“Almost”
Lol, Impossible burgers and nuggets taste better than the real thing to me. The burgers’ mouth feel isn’t as good as the real thing, but the taste is better. And the nuggets both taste and feel better than the real thing.
I like not feeling disgusted about the cruelty. Really adds to the experience.
There’s that too. After seeing the way chickens are factory farmed, even if real nuggets tasted better than Impossible nuggets, I’d still go with Impossible. Luckily, Impossible’s are better, so it’s the easiest choice ever.
For things like frozen nuggets? It's already just a breaded and deep fried protein paste at that point. Easy bar to clear and stay vegan.
And I bet all of them are loaded with methylcellulose (a.k.a. nature's laxative) just like every other bullshit fake meat product.
I follow a vegan diet now, but grew up in the southern US around legit BBQ. There is no point trying to replicate that, never going to come close and it's just going to use shitty processed food techniques to accomplish it. If you're going to go vegan, how about actually be vegan instead of chasing a life you decided to leave behind.
I’ve been eating Impossible burgers and nuggets for years, and it’s never had a laxative effect. I think you might be assuming there’s a high enough dose to produce the effect, when there probably isn’t.
What’s wrong with being vegan but wanting a meat substitute? Does it make someone a worse person than you if they do that?
I’m not vegan, and I eat Impossible meats, because I try to eat less meat and they taste really good. Would it be better if I ate real meat instead? Because the way you’re talking, it sounds like that’s what you’d prefer.
This. I'm not giving up BBQ, sorry. However, if I can replace my heavily processed meats like nuggies or hamburger patties with something that tastes more or less the same, has a vaguely similar or better texture, and doesn't involve killing an animal, then fuck yeah I'll try it.
Talking about how an ingredient is a laxative as if it's going to immediately make everyone shit their brains out just pushes me and presumably others away from meat substitutes. Tbh it almost feels elitist or like meat propaganda. "The fake meat is gonna make you die from diarrhea!!!!" or "Oooo... Look at me, I'm a real^tm vegan because I don't eat that chemical filled, laxative laced fake meat".
I get what you mean especially in comparison to the real southern BBQ. However things aren't rational ... I used to have cravings for meat all the time and a random veggie dog or burger would make it go away.
I don't really chase the vegan lifestyle so there's probably a market for those people like us that would try to eat vegan/veggie more often than they do.
Yeah, but what if they're not loaded with methylcellulose, or what if we do eventually come close to the real meats or what if this is a gateway product that could convert carnists?
Nope. Give me real plants, unprocessed. Just because a heavily processed compound that happens to be considered vegan might taste like meat has absolutely no bearing on whether or not someone is going to stop eating meat.
It's kinda like a heroin addict. They're not gonna stop just because you took their needle away or gave them a different drug. They have to want to stop on their own, otherwise anything you try is moot.
In your heroin example, when they do decide to break the addiction, giving them a different drug (Methadone) is exactly what you do.
No one is making you eat these products. If you’re so addicted to meat that you can’t have even fake meat without risking falling off the bandwagon, then it’s probably better you don’t anyway.
There are plenty of people (me included) who enjoy the taste and experience of eating meat, but would rather eat a plant based alternative. That’s who these products are for. When I have a choice between a real burger and an Impossible burger, I’ll choose the Impossible burger every time. But when I don’t have that choice, I’m going to eat the real burger.
Fake chicken > real chicken
Given how tasteless real chicken from the broiler varieties taste, I'm not surprised that something with a similar texture and the same spices tastes similarly. I had the misfortune to grow up around and eat colorful chicken and my brain still can't get over the taste of factory farmed poultry.
I found the same with beef, bland and flavourless, compared to moose my dad would hunt.
Sure, if your definition of "meat" is frozen chicken nuggets or those sawdust & gristle pre-made burgers. I've tried all these meat alternatives and they're nothing like actual meat, both in taste and texture, and they come with the added bonus of being ultra processed.
Let's see the cloned meat. I'm really curious to see if that's any good.
What does “ultra processed” mean, in this context?
That they are made from heavily refined products such as pea protein as compared to non-processed foods like whole vegetables or minimally-processed like salads.
That, however, does not make them bad by itself - they are generally still healthier than other ultra-processed (junk) foods since they are not made to be addictive with a lot of salt, sugar, and fat.
You should watch this video. This shows how Impossible burger meat is made.
Nothing in it is what I would describe as “heavily refined” like you said. The “heaviest” refinement process they use is fermentation, like sauerkraut, beer, yogurt, etc. I don’t think anyone would describe sauerkraut as “ultra processed”.
Here are the ingredients:
Ingredients: Water, Soy Protein Concentrate, Sunflower Oil, Coconut Oil, 2% Or Less Of: Natural Flavors, Methylcellulose, Cultured Dextrose, Food Starch Modified, Yeast Extract, Dextrose, Soy Leghemoglobin, Salt, Vitamin E (Tocopherols), L-Tryptophan, Soy Protein Isolate,
Vitamins and Minerals: Zinc, Vitamins (B3, B1, B6, B2, and B12)
Contains: Soy
I'm a hardcore meat eater, and TBH, I would rather eat a vegetable, than something ultra-processed and vegetable adjacent.
