The environmental problems don't come from cattle or pork or palm trees themselves, they're caused by massive industrial levels of production that modern civilization needs. To truly substitute pork this industry will have to become as massive as the pork meat industry is now. And that means, among other things, a huge increase in already high demand for coconut and palm tree oil - which will certainly reflect in 3rd world countries jumping the wagon and clearing even more rain forests, and even more rare species will be endangered. So we just replace one problem with another.
I like to think in the framework of "you're never really solving any problem, you're just replacing a bad problem with a slightly less bad problem". My speculation is that Impossible Pork (or any other such product) would be just that – a slightly better problem to have compared to the current pork meat industry.
Yes, sourcing ingredients for plant-based meat alternatives still takes resources and, given enough scale, that demand will have negative environmental impacts... But growing plants is still an order of magnitude better than farming animals.
Literally an order of magnitude. The maximum trophic efficiency between two steps in the food chain is 10% so for a pound of meet you need at least 10 pounds of plant feed. In order to supply the world with meat, we're already growing far more than enough. The problem is the distribution of crop species since humans can't eat just corn and alfa-alfa. Processed meat substitutes might be able to redirect those existing animal feed crops towards feeding us directly and making good use of less fertile land.
Reading that Wikipedia article I wondered whether it was possible to have an FCR (feed conversion ratio) of less than 1. And indeed it is! https://pdf.usaid.gov/pdf_docs/PA00K8MQ.pdf Of course, the livestock are consuming highly processed, energy rich feed, but so do humans.
OTOH, none of this means that the same amount of net calories are available to the human. FCR is not the same thing as trophic efficiency. In particular, as per the above explanation, FCR is often calculated using wet mass of the output but dry mass of the input.
All that said, the conversion efficiencies for chicken and farmed fish are still amazing.
If/when it becomes necessary, I'm sure Beyond/Impossible would figure out alternative ways of producing coconut/palm oil. And the meat industry astroturfers would come out again to fear-monger about how it's too artificial.
Every food-stuff solution is a problem with a perpetually growing population, as encroaching on land and increasing use of resources is certain. In fact every person represents a carbon footprint and that extends beyond just food, but everything they consume, all the infrastructure they use. That is the unsustainable part of the equation. Strangely the mainstream view is shifting away from the GDP as the cradle of economic prosperity, and yet, policy is still to double-down on growth.
The only way to reliably (and amicably) decimate global population growth, and therefore growth in the West, is eliminating global poverty and allowing universal access to contraceptives everywhere. If you achieve this, it doesn't matter what people eat or do; and arguably, it only matters currently in terms of how it impacts the pace of environmental destruction, not whether or not it gets destroyed.
It just doesn't get into peoples heads that more converts to green slime will not save the world.
If vertical farming becomes widespread we could free a lot of land from farms and use them to produce palm oil. Besides that plant based food is more efficient than meat based, as meat based you need to feed the animal and then eat the animal
I really like Beyond Meat hot Italian sausage, think the Beyond Meat burgers served with all the trimmings are good, and the Impossible Burgers at Burgher King are OK.
I welcome Impossible Pork, looking forward to trying it.
I am one of those weird people who doesn’t like to eat inhumanly raised animal products, but I just don’t care what other people choose to eat.
I tried the Beyond Meat patty, version 1 I think. Wondering if anyone else got an absolutely strange type of taste / sensation in their throat when they tried it? It wasn’t at all pleasant and really hard to describe. Kind of like - I don’t know - canola oil mixed with peanut - sort-of? While breathing in a thick gas. Very odd.
I was really hyped up to like it, but found it only somewhat like meat. I was impressed with the texture inside. The outer crust reminded me of warm cardboard. To be fair, I might have burned it so I do want to try it again. Really keen to try an Impossible Burger (anyone know if there’s somewhere in Australia that serves them?).
My whole place smelled sickly sweet after cooking it as well. I’ve seen some people describing it as smelling like cat food, which I’d agree with.
The white fatty flecks that make it look more like ground beef is coconut oil and cocoa butter.
I think coconut oil is somewhat like cilantro, in that certain people get a soap like taste from it, based on some kind of genetic trait.
Though it does have less aldehydes than some other types of oils, which goes against my theory. It does, however, have a fair amount of decanal, one of the aldehydes in cilantro.
Would "soap like" describe the unpleasant flavor at all?
I've tried one at two different Burger Kings, both tasted a bit burnt. I wouldn't mind a legume taste, but I can't do overdone. Has anyone else noticed this?
Have you tried that at A&W? I don't know what they do differently, but when I cook them at home the texture isn't as good, nor is the taste (but that's probably simply the condiments).
> weird people who doesn’t like to eat inhumanly raised animal products
It really shouldn’t be weird. It should be the default. Almost No one would purposely harm an intelligent animal yet it’s to norm to support industries that do.
Unfortunately, there are plenty of people who eat chimpanzees and gorillas as bushmeat, even while appreciating their intelligence. There's no contradiction there. Humans are predators--don't underestimate our capacity to dissociate and follow our predator instincts. In fact, forget the whole predator angle--don't underestimate our capacity to dissociate. That ability isn't inherently bad; it's one of the things that makes us human, and is a prerequisite for making choices in the first place.
I think genetically engineering animals to be braindead is itself the unethical action. If we're willing to sacrifice efficiency we could emulate what animals go through in the wild. They live a life full of socializing and emotions and then slaughtered for meat at the end.
Why not? Animal welfare is a primary reason why some people don't eat meat. Making them braindead should alleviate the concern for those people, but I have a feeling that the same people would be against it.
I am not sure if that is even weird tbh. Maybe I am an outlier, but I know a lot of vegetarians and can't think of a single time where they have commented about someone eating meat.
I don't think vegetarians are usually the ones commenting, there's a reason vegans get a lot of flak on the internet. I've also never heard vegetarians commenting on anyone's dietary choices.
People hold themselves to different standards than the general population all the time.
Just because I cycle to work and don't own a car for environmental reasons, doesn't mean I think car owners are assholes - I have owned a car in the past, may do again in the future, sometimes get taxis and lifts, and have plenty of friends and family members with cars.
I think that "not caring about other people actions" should be the standard way of thinking if you think their actions doesn't cause harm to other humans. That's what I get from that text.
But he already said he had a problem with inhumanely produced meat, in other words, actions that cause grave harm to animals. Why would you have that standard at all if you don't care if it's met?
(There's also the land use and emissions angle. Arguably meat consumption causes harm to all humans and beyond.)
For me, it’s a “chose your battles” sort of thing. I don’t seek confrontation nor even diminishing others. Life is too, too short. I further hope that my nonviolence will lead others to treat me nonviolently.
But is the parent really needed here? This discussion seems to have become "how dare you take a stance in this issue that we cannot fully understand"?
How about, while hungry they are sickened by the cruelty involved in producing food, but while full, they simply have other, more important things on their mind?
I don't care that much about animals, as far as their pain or feelings.
If we slaughter ants and fruit flies while not caring for their rights, what is that different from a cow or dog?
I know this is an unpopular position, but I don't see the logic in animal rights.
Now, when we're talking about maintaining ecosystems, I'm all for it. What's happening to bees is bad for humans.
But creating cattle just to slaughter and eat it, that's just part of our nature. Like a lion slaughters a gazelle. We just evolved to have the tools to breed them...
