81–90 of 464 posts
This is a noble effort. Animal agriculture is pretty terrible. It's massively wasteful in terms of land use and water use. It's incredibly inefficient when it comes to energy use (beef cattle production requires an energy input to protein output ratio of 54:1 [1]). And, of course, there are the animal welfare concerns. Even given all the problems, I'm convinced that people won't stop eating meat unless there is a mar…
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Carbohydrates in excessive amounts, yes. Meats and cheeses are basically the last bastions of non carb-laden foods. Pretty much everything that's not "diet" or meat/cheese is jam packed with carbs for flavor/cost cutting/fat reduction. And there's plenty of evidence that this is a bad thing.
Plenty of low-carb things that aren't meat and cheese. Avocados, nuts, etc.
> "When I tried a mini burger slathered in vegan mayo, mashed avocado, caramelized onions and Dijon prepared by San Francisco chef Traci Des Jardin at the company's headquarters in Redwood City, I was floored." Honestly a good chef can make cardboard taste good. But as a daily meat eater I'd love a good ground beef alternative.
Honestly a good chef can make cardboard taste good. Which is exactly the core operating principle upon which the fast food industry (including much of what is put on the shelves in larger grocery chains) basically works these days: low-quality base ingredients + sugar, spices, MSG + gratuitous fats/oils + marketing == profit
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Is there any proper (peer reviewed) evidence that carbohydrates are bad?
Carbohydrates in excessive amounts, yes. Meats and cheeses are basically the last bastions of non carb-laden foods. Pretty much everything that's not "diet" or meat/cheese is jam packed with carbs for flavor/cost cutting/fat reduction. And there's plenty of evidence that this is a bad thing.
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Is there any proper (peer reviewed) evidence that carbohydrates are bad?
Sugar specifically is showing signs of being incredibly bad for you and yet is added to most of the "diet foods" instead of fat (which is showing signs of being less bad for you then people say). I don't have the studies handy, and you can find studies that say either way.
I think it was on here I read an article by a doctor who's general rule was keep your food as unprocessed as possible.
> "When I tried a mini burger slathered in vegan mayo, mashed avocado, caramelized onions and Dijon prepared by San Francisco chef Traci Des Jardin at the company's headquarters in Redwood City, I was floored." Honestly a good chef can make cardboard taste good. But as a daily meat eater I'd love a good ground beef alternative.
Depending on the context, texture vegetable protein (TVP for short) is an option for things like pasta sauce that you want to add a ground beef alternative too. I'm sure there's many other ways to use it, but that's one we regularly use in our house. http://www.bobsredmill.com/tvp-textured-veg-protein.html
- How well does this product replicate the Maillard Reaction [0]? This is key when we're talking about taste and texture.
- Why did the author taste the burger with 82 toppings slathered on top by a professional chef? That's like testing out a new 21 speed, strapped to the top of an SUV.
- Why are they (presumably) trying to recreate chuck? Ground chuck is a terrible thing to replicate. It's like burger meat designed by committee[1].
- Is the sizzle coming from only extracted water from the plant burger (water vapor, decreasing heating temp)? Or are their lipids present spiking the flame, positively contributing to the cooking process?
That said, I'd love to give it a shot. Proper seasoning, a nice medium rare with a slice of American. But I'm not holding my breath. Meat is very hard.
[0]: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Maillard_reaction [1]: http://aht.seriouseats.com/archives/2009/10/the-burger-lab-b...
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There are places in the world where cattle production is the most efficient (and really only) efficient use of resources. Very large herds of cattle on extremely large areas of semi-arid grasslands mimic the buffalo that humans eradicated. They take few to no resources that aren't already there, and they actually support the ecosystem. In some places cattle suck down resources that could go to other more useful place…
It's not just about use of land resources though, it's about greenhouse gases (methane) generated by cattle. Beef is just about the worst thing you can eat with regards to climate change.
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When I visit India and eat vegetarian food properly prepared by a culture that has refined vegetarian cuisine beyond "fake meat", I don't miss meat at all. Much of Western food is only expected to be an accompaniment to a meat dish, which is why you can't just cut meat out and eat the vegetable dishes you're used to when you're eating meat as well, imnsho.
I'm a huge fan of Indian food. (Because it's tasty, AND because they are one of the few foreign countries that uses the same definition of "vegetarian" that I do). That said, I actually have a fairly limited range there too: if you don't like yogurt, dill, bell peppers, cucumbers, or okra, a lot gets cut out. That's on me an my tastes, not the Indian food, but it's still a reality I have to deal with.
Can you elaborate?
I've had the good fortune to try an Impossible Foods burger. It really does taste like meat. I'm not sure I would say it's indistinguishable from a beef burger. But I would definitely have a hard time telling it apart from a ground turkey burger. Or an ostrich burger from Fuddruckers.
If someone came to your house with it and cooked it on the BBQ, would you have been able to tell that it was an Impossible Foods burger?