever growing vegetarian/vegan population an option that was familiar to them. For example, if you do not care about celebrating vegetables, and just want to end animal cruelty, but you miss the taste of meat, then a beyond burger was supposed to be for you. The biggest problem they have is the exhorbinant prices, which releg…

> just want to end animal cruelty, but you miss the taste of meat Does that actually describe a commercially relevant segment of the population? Intuitively, having known a lot of vegetarians, I'd expect the people whose primary concern is animal cruelty to be specifically turned off by realistic fake meat.

If you ask a bunch of meat eaters how they feel about animal cruelty, they'll get uncomfortable. Many will admit that they would like to avoid it but don't think it's practical. Look in particular at the kind who seek out organic, free range, and other (honestly, not very effective) ways to reduce suffering.

I suspect the market research turned up a large contingent of such. Perhaps not sufficient to justify a whole separate product line, but enough to hope that economies of scale would reduce price and create a virtuous cycle.

So I'm sure it seemed worth a shot. I'm sorry but not surprised that it didn't work.

Re: Beyond Meat fights for survival

#439

Post by kjkjadksj »

JeremyNT wrote: post #408
null0ranje wrote: post #384

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Ive never understood the drive to make meat substitutes instead of celebrating vegetarian cuisine. I’m not a vegetarian, but if I eat some dish that is vegetarian, why wouldn’t I want to celebrate the vegetable itself made from instead of trying to make some fake meat that never quite hits the mark?

As a vegetarian I actually prefer stuff like Beyond when eating out. The reason is simple: it has higher protein content than most other place based fast foods. I'd love to live in a world with minimally processed high protein vegetarian restaurant food (like lots of legumes), but the only reliable place to get this that I know of is CAVA. Products like Beyond are at least a step up from carb heavy pastas and grains…

Plenty of places will give you beans. Are beyond burgers really higher protein than a bean? Taco bell the whole menu can be subbed for black beans.

Re: Beyond Meat fights for survival

#440

Post by kjkjadksj »

santoshalper wrote: post #389
null0ranje wrote: post #384

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Ive never understood the drive to make meat substitutes instead of celebrating vegetarian cuisine. I’m not a vegetarian, but if I eat some dish that is vegetarian, why wouldn’t I want to celebrate the vegetable itself made from instead of trying to make some fake meat that never quite hits the mark?

I think the idea was that Beyond Meat would be a "transitional" product that would provide an ever growing vegetarian/vegan population an option that was familiar to them. For example, if you do not care about celebrating vegetables, and just want to end animal cruelty, but you miss the taste of meat, then a beyond burger was supposed to be for you. The biggest problem they have is the exhorbinant prices, which releg…

The miss the taste of meat thing anecdotally doesn’t happen to my vegetarian friends. It is like without exposure they actually lose the taste for meat. They will even get nauseous if they smell it cooked because their senses are so un primed for meat by that point.
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