Maybe cattle breeding is inefficient and pollutes the planet. That's also bad,but it's the best way we've found yet to feed billions of people and keep affordable food prices.
I am sure almost every action could indirectly be related to human suffering of some sort. Using a phone for example and there is a good chance that it will have cobalt mined by children in Congo.
Sure. But that's a very weak excuse if it's one at all. I sometimes jaywalk, does this justify me mudering someone? I mean I can't be perfect right so why even try?
For me (not about meat but other things) it's selfishness and ego. I care about me, I care about the picture of myself I have in my head and who I think I am. My self-image and the kind of person I want to be (and want to pretend I am) are important enough to me that there are some things I do (or not). Everyone else? Looks like they have different delusions, fantasies and aspirations about who they are and who they want to be.
Upon seeing the name of the comedian, I wasn’t planning on watching, as I’d previously found his humor more baffling than funny. But, the title of the song piqued my interest, “Peace anthem for Palestine”, so I watched in entirety and include below my complete summary.
Tim Minchin, comedian pianist, is going to share a song he hopes will be a seed for peace (first 2 and 1/2 minutes), the lyrics are “You don’t eat pigs, we don’t eat pigs, why not not eat pigs together ... ... pigs.” (last 2 and 1/2 minutes)
The audience laughs and sings along. I liked the song but the laugh timing, particular when he was playing music but not speaking, made me feel as if there was an in joke I was very far outside of.
With the majority (>50%) of the calories in these meat replacements coming from Coconut Oil, Sunflower Oil, Canola Oil and possibly other... not so great high fat ingredients, I worry about these products from a health perspective.
If you're worrying about the health aspects, look more at the sodium (500% as much as real pork). It's true that the jury is still out on how bad sodium is for you, but it's definitely not great to have 5x as much sodium as the real thing.
I would probably try to counteract this with lower-sodium pasta sauce, or less soy sauce.
It is much closer to a finished product than raw pork though. You generally add a decent amount of salt to pork while cooking/preparing it. For Impossible Pork you don't add any(?). Looks like the stats are decent for Impossible. Higher iron, less saturated fat, less total fat, more fiber.
What makes you say this? If this were true, I would think the company would be mentioning it in order to improve the optics around the sodium content (which is about 25% of the RDA). Have they (or anyone else) made any claims about the need to add seasonings?
The traditional criticism of salt was that it raised blood pressure and was related to heart disease. I think that line of thinking is being questioned - but nutritional science seems to be a mess and guidelines changes as often as the JavaScript ecosystem.
There's currently a difference of opinion between the WHO who say that healthy people consuming reasonable amounts of salt don't need to worry about reducing it, and the US who say that they do.
Stomach cancer is the most adverse. Increased sodium is proven to drastically increase blood pressure, which in turn increases many cardio vascular and renal diseases.
Edit: surprised by the downvotes on what are well established facts [1]
Research shows that the relationship between sodium intake and high blood pressure is much more complex than just saying that increased sodium increases blood pressure (let alone claiming it does so "drastically").
Too much sodium in the bloodstream causes the body to retain extra water to dilute it. This can cause swelling of the blood vessels, which can cause them to harden over time. That hardening raises blood pressure and makes the heart work harder. When this has happened, reducing sodium intake will help reduce blood pressure by reducing the volume of fluid the heart has to circulate.
But if your blood vessels haven't hardened, there are other ways of helping to regulate your salt levels in addition to, or instead of, decreasing sodium intake. Drinking more liquids will help your kidneys process more sodium, and regular exercise will also help.
The pig won't exist at all if it's not raised for food.
Some will say that's preferable (for multiple reasons). That's partially opinion though. We'll need to get the pig's input on existence to be certain.
Maybe we'll get our shot at that question in a hundred years when AI is ruling over us: better to live in the service of the AI's ends, or better to not exist at all.
“Fat” is an umbrella term; there are many different fats, with distinct effects on metabolism and health. (Lookup n6 vs n3 fats to start to get an idea.)
The particular fats in these plant replacements are not too similar to what you would find in real meat.
(Though to be fair even real american pork is pretty different to what it was traditionally, because of modern pork feed.)
I thought it was more fairly well accepted that dietary cholesterol is just shat straight back out, and that blood cholesterol comes from converted saturated fat?
Cholesterol is an energy-intensive molecule to produce, and as such, your body recycles it as much as possible. Your liver produces cholesterol to be released with bile into your digestive track (to aid with fat absorption), but your body re-absorbs that cholesterol, along with any additional dietary cholesterol, back into your bloodstream in the intestines.
If you want to pass the cholesterol out (dietary or otherwise), then eat more fiber, which sticks to cholesterol and prevents your body from reabsorbing it.
somehow this comment finally made me realize my issue with "everything in moderation".
There's clearly a pretty big public health crisis when it comes to food. So saying "in moderation" is very hard to judge! Clearly the status quo isn't great.
So what's a moderate amount of fat to consume?
It could be half of what people tend to consume. it could be 10%. It could be double!
Given that if you follow "eat what you like" you end up in a bad place, it's kind of hard to lend credence to stuff like paleo.
So you're back to square 1 of having not much of a great idea. My bet is that the moderate amount of stuff that would be healthy vastly differs from what the "average minus 15%" or something would be.
There are some studies which show that fat and sugar combined lead to more consumption [1]. The food industry calls this the "Bliss point" [2] and that's why many processed foods combine have a high amounts of fat and carbs.
As a rule of thumb, sugars trip the insulin absorption endocrine pathways (weight gain) in the body more readily than the other macros. Fats are energy-rich, so combining sugars with fats means you're tripping the weight gain mechanisms with extra chemical energy present.
can you elaborate more? I thought eating fat and sugar together actually lowers the glycemic index in the food? (Lower glycemic index than you would without the fat)
I wouldn't put coconut oil in the same category as the rest of those, but I agree with your point. These new meat alternatives are probably not that healthy overall right now compared to the absolute healthiest hamburger patty. But more often this would replace a McDonald's level beef patty, so the standard for "not worse for you than what it's replacing" is easy to meet.
My friend often recounts the story of passing a McDonalds during delivery day, and spotting crates of meat being carried in with the label "GRADE D, STILL EDIBLE" written on them.
I wouldn't be surprised if this isn't accurate, but the problem is knowing McDonalds, I would also not be surprised if it were.
I figure these are still in development. In 5 years they will have iterated a fair bit more and the patties should really taste good and be healthy (maaaaaybe).
I hope they use fewer oils and more Whole Foods eventually. I’ve had “chocolates” made out of diced dates and nuts which were great. Because they’re made of diced dates instead of extracted sugars the product contains the nutrients and fibers of the original plants. Much easier through the system.
There's no saturated animal fat which has been shown to raise LDL cholesterol, dietary cholesterol, or trans fat. The absence of those three things alone helps it be monumentally more healthy in the long run.
That being said, yeah, it's definitely a treat. Coconut oil is not the best thing for you.
A bit of a "meta-question" here: is there an comprehensive source about the approval process for this kind of products (or is it considered "as safe as anything else" since it's basically processed plants ?)
Would there be a different process for "lab-grown" meat ?
Does anyone know if such approval processes are substantially different on different sides of the Atlantic ?