I don’t see the appeal. If I want vegan fried snack food / street food I’m going for falafel, pakora, tempura, or even beer-battered onion rings. Fried chickpeas, fried plantain chips, potato chips, fried tofu skins, vegan fried spring rolls, blooming onions, fried wonton nachos topped with vegan pulled pork (made with jackfruit), vegan empanadas, vegan pizza rolls, …
The list goes on and on and on. There is so much better stuff to eat than highly processed nuggets. Even if you aren’t vegan, there are much better things to eat than chicken nuggets.
But I see it. I want this.
I am happy for you if you don't want chicken, but I like chicken and I want to eat it. If there is an alternative that tastes the same, I'm going to use that. If there's falafel as an alternative, I'm going with the chicken.
Only the first paragraph or so is readable, however the entire article is viewable from the source. https://grist.org/food-and-agriculture/best-vegan-meat-brands-taste-test-nectar-almost-as-good-as-the-real-thing/
Four of those products performed so well they almost reached taste parity, which Nectar defines as there being no statistically significant difference in how participants scored the vegan product versus the animal one in terms of overall liking. Those four are Impossible Foods’ unbreaded chicken breast, chicken nuggets, and burger, as well as Morningstar Farms’ nuggets.
The secret is salt.
And fat. Vegan burger patties taste like heaven because of fat and salt.
Don't even need to taste as good, I'll gobble up most vegan nuggets alternatives regardless.
"Taste tests prove these vegan meat brands do not taste as good as the real thing."
the sheer amount of carnist misinformation in this thread is something else...
It really is something to behold. The animal agriculture propaganda did its work.
I already like how they will cost the same as meat, even though they are much cheaper to produce. /s
That's not how any of the products in the supermarket are priced though
I'm going to be pedantic here, because it's sometimes my favourite thing to be. But "Vegan Meat" is an oxymoron.
Meat is specifically defined as the flesh or edible parts of animals.
These aren't Vegan Meat brands, they're Meat Substitute brands.
Meat also refers to the edible nut part. Like the meat of a wallnut is inside the shell
https://www.merriam-webster.com/dictionary/meat
Meat is only specifically animals when in that context. Example: "let's get to the meat of the issue" is not referring to animal flesh, but the details of an issue. Not even food related.
No, vegan meat exists, because I use it in that way.
if vegan is so fucking good, why are they trying to imitate meat all the time? If you want to taste meat, eat meat. If meat is offensive to you, then don't try to fucking create a meat taste
Many vegans were brought up in meat eating families before they started questioning it and going vegan because of moral reasons. It's not weird to miss the taste while refraining from eating the meat because of the belief that the life of an animal is more important than taste buds. And that's how this industry exists; to satisfy taste with respect for animals.
But continue hating if you want to.
Have you considered that maybe meat tastes good, but I don't want to kill and consume animals?
Because we want to keep our favourite foods. So many people say they don’t want to go vegan until they realize there are vegan alternatives to almost everything.
The vegan alternatives do not have animal abuse and environmental degradation.
Tastes good
It isn't about taste, it is about not being able to replace the nutritional value of the meat serving with the Vegan alternative. Vegan food is delicious, but it has issues getting everything you need into your body when replacing things found specifically in meats.
Isn’t Impossible burger meat virtually identical nutritionally as real meat? That’s why it’s not very good for you. Like, burgers aren’t healthy.
Isn’t Impossible burger meat virtually identical nutritionally as real meat? That’s why it’s not very good for you. Like, burgers aren’t healthy.
This has nothing at all to do with what I am saying.
My point is that articles pushing the flavour narrative are missing the point because it isn't about taste. It is about the fact that being Vegan is expensive as it takes a lot of supplements outside of food consumption to replace what can only be found in meats that the human body requires to survive.
Junk food tastes great, but it isn't good for you. Burgers aren't inherently unhealthy, just like Vegan food isn't automatically healthy.
Idk man, plenty of people survive just fine without eating meat. Multivitamins are incredibly cheap. I eat meat and I still take a multivitamin daily. It’s like $25 for a 6 month supply at Costco. Impossible burgers are about the same price as regular burgers there too. I can make an Impossible burger at home with all the fixings for less than the price of a Big Mac. Maybe you live in a place where these things are really expensive?
What's going on Canada?
🍁 Meta
🗺️ Provinces / Territories
🏙️ Cities / Local Communities
Sorted alphabetically by city name.
🏒 Sports
Hockey
Football (NFL): incomplete
Football (CFL): incomplete
Baseball
Basketball
Soccer
💻 Schools / Universities
Sorted by province, then by total full-time enrolment.
💵 Finance, Shopping, Sales
🗣️ Politics
🍁 Social / Culture
Rules
Reminder that the rules for lemmy.ca also apply here. See the sidebar on the homepage: lemmy.ca