In the US legal system something or some act is considered legal until a law makes it illegal. They’re selling a good as food so it’d come under whatever regulations are in place for food. Their products don’t contain any ingredients requiring any other regulation. There’s maybe some approval process to show that what they say is in the product is actually there through some regulation somewhere, but they’re not like certifying a drug with drug trials.
So I've been vegetarian for nearly 10 years. I tried an impossible burger for the first time last week. I liked it, but found it to be a bit disturbing because the texture reminded me of eating actual meat. I want to have vegetarian food which is nutritious, has good taste, has good texture, and doesn't remind me of meat. So I don't think I'll stick with the impossible brand, since it fails on that last measure.
Edit: To elaborate a bit, I think foods like this may fall in an unfortunate valley where they are too similar to meat to please some vegetarians but insufficiently similar to meat to please some meat eaters. I tried the impossible burger because I had heard some complaints from meat eaters that it was not "meaty" enough for them - meaning it might not be too "meaty" for me.
As someone who eats too much meat I think the appeal for me would be to replace part of my consumption. Making tacos or a quick spaghetti? Why not use impossible meat. For me it's not going to replace local grass fed ground chuck or a wagu steak I'd occasionally treat myself with, but it might make it so I only eat meat 1-2 times a week.
And imagine the impact if these just displaced 50% of beef patties at fast food joints.
I'd love to see a world where the bottom shelf of meat isle is completely plant based.
>Making tacos or a quick spaghetti? Why not use impossible meat.
Why not use beans, or mushrooms? Or quinoa? Or cauliflower? Or lentils? All cheaper and healthier. And if they don't make sense in your dish...why eat that dish? Food combinations are endless; find something you like made up of the food you want to eat.
I'm not lecturing. I also love meat, but I have trouble wrapping my head around "vegetables and other stuff smashed together to simulate meat". Seems easier to just eat the vegetables.
This is the food equivalent of "well why don't you just use rust or scheme to solve that problem?"
Because people like meat. It tastes good, it's comforting. People like meat, that simple.
> And if they don't make sense in your dish...why eat that dish?
For a lot of people, cooking and eating is something they have to do but don't particularly care for. Maybe homie just wanted to have spaghetti with meat in it like his mom made all of his life. And now you're telling him that he should just eat something else entirely because he doesn't use quinoa in his spaghetti.
I'd rather have a bit of ground beef in my spaghetti than anything you listed. I could do mushrooms but I just... Like meat more.
Because they taste worse. It isn't rocket science. People aren't putting meat in their dishes because its healthier than putting vegetables. They are putting them in there because they are delicious in a way that vegetables, heretofore, have not been able to replace.
Agreed. I like me an Impossible Burger now and again, but I eat lentils and beans every day and make my own burger patties out of them (using quinoa, like you mentioned). Some gluten free panko breadcrumbs to help it all stick together.
The best "ground meat" texture I make is made out of overcooked lentils combined with ground walnuts. The texture is terrific! All healthy fats, no animals or palm oil fat.
That makes sense, but the Impossible brand is not for us vegetarians and vegans. So evaluating it or calling it a failure on a measure that is not its objective isn't fair :/
I think I'm more of the target market, rather than current vegetarians. Meat is my primary source of protein, and the main source of flavor in meals that I cook. I have some ethical issues involving meat, primarily in terms of how energy-inefficient it is to produce meat. Impossible Meats are exactly what I want long-term, because they will let me make the meals that I enjoy at a lower environmental cost.
Right; the reduction of intensive animal farming is the primary benefit of this stuff. Replacement sourcing for people who eat meat and would like to continue doing so. As noted in another thread, it's not at all clear that there's much of a difference personal-health-wise: even if Impossible Meat avoids some of the dietary negatives of animal meat, it probably comes with its own. You still don't want to be eating cheeseburgers three meals a day. Rather, if you were going to eat meat anyways, substitute this.
Which is honestly a great way to do it. Treating it as a religion will only make people "fail" and feel bad and quit. I'm doing (vegetarianism) for environmental reasons so 80%ing it is a big improvement. It'll be much easier to convince most people to replace meat with an alternative half the time than converting people to full true-believer veganism.
I'm going to sound pedantic but it sounds like they are plant-based. Veganism is a belief system not to exploit animals - you simply don't see animals as food anymore. Been plant based for a year myself but I'd consider myself vegan the second half as I did more research. I get asked a lot "does being around meat at the holidays tempt you?" and my answer is along the lines of "as tempted as I am to eat the family dog".
I see this said a lot but I'm not clear who else it could possibly be for besides people who like trying novel things. People who care about quality aren't going to eat impossible brand because its strongest quality is tasting like average meat within a specific format. To the same end, it's not superior in price either in my area (and that includes fast food). So who is it for besides people who want to ride the hype train?
If I can get a burger that tastes just like a regular meat burger, but didn't require a cow to die, that's a win in my book, and I'll even happily pay a small premium for that. So there's the ethical perspective of it.
In the long term, plant-based meat substitutes should be cheaper to produce than actual meat, and if you can get a burger that tastes just like a regular meat burger, but is cheaper, that's also a win. Burger King already features the Impossible Whopper, but at a premium. If that becomes cheaper than a regular meat Whopper, a lot of people, and a lot of other fast food chains will follow. So that's the economical perspective of it.
It will be cheaper eventually, hopefully sooner rather than later. The only reason meat is as cheap as it is at the moment is because government subsidies on corn keep it that way. If we really paid the true cost including all of the water used to produce the grain and all that, it would be far more prohibitively expensive.
I am a person who would eat these (and am a meat eater). I care about reducing my carbon footprint, have concerns about our food supply, and also the treatment of animals to some degree. I still eat meat, but as these products improve (and they are improving very quickly), I will have them more and more often as a change from meat. My wife is also vegetarian so it also means we can share more food together.
There is definitely a use case for this, I've had impossible stuff with a lot of non vegetarians. In fact most vegetarians don't care about this product.
Ok so obvious question here, why eat fake beef if you don't want to be reminded of beef?
Edit: this got asked a lot, so I'll all a related question instead. Is it possible for a burger to have "good taste and good texture" but also not remind you of beef?
Try a turkey burgers, a chicken burger, a black bean burger, ect... There's so much better variety in veggie burgers, (and they don't cause the run to the bathroom, if you know what I mean.)
And, if you ever find yourself in India, try McDonald's vegetarian burgers. Nothing like beef, but still delicious.
Think of a "burger" as a style of sandwich. Some of us are so used to "hamburger" that it's hard to imagine the patty being anything else.
Honestly, it's worth trying a veggie burger. (A lot of people order them with bacon on top.) As long as you stay away from the "I can't believe it's not meat" style, they're delicious.
I've heard plenty of anecdotes of recent immigrants / tourists to the US ordering a "hamburger" expecting it to be ham. It's a rather awkward surprise for Indians who will eat pork, but not beef.
> Is it possible for a burger to have "good taste and good texture" but also not remind you of beef?
Ever had a turkey burger? The meat has a different taste and texture from beef, but it's not bad.
Also see alligator, elk, deer, chicken sausage, etc. "Exactly like beef" is not the end-all-be-all of "satisfyingly meaty", even when you only include actual meat.
>Is it possible for a burger to have "good taste and good texture" but also not remind you of beef?
Yes! I had one today for dinner in fact. The one I ate today the patty was made with mushrooms, tempeh, and wheat berry. Greens, aioli, pickes & pickled vegetables on top.
And this is why you vegetarians and vegans aren't he target. I couldn't eat that. I don't like mushrooms or tempeh and I don't know what a wheat berry is. To be fair, I don't like most foods. I eat steak with salt and pepper and baked potatoes with butter and salt. Pickled anything is a non starter. I also don't like most cooked vegetables, almost no cooked fruit (no pie, thank you), dressing that isn't ranch or anything with a weird texture.
Impossible is a blessing because I can be a boring eater and still do ad little harm as possible.
(Being a picky eater sucks. I wish I liked food. I promise, it's not because I like being a pain. My policy is that I'll try anything twice, to avoid any initial bias. I'm just kind of broken.)
For what it's worth, before I became a vegetarian that would have also sounded gross to me. I avoided nearly all vegetables, most sauces (even on dishes like pasta), any kind of salad dressing (and most salads as well). I still only really drink water.
I feel like there's a really big hump to get over with expanding a pallet, where once you have even just one or two new foods under your belt it becomes easier to learn to like other ones. For me, it was (and still is) kind of a snowball effect. I'm eating more variety of food now than I ever ate before, but I'm still a lot more narrow than other people I know.
I spent a relatively large portion of my adult life trying to learn to eat vegetables, and it wasn't until midway through transitioning to a vegetarian that I suddenly discovered the magic of sauteing with a little butter and salt instead of boiling vegetables until they were all soft and waterlogged and horrible, or baking them until they just turned into hot mush. That was honestly kind of surreal -- years of not liking veggies, and occasionally trying them in different recipes to see if something had changed, and not having anything change. And then in the space of a few weeks suddenly very quickly realizing that crunchy string beans with a tiny bit of soy sauce were delicious and that I really wanted more food like that.
That's not to say you would like the same stuff. The point is, learning to eat more things is hard, and being a picky eater is hard, and just in case you're stressed about it, don't stress about it. Just keep trying at your own pace and don't worry too much. As long as you keep occasionally experimenting, eventually you'll find a few things you like, and your pallet will expand from there.
And even if you stay a picky eater, as long as you're still getting a decent nutritional intake, and assuming you're meeting whatever dietary goals you have, then you're fine.
I'm not nearly as picky as I once was, but there are still some foods that I just can't deal with, and mushrooms are one of them. It's not just the taste or texture, it's the whole idea of them!
I'm omnivorous, but have found myself in Ubud eating a lot of vegan food before. You can have an incredible burger that isn't a beef burger, if you're appreciating it on its own merits, rather than comparing it to how close it is to a beef-burger -- love me a tempeh burger, for example. Nut cheese is great _on its own merits_ if you can free yourself from it needing to taste just like cheese, and I've had some great Cauliflower Wings.
The Impossible Whopper tastes so much like I remember regular Whoppers tasting that I nearly went back to the counter to double-check that they hadn’t given me the wrong one. Main diff: absolutely no gristle/other weird bits you’ll occasionally encounter in ground beef.
So an excellent ground beef substitute for “utility” use. Nobody’s buying a fast food hamburger to savor the delicious, high-quality beef or as part of a carefully-planned fitness and nutrition strategy.
My problem with the Impossible Whopper, at least when I tried it, was that the texture was too much like the bread, so the mouth-feel was off. But maybe I'm so use to eating beef burgers that I expect there to be be gristle/other weird bits to give some texture. I thoroughly enjoy the Beyond Meat burgers, though, as their texture is more meat-like than my admittedly-limited exposure to the Impossible burger.
If you are not anti-soy, Morning Star Original Sausage patties are quite delicious. Probably the best meat substitute I've had. They've been at it for over 40 years.
Also, soyabean is mostly GM, which doesn't go down so well in EU either, though some varieties are approved for use - possibly due to further labelling requirements: https://www.fsai.ie/legislation/food_legislation/gmos/labell... and the association with the (over)use of glyphosate.
It does, and it can also lower thyroid function. I wound up on thyroid replacement hormone because I was drinking too much soy milk. Much of the soy processing is problematic if you're trying to avoid industrialized foods. There are a lot of sites that explain these issues, so it shouldn't be hard to find one if you're interested.
Soy does not increase estrogen and I wish people would stop spreading this misinformation. Also, your situation is anecdotal and thus insignificant for trying to prove some point. I drink a gallon of soy milk a week and tofu and tempeh almost daily. Never had a problem with anything, best shape of my life, and highest test levels ever.
"I drink a gallon of soy milk a week and tofu and tempeh almost daily. Never had a problem with anything, best shape of my life, and highest test levels ever."
^^^ "your situation is anecdotal and thus insignificant for trying to prove some point."
> There are a lot of sites that explain these issues, so it shouldn't be hard to find one if you're interested.
There are lots of sites that describe everything these days. 4chan being one example. I was looking for something that had some scientific credibility.
As a vegetarian or vegan, even if you don't like the taste or it's too meaty for you. I would imagine, you would want to promote the hell out of it.
The point being, the more people you get to skip a meat meal by eating a veggie alternative, the better it is for whatever your reasons for avoiding meat are.
Why do vegans/vegetarians have to promote/preach their diet restrictions to everyone else? Can't they just be happy with their lifestyle and shut up about it? I have nothing against vegans/vegetarian, they can eat whatever they like, but I can't stand those that have to impose their diet onto the rest of the world.
> I can't stand those that have to impose their diet onto the rest of the world
I hear this complaint a lot about "imposing" beliefs, but mainly when it comes to diet. Why does diet get singled out?
It's usually considered a good thing to campaign for changes in politics (e.g. for/against drug legalisation, for/against vote reform, for/against higher taxes). You may not agree with a particular argument, but I think most people agree that being allowed to persuade people towards a point of view is part of a healthy society.
Why does politics when it comes to diet get such a visceral reaction?
> It's usually considered a good thing to campaign for changes in politics
Not true in many contexts, and comes across as preachy and holier-than-thou, especially when using guilt. Campaigning upwards is fine, even for diet, but not downwards.
Australia is burning. Animal is not only reason for climate change and species extinction but one of the big ones that we need to eliminate if we want to have a chance at stopping this madness. I'd stand up for the future of my children and grand children, so why do you value your taste pleasure more?
If climate change is your worry, then you probably shouldn't have children and grand children, as overpopulation is the single greatest cause of climate change.
Well a company offers a food you’re not forced to eat and that was enough for you to state your discomfort of people simply showing you the result of your actions. Not much more to say really
And why is that? Is it because it's more people born.. that will consume meat?
What a nonsense argument. "I won't inconvenience myself because it's not the BEST way to help the environment and the human race." In that case, I can't afford a Tesla, so I'll keep driving my F-350.
You know absolutely nothing about how I do or do not inconvenience myself, it's your comparison that is nonsense. But if you can't understand why overpopulation is a huge problem, then there is no reason to continue this discussion.
i'd say more like you're give the choice between switching to the Tesla or stopping using plastic straws, and you're picking the plastic straws option. (and you're able to afford said Tesla. it's not like either option of eating different food or not having kids is unaffordable)
That's kind of like saying that the majority of people who get cancer are old people, so we can reduce cancer rates by dying young.
The issue isn't strictly overpopulation. Its overpopulation combined with the amount of consumption. You can solve this either by reducing the population, or reducing consumption, or both. For a lot of people, there are compelling ethical, economical, and personal reasons for wanting to have children or at least avoiding restricting other people's desire for children. So in that case it makes more sense to reduce consumption.
As with any diet, it's good to spread the diet if you want more dining options. If there are more vegetarians, then businesses will have more incentive to offer vegetarian options/products. So there is a component of self-interest involved.
However, many vegetarians believe there are societal or ethical benefits to promoting vegetarianism that don't necessarily apply to other diets. It might be because they believe they have an ethical responsibility to limit the suffering of animals raised for slaughter, for example. Or they may believe that the spread of vegetarianism will curb the number of livestock and growth of pasture, which will be good for the environment.
> It might be because they believe they have an ethical responsibility to limit the suffering of animals raised for slaughter, for example.
That sounds more like a religious argument. At the extreme, some people don't believe that it matters ethically how animals are treated, and there are certainly many people who adopt an "out of sight, out of mind" attitude, or try to only eat meat from animals raised and slaughtered as humanely as possible. People are of course free to make a value judgment on these attitudes, but preaching vegetarianism/veganism on those grounds sounds too much like religious proselytizing for my taste.
I think it's fine and useful to promote non-meat diets by arguing that meat production (as we currently do it) is devastating to the environment, but religious/emotional preaching is IMO what gives a lot of vegetarians/vegans a bad name.
I can't say I experience any preaching by vegetarians/vegans. Perhaps I see the odd advert on a website or TV, or occasional news articles but the vegan/vegetarian friends/associates I have, never have them preaching at me.
Where is everyone hanging out that vegans and vegetarians are constantly pestering them? And, if you're being honest to yourself, is it really an issue in your life?
I never claimed it was an issue in my life. I've definitely had the odd veg acquaintance who has been preachy, but those tend to be people who never make the acquaintance-to-friend transition for me. My veg friends don't care what I eat, or at least have the social graces to not pester me about it.
I don't think that applies here; I don't feel particularly guilty about my meat consumption. I would prefer that animals be treated humanely, but I don't lose sleep over it. I'm far more concerned with the environmental affects of livestock farms.
Is there nothing you believe in that you believe so strongly about that you'd like it if everyone else has the same belief?
Nothing? Or as simple as "I loved watching X tv program, you should check it out too"? Surely there is something you promote in your life? If so, same thing. Why should you impose your tv watching habits on other people?
So you have never imposed your view, like or dislike of something - be it a TV program, a video game, a piece of music, a political party/piece of legislation?
Here's the thing - you may not realize it, but your lifestyle of eating meat promotes _your_ diet on to hundreds of animals every year, and literally every human being on the earth via the environmental destruction it causes. When there are victims directly and indirectly involved, it's not just a personal choice. Your diet directly destroys the world and promotes the unnecessary suffering and torture of animals.
The tone of the post, makes you sound exactly like the run of the mill militant vegans, that I have been talking to many times before, so no reason to continue.
But I will let you know that I respect your choice of not eating meat, even though you won't accept that I will continue, like the majority of people, eating meat. Have a nice day.
>Why do vegans/vegetarians have to promote/preach their diet restrictions to everyone else?
This is fundamentally the way we talk about morality - not as a matter of attitude or personal preference, but as objective facts we believe are true. Whether any particular moral statement is true or false is what most people would question, not whether moral statements are in themselves motivating. In this way, most people seem to be (1) moral realists, (2) moral internalists.
Assuming you're a moral realist, it's easy to understand why someone would "promote/preach" their diet restrictions on moral grounds - because morality, to the realist, is a matter of fact (either an "objective" morality, or a "relative" (to a culture, time, or place) one). The assumption, also, is that unlike other facts, moral facts are inherently motivating.
To the moral realist, a statement like "eating meat is morally wrong" has a truth value, in the same way "the earth is spherical" or "the earth is flat" has a truth value. The moral internalist further states that this fact is enough to provide some motivation for action, so the statement "eating meat is morally wrong" necessarily implies and states to us that "one should not eat meat" - assuming there is no failure to motivate (as may the case with depressed people or people who face extreme exhaustion, or have some other mental malady).
That's OK, you're not really the target audience, I am. My wife is vegan and I'm not. We have pet pigs, so I gave up pork. We have pet chickens now, so I've mostly given up chicken. We never have meat in the house. It's nice to have a burger and damn do I miss pork. We buy a lot of impossible. I even ate the whopper, despite finding everything at burger king to be inedible. (It was OK. Tasted like a crap burger, so it was entirely convincing.). I'm very excited about this.
I see your point and I don't blame you. But for myself, it is the opposite: I've always been a meat eater, and I'm looking for a vegetarian burger that mimics the taste and texture of meat as closely as possible...for many reasons, but one of the main reasons is the sheer engineering novelty of it. I can't help but cheer on these efforts and I'm always eager to try the latest attempt.
I believe my meat-eating friends who say they can tell the difference, but as someone who didn't really eat burgers that often even before I became vegetarian, I can't. It tastes the way I remember meat tasting (though obviously I haven't done recent comparisons).
I've joked before that if I ordered an Impossible Burger and got served a regular one, I wouldn't know :)
It does feel kind of weird eating it. There's definitely a part of my brain that protests when I take a bite. But it's also kind of novel, and I do still occasionally miss meat -- there's also a part of my brain that feels really good while I'm eating it. I like what they're doing, and I'm happy to occasionally grab one when I see it offered.
The thing is, vegetarian food is already really good -- I don't feel like I have a problem finding tasty, nutritious non-meat dishes that are filling, satisfying meals. And that's getting progressively better, not because new foods are being invented, but just because restaurants are getting better at adding vegetarian dishes that aren't just token options. I don't think there's a need for a brand new breakthrough in that area. There is no need to swoop in and invent a compelling dish for vegetarians, we have plenty of them.
It's the space in-between vegetarian and carnivore that needs innovation.
There are vegetarian meat-substitutes that I already avoid because my aversion to feeling like I'm eating that specific meat outweighs the novelty, even though they're not that convincing. I still think it's fine to have these kind of weird "in-between" foods -- my "I don't want to be reminded of that" is someone else's "this is close enough that I could give up or cut back on the real thing." I first started down a vegetarian route once I found a taco-meat substitute that I liked; I might not have even made that initial decision to start cutting back on meat if that product hadn't existed.
Being pedantic here. You're an omnivore, and not a carnivore, since the parts other than the patty are made from plants in real Whoppers too. Carnivores are animals who eat only other animals (or animal parts). You can say you're a heavy meat eater instead, if you want to emphasize that behavior or preference of yours.
That is the entire purpose of the product though. Burger patties that cater to vegetarians have been around for a long time and taste nothing like meat.
I think this is a big issue for a lot of vegetarians and vegans. The few times that I've ordered Impossible burgers, I could not shake the feeling that the kitchen got my order wrong and gave me a meat burger.
>I want to have vegetarian food which is nutritious, has good taste, has good texture, and doesn't remind me of meat.
I'm not even sure it's "healthy". The entire purpose of the product is to taste and feel like real meat. Although, I'm with you in that I don't understand why anyone would want to eat a food with a mile-long ingredient list because it's "like the real thing". There are plenty of healthy vegetarian alternatives to hamburger, obviously.
Sweet Earth makes great plant based burgers. I try to avoid saying the phrase "veggie burgers" because it scares people into thinking of those frozen green hockey puck things of years past lol. But these days they are fantastic. Look for the ones with all vegetable ingredients and no oil.
It's owned by Nestle which isn't my favorite fact in the world, there are plenty of other brands though that make super healthy burgers out of things like lentils, quinoa, and black beans. Or of course, roll your own.
I think it’s ok to eat this stuff as long as people don’t believe that this is healthy food. I have been vegetarian for a few years now. I cook mostly Indian food which I love but I still miss stuff like fried chicken or a good burger from time to time. So occasionally I eat some soy stuff or behind burger. Just don’t think that this is healthy...
I've been a vegetarian twice as long as you. I'm at a point now where I'm enjoying the very "meaty" substitutes, but 10-15 years ago I felt the same as you, didn't want anything that reminded me of meat.
Considering the damage that ultra-processed foods have already caused to humanity, and considering how new this kind of thing is, I'll stick with real meat and other whole foods until I've seen a decade-long study showing that these alternatives are safe.
So, I think it's important to consider here why ultra-processed foods have been a problem.
If you ask me, it's because they've simply been a way to refine sugars and fats into purer forms. This allows us to consume more of them more efficiently, which is an issue especially as our populations are becoming more, not less, sedentary.
I see no evidence that the processing required for "impossible" foods is similar in that respect (but I'm no food scientist).
And probably less likely to include pathogens that come from animals.
I think all people need an occasional look at where their food comes from. The amount of animal shit (rodents and the slaughtered animals themselves) in commercially sourced meat has increased in the last decade. If you stood a person in front of a meat grinder and said, "Here, now we throw in the appropriate legally-allowed amount of poop into the mix", fewer people would be in line to buy the end product.
Or if they were allowed to go visit the factory chicken farms and see the sick, diseased chickens that end up on their dinner plates, I think they would be unable to eat it.
Do people not realize that the recent laws aimed at preventing information gathering from factory farms is designed to prevent them from learning what they are really eating?
Pathogens reduction yes. Animal biological matter, no. Harvesting entails inclusion of many small animals and insects which get processed.
That said, it may not be a bad thing to be exposed to those byproducts of farming. Too sterile an environment (and food) can result in other problems. Obviously we don’t want to overwhelm our immune systems with pathogens but they need to be exposed to them to be ready and also to not attack our own system.
I don't think we are at any risk of living in too sterile an environment. If anything, the knowledge that at least 1/3 of people don't wash their hands after they poop... is just one of the lovely ways we get exposed to a lot of interesting "biological matter".
Practically everything we touch in public has someone else's complex human fecal matter on it, plus stuff from other sources.
I never suggested that a manufactured meat replacement was a solution :).
Personally I think the fake meats are a needless crutch. Yes, creating an interesting vegetarian dish requires more effort than just throwing a fatty steak on a grill (the magic of heat, fat, and animal protein), but with just a bit of effort a vegetarian dish can be very satisfying and healthy at the same time.
> Personally I think the fake meats are a needless crutch.
More then that, they're a hype-driven fad where a good concept gets ruined by people letting their imaginations run away, like cryptocurrency and driverless cars.
Honestly, I think test tube meat is where the real revolution will come from. (Animal flesh grown without the animal.) "I can't believe it's not meat" will join the ranks of Jello salads and other foods that we no longer eat.
(That, and I think that vegetarian dishes will slowly become more and more popular as people realize that they taste good and eating meat everyday is boring.)
And humankind. The amount of antibiotics countries like US use for farm-animal optimized growth certainly has a much much higher long term risk than "processed food". Once an antibiotic resistant superbug jumps from pig to people we'll pay a much higher price.
Very excited to try this. Impossible burgers are amazing, way better than beyond burgers. And Dunkin donuts Beyond sausage is not very good, so I'd love to try impossible instead.
Yeah, I agree with you. There's a big difference between impossible and beyond to my palette, the former being way more convincing. I have a feeling these are only going to improve. We've come such a long way from what constituted a "veggie burger" in the early 1990's.
Maybe a vegan sausage patty could be more easily convincing - they usually have lots of binders and spices anyway. Beyond Meat/Impossible Burger were disgusting to me (compared to regular beef), and they were dyed bright red and stayed bright red when they were cooked which is weird and not like meat.
My favourite (chain fast food) non meat burger option so far has been the one that McDonalds recently released in New Zealand - it's a deep fried, crumbed mashed potato patty with other vegetables in it too. Doesn't pretend to be meat but is delicious.
Beyond Meat/Impossible Burger were disgusting to me (compared to regular beef), and they were dyed bright red and stayed bright red when they were cooked which is weird and not like meat.
Where did you have this burger? My experience with Impossible Burgers (at The Counter) is not at all like this. They were a pretty good facsimile of meat. I’d go so far as to say they changed my opinion on meat substitutes.
Previously, I was in the same camp as all those here saying they prefer delicious food that doesn’t pretend to be meat - but I think I’d choose an Impossible Burger over that now if I was in the mood for a burger.
The way they're cooked matters a lot, at least for the Impossible Burger.
A well prepared veggie burger is a very different experience from one that's just been thrown on a grill and taken off when it's hot. I've noticed some huge gaps in quality at different restaurants.
Also will add my vote that Impossible is doing a way better job imitating meat than Beyond is, just in general.
I cooked up some beyond patties from the grocery store and they stayed red for me. I did attempt to cook them the same as I would a meat patty though. Seems like there's a technique to cooking them well
I’ve only ever cooked the store bought beyond burgers and prefer grilling them. minor adjustments in cooking technique can produce both red-in-the-middle and well done versions. I don’t care for the pan fryed version as it crusts and sometimes burns a little if left on one side too long.
As a life long meat eater, beyond meat tastes weird, but enjoyable. Impossible tastes so close to beef that I cannot tell the difference. It absolutely does not stay bright red, it cooks just the sames.
> Impossible tastes so close to beef that I cannot tell the difference.
The White Castle Impossible Slider is much better than the Burger King Impossible Whopper, IMHO, especially if you want a real demonstration of the similarity to beef.
Maybe they weren't cooked correctly? I've had impossible burger many times, and it always looks light brown like a McDonald's burger when cooked. Tastes like one, too (which I enjoy).
> My bias is obvious, but I really feel the world needs to get more into Indian food. No other cuisine does vegetarian food as well.
Agreed, when cooking myself (which I do a lot) it's usually Indian recipes. I really came to enjoy the food after I turned (mostly) vegetarian and went to visit friends in Rajasthan many years ago. I used to eat Indian meat dishes (especially curries) but found that I like actually like the vegetarian ones better. It is very easy (and cheap) to cook really good (and healthy; I don't use ghee etc as in the original recipes) and tasteful vegetarian food.
Dunkin Donuts recently debut'd a plant based sausage sandwich (at least in the Great Lakes region, USA), it was ok. Tasted a bit heavy on the salt for me.
I tried one of those. Despite having been a Beyond fan for ages, I thought the Dunkin Donuts version tasted terrible. AFAICT preparation makes a big difference, and whoever made that one at DD simply did it wrong.
The beyond burger tastes like paint and actually gets more red when you cook it. The impossible burger is red when raw, but turns brown and firm like beef when cooked.
Paint! That's a very accurate description of the flavour, I'll have to remember that. As mentioned in another reply it's possible I'm misremembering and have only had Beyond Meat.
I had a Beyond Meat burger recently and visually it was almost identical to a beef patty. The taste was a bit less intense but seemed to be in the right direction. I can't see anyone actually mistaking it for beef but it seemed like a reasonable facsimile thereof.
I also tried a Hungry Planet burger which was chewier and tasted stronger and was probably more beef-like overall. Again I don't think it'll deceive anyone but it was pretty good.
Haven't yet managed to get hold of an Impossible Burger but it's on the list.
> My favourite (chain fast food) non meat burger option so far has been the one that McDonalds recently released in New Zealand - it's a deep fried, crumbed mashed potato patty with other vegetables in it too. Doesn't pretend to be meat but is delicious.
man, they used to have this in Singapore as well but it's no longer on the menu here.
I tried a Beyond Burger for the first time last night (and again tonight). I wasn’t expecting this, but: it looks like a burger, it cooks like a burger, it smells like a burger, and it tastes like a burger (including texture).
That said, I will likely never buy it again, and have no interest in trying new products from Impossible Foods.
My main problem with it is the lack of clarity around how healthy engineered foods like the Beyond Burger really is. Sure, it doesn’t have the cholesterol of real meat, but is a heavily processed alternative really any better?
> My main problem with it is the lack of clarity around how healthy engineered foods like the Beyond Burger really is.
That's what the nutrition facts label is for. "Being processed" doesn't magically make food worse than non-processed food.
For the Beyond Burger in particular, it's directly comparable to ground beef: roughly similar fat content (depends on the lean/fat blend you get for the beef), more sodium but no cholesterol, similar protein levels, and a bit more miscellaneous stuff like potassium, iron, and phosphorous.
> "Being processed" doesn't magically make food worse than non-processed food.
No but being processed at a factory means that it can be treated in a way that makes non-processed food or home-processed superior. By definition, processed food bought from the supermarket is not fresh and has already lost nutrition and it will stay in a supermarket for weeks. No matter how many preservatives you add it's old food. Processing often increases the surface area which makes it easier for bacteria to spread and the food to oxidize. Meanwhile the most significant "processing" you do at home happens a few hours or minutes before eating. Nobody is arguing that left overs are superior to eating food on the same day it's cooked.
The heuristic that factory processed food is worse still holds. In theory you could make healthy processed food but there is no economic incentive for that so it is the exception, not the rule.
> The heuristic that factory processed food is worse still holds.
This is a critical observation, and should be at the top of this entire comment thread.
There's a fetish amongst intelligent people to try to think "logically", but logic is actually a terrible system for analyzing anything in the real world. The argument that "it is possible for a processed food to be good for you, and possible for an unprocessed plant to be deadly" is a totally logical refutation of the idea that "processed food it bad" but nonetheless is completely nonsensical because we don't live in a world of binary.
Yes, this is the thing... it is highly processed. It is a similar situation to nut milks and soy milk, which tend to be either highly processed, lacking real nutritional value, or both.
The other problem I think is that over time these meat substitutes will evolve to improve sales, and if the biggest buyers are fast food chains, that evolution will tend in the wrong direction.
I’ve always found Impossible’s “versioning” scheme amusing.
One of my favourite burger joints recently shifted from offering Impossible v2 to v3 for their patty, as v3 supposedly resembled meat more closely.
However, I thought that v2 tasted much better while avoiding the “uncanny valley” of meat substitutes... I wish they would keep them all available rather than phasing out older versions.
I'm curious what will happen when we will be able to grow "just" meat (like organs), without cows/pigs/chicken (I believe that we will be able to achieve this). Will the people who refuse to eat meat now due to ethical concerns, still refuse to eat it.
Cultured meat is supposedly getting pretty close, maybe the next few years, though maybe longer. https://www.memphismeats.com/ is one company doing it.
I'm vegetarian and I would definitely eat it, and most of my vegetarian friends would as well (assuming they figure out how to produce it without fetal bovine serum, which isn't vegetarian). But certainly everyone is different. I imagine some people will still have ethical qualms, and I know a number of vegetarians who don't like the impossible burger because they don't like the taste and texture of meat, so presumably they wouldn't like lab-grown meat either.
How do you ensure that the meat didn't come from a factory farm? When you're going to a friend's BBQ or a restaurant you may not know the source of the meat.
I assume that it would be possible to ask and find out from the packaging, just as one currently finds out if foods contain certain allergens. Asking the BBQ host if the meat is factory farmed or grown in a lab would be just like asking if the mustard contains gluten.
This is an actual use case for a blockchain - it’s already used in Walmart (with IBM) to check where some vegetables have come from and this is not far from that. Maybe some sort of QR code you can scan to see the items history from source.
It would technically be a plant of sorts. Or maybe it would make vegetables the new "meat" in terms of ethical concerns. Do vegans distinguish between something like carrots (where you basically kill the entire plant) and apples (where the fruits are harvested but the tree remains in tact)?
> Or maybe it would make vegetables the new "meat" in terms of ethical concerns. Do vegans distinguish between something like carrots (where you basically kill the entire plant) and apples (where the fruits are harvested but the tree remains in tact)?
Actually, there are fringe but growing number of people who hate vegans because vegans kill and torture plants. Plants after all have senses and can feel and communicate with each other. And they find people who eat fruits disgusting since fruits are a plants' womb and eggs.
I’ve heard of these - their diet consists of fruits that fall onto the ground (therefore ‘dead’) and certain vegetables that don’t have feelings right?
Personally I find meat unappealing and lab grown stuff would still be the same, it’s the same reason why I don’t agree with vegan alternatives that look, feel and taste like meat so much so that it mimics blood. Disgusting
Based on the picture, it looks like they're marketing this mainly as a filling for pork dumplings. And as all Jews know, pork is already kosher when it comes minced or ground in Chinese food.
There's an oddball NYC tradition of (not strictly observant) Jews going out for Chinese food on Christmas because those were the only restaurants that were open. The Chinese restarauteurs are appreciative, but sometimes mystified...
Just shared the exact same sentiment with a friend; while I'm no committed vegan or vegetarian, if I see an impossible burger on a menu at a burger bar, I'll happily order one.
If they manage to make a passable and just as enjoyable impossible bacon strip, oh boy.
What I want is Impossible Steak wrapped in Impossible Bacon for half the cost of the real thing. The company that can give me that will have me as a customer.
Insects are not kosher so some plant products can contain too many insects to be kosher or require careful washing and inspection to be kosher. Figs contain wasps and need to be inspected and the wasps removed before they can be consumed. Fresh strawberries with stems have a lot of tiny insects on them that need to be washed away before consumption.
Hmmm... your reference seems to indicate it's OK, so long as it's clear to any observers what's really going on. Cheeseburgers with non-dairy mock cheese are an explicit example.
(Next two paragraphs quoted:
For example, if one wishes to drink almond milk while eating meat, he needs to indicate that it is in fact almond milk, not regular milk, which is forbidden. In the olden days, this was done by popping some whole almonds into the milk. Today, this can be achieved by having the container on the table, making it clear that it is almond milk.6
The same would need to be done in order to serve a veggie burger that resembles meat, topped with real cheese, or to serve a beef burger under a slice of imitation cheese. It’s fine to eat, provided that the package is nearby and visible, or its parve identity is spelled out on the menu, receipt, etc.
> For example, if one wishes to drink almond milk while eating meat, he needs to indicate that it is in fact almond milk, not regular milk, which is forbidden. In the olden days, this was done by popping some whole almonds into the milk. Today, this can be achieved by having the container on the table, making it clear that it is almond milk.
Who are you indicating it to? Does gods omnipotence not extend to distinguishing different types of milk, or is this so people can police it? (not trying to be snarky - genuinely curious)
I'm not sure I would point to ground beef as a particularly "natural source of calories". At least not in the US, where cows are largely raised on.... corn and soy (and pharmaceuticals).
> "CHOW contained spun, plaited, and woven protein molecules, capped and coded, carefully designed to be ignored by even the most ravenous digestive tract enzymes; no-cal sweeteners; mineral oils replacing vegetable oils; fibrous materials, colorings, and flavorings. The end result was a foodstuff almost indistinguishable from any other except for two things. Firstly, the price, which was slightly higher, and secondly, the nutritional content, which was roughly equivalent to that of a Sony Walkman."
Neil Gaiman - Good Omens: The Nice and Accurate Prophecies of Agnes Nutter, Witch
Although, these particular preparations might be closer to MEALS:
> "MEALS was CHOW with added sugar and fat. The theory was that if you ate enough MEALS you would a) get very fat, and b) die of malnutrition."
Also if you are going to say that humans are designed and ignore Darwin's theory of evolution, you are going to lose you credibility on your thoughts on science.
This is a bad example, because ignoring what we have been 'designed' to eat, fruit is certainly designed to be eaten, which is even better. Just think about it: you can pick it, and leave it lying around for weeks and it is still fine. There are almost zero fruit-borne illnesses. When it is spoiled, it is obvious by looking at it or smelling it. I mean, this is something that has evolved to be eaten by large mammals. I don't think this is substantially changed by modern farming.
I don't understand your argument at all - you are saying that foods that are designed to be eaten are inherently better?
Sugar is sugar. It doesn't matter if the sugar has been added through selective breeding or just added afterwards. The only reasons fruits are a little bit healthier than soda with the same sugar/micronutrient content is the fibers in the fruit that makes it harder to consume too much of it.
The original comment was arguing that modern fruit is not 'natural' due to farming practices. My argument is that this isn't the example to choose, because of all things, fruit is among the best things to eat.
There is plenty of evidence that fruit consumption is good for you[1], which will obviously not be reproduced by drinking the equivalent flavoured soda. "A little bit healthier"? This is a joke?
Not really, at least not in any directed way. To the extent that you might say that evolution designed us to do, including eat, anything, it is only exactly whatever we do do.
Humans are complicated creatures, and just replicating the macronutrients (and even micronutrients) into an ingestible substance is not a replacement for real food.
There was an article in HN news sometime last year covering the results of a well controlled experiment.
In summary: All processed food is bad for you. Not "bad" like cigarettes, but bad in the sense that if your diet primarily consists of processed food, you will gain more weight, and gain it rather quickly.
"I can't believe it's not meat" products are heavily processed and shouldn't be the majority of your diet. Stick with real meat and/or high protein vegetables, depending on your preferences or dietary needs.
You don't have to look it up if you don't want to, but you should know the health risks of eating factory-farmed meat (regarding antibiotic resistance, among other things) are almost assuredly worse.
I get the appeal of making something familiar to consumers, but will we ever see an Impossible product with a flavor that they claim tastes different from and better than any existing pork or beef product?
When you think about it, pork allegedly tastes like human. I wonder how hard it is to get to impossible long pork. The marketing challenges would only be similar to getting halal/kosher eaters to try impossible pork.
A bit more than allegedly. Pozole used to be used to be made with human meat, which was swapped with pork precisely because it "tasted very similar" [1]
I wonder if you could make Impossible Crackling. One of the Danish classics is something called flæskesteg, which gets really good if you have the skin done right so that it's crispy.
I've had the Beyond Sausage at Dunkin Donuts. It was acceptable, but actually more spiced than you normally ever get from a sausage patty — probably to cover up for other deficiencies.
I have to disagree - till the products actually made it to the shelves, where nutritional analysis revealed how unhealthy beyond/impossible truly were, they conveniently left out these bits in their messaging. It wasn't an accident that their marketing paired "tasty" and "vegan", which to any casual observer screams "healthy & tasty"
My wife is allergic to pork so I can somewhat appreciate this... otherwise I don’t get it, if you want to eat plants just eat plants. But hey if they are making money well, I get that!
Though I always wondered if the animal rights type of vegetarians eat this stuff, I would suppose they consider it a grotesque display or a mockery to dress up plant matter as animal murder.
Impossible's goal isn't to make food for vegetarians, it's to try to replace meat for meat-eaters by making the facsimile very close, the ultimate goal being about the environmental effects. Something like 70% of water usage in US is for cattle production.
70% of water goes to cattle, another 70% goes to walnut trees, another 70% goes to water golf courses, and the last 70% goes to the next trendy anti-cause. Anyway, not even close to true.
This reminds me of everyone having a favorite pet project that could be funded by cutting the military budget. It's a nice shared fantasy because everyone can dream that their pet project gets funded but if it actually happened then lots of those dreams would have to pop because there simply isn't enough money for more than one giga project.
The point is, meat is freaking delicious. You can't deny it. The smell of bbq will get most people drooling.
Some people, you will never convince to eat veggies instead, especially if they taste way worse than the meat they love. But if you have an alternative that tastes just as good, if not better, than meat, and is cheaper (with economies of scale), they would be more willing to go with the veggie option.
>I always wondered if the animal rights type of vegetarians eat this stuff, I would suppose they consider it a grotesque display or a mockery to dress up plant matter as animal murder.
Well, yes, your wondering is exactly right. Long-time vegan here. (I think most "animal rights type of vegetarians" are vegan–what's done to cows in the dairy industry isn't pretty.) Butchers, ads for eating lambs etc start to seem horrific. I'm not at all interested in fake meat. Yes, the very idea seems grotesque. There's plenty of delicious vegetarian cuisine from around the world without needing or wanting fake meat, fake cheese etc. I haven't missed, wanted or craved meat once in..uh..gee, almost 30 years.
I like how both comments are ethically compatible with a vegan sitting at the same table, gobbling up an entire impossible burger and replying with a full mouth, "That's exactly what I was thinking!"
Hi. I think "both comments" means, mine and the person I was replying to? It seems you're commenting on my comment more than replying to it..but further than that, I have no idea at all what you mean, sorry.
I don't think their win condition is hard to grasp: price.
With further innovations and economic of scale, you'd imagine that one day they'll substantially undercut the [heavily subsidized] meat industry.
Not an economist (and I doubt even they'd know), but I feel like at x% the price of meat, they'll capture y% of the market. And, it'll snowball, as the meat industry loses market share, prices will go up.
If that’s their real goal then that seems a bit dystopian, corner the market with artificial meat as a means of forcing everyone into a diet that will make us all collectively weaker?
>Though I always wondered if the animal rights type of vegetarians eat this stuff
Some don't like it, but I do. As long as it resembles processed meat instead of intact animal parts (like chicken wings, for example), I'm not bothered by it at all. It might as well be any other processed plant-based food to me.
