I think you are completely wrong.

People eat meat because they like the taste and the texture, but at the same time everyone knows that meat is produced by killing animals, and that it's much less sustainable than vegetarian food.

If you want to get people to switch to meat alternatives, you have to keep everything that's great about meat (taste, texture, proteins), while removing everything that's bad about meat (slaughter, livestock industry).

And that is exactly what this new generation of plant-based alternatives are focusing on, and given their popularity compared to earlier attempts, I think they're on the right track.

Quick question: Are you yourself a vegetarian or vegan?

It’s just people completely missing the point. If you get fake meat close enough in taste/texture/price you’ll move a large amount of product. The high high majority of meat consumption is not high quality product, but the absolutely lowest quality possible. It’s so easy to swap out they meh hamburger patty you have at a bbq with a plant based one, be healthier, and have less impact on the environment.

It's hilarious, because there's one comment just like that below yours now.

> The high high majority of meat consumption is not high quality product, but the absolutely lowest quality possible.

Yes, this. A lot of people, myself included, eat a lot of meat dishes simply out of habit. Switching those dishes to vegetarian dishes is simply not going to happen, because the force of habit is so strong. If I want a spaghetti bolognese, a spaghetti marinara isn't the same thing! But if I can make my bolognese with a plant-based meat alternative so that it gets the same taste and texture as the real thing, that's a win, and that's something I, and a lot of people, will be willing to do.

I suspect that all the people arguing for vegetarian dishes are people who would always choose the marinara over the bolognese, and therefore don't see the big deal.

> It’s so easy to swap out they meh hamburger patty you have at a bbq with a plant based one, be healthier, and have less impact on the environment.

Even better, have McDonalds and Burger King and every other fast food joint swap out their meat! The Impossible Whopper is almost there now. It just needs to get a couple of notches better, and be the same price as a meat Whopper and there'd zero reason to choose the meat Whopper anymore. And if you can get the Impossible one cheaper than the meat one, it will be the default choice, and you'd have eliminated an absolutely massive amount of habitual meat consumption. Win-win-win.

One has the protein I need and one doesn't.

I did, however, discover falafel balls recently, and they're definitely something that I can imagine eating regularily.

I'm not sure about cheaper, I think that might have some of effects - perceived inferiority, etc.

I wonder if a hole-in-the-wall franchise based on serving Soylent-based food might work - like a Boba Tea or Pho place, but serving insulated mugs of hot Soylent?

Consumers know that producing meat takes a lot of time and effort, and is therefore expensive. They also know that vegetables are much cheaper than meat.

Personally, I'm not going to try an Impossible Whopper if it costs more than a normal, meat-based one, because in my mind it should be cheaper, and I'd feel like I was getting ripped off by excessive margins.

Back when I lived in the bay, my brother and I found a vegan restaurant - Golden Era. He had taken me to other vegetarian restaurants and they always felt lacking for something. Golden Era... the 'chicken' drumsticks - ok, they were on a wooden stick, but the texture of whatever it was was right. Then Mongolian 'chicken' had a texture to it too and the sauce provided a nice savory to it.

Since then, some others suggested that the texture may have been from jackfruit (some day I'll hunt up some around here and see if I can make a reasonable BBQ Jackfruit sandwich.

But yea - the thing that had me not pass on my brother asking if I wanted to head to Golden Era was that it felt right when it was being chewed.

The preparation is more involved than your basic 'throw it in a blender' seitan steak, but the result is totally worth it. You can get really fulfilling textures and flavours, and quite a variety, to boot.

The pot stickers are still there as are the drumsticks.

The drumsticks now say 'soy "chicken"' (the menu that I remember didn't have that - http://d2by9dx2k0n1tg.cloudfront.net/menus/1/1829/public.jpg... ) and ghads... the price has gone from 4 @ $5.95 to 3 @ $8.00

Likewise, the "Spicy Mongolian Delight" is now listed as "slices of soy protein, bell peppers, & onion in a spicy sweet sauce" (which has gone from $7.95 to $12.50)

---

In other vegan... the Fisch Stix and "Chicken" Fingers from https://cheezefactoryrestaurant.com/menu are good (though I'm a bit wary of trying to get the fish flavor and texture right).

My "it might have been jackfruit" - look at https://www.loveandlemons.com/bbq-jackfruit-recipes/ and the way that its nearly indistinguishable from pulled pork in appearance and apparently unripe jackfruit has a pork like savory taste when cooked.

Have you seen the animal industry? It's absolutely disgusting. Getting rid of that would be an enormous net win, both ethical and environmental.

That being said, I think it's only fair to compare that to all the antibiotics, hormones, and fertilizers that your average low-grade ground beef has been exposed to or fed.

Weird, how?

Weird, because they have funny names that are hard to pronounce, and are therefore magically "unnatural" and bad for you?

Or weird, because their effects on nutrition, digestion, and human health hasn't been widely studied yet?

And the decisions are sometimes odd. Like beet juice being added not for flavor but so it looks like the patty is bleeding. Meat eaters aren't sold because the veggie burger looks rare.

The truth is meat eaters aren't, en massé, abandoning meat for a plant based alternative that provides little to no health benefit and costs just as much or more.

Will we get there? Probably. But we're in a weird limbo area that is barely appealing to either side of the fence other than as a novelty.

Those 'odd ingredients' don't seem so odd to me. Go through the list of a meat alternative one by one, you'll be surprised how mundane they are

[ citation needed ]

I'm a long-time vegetarian but this kind of specious pseudo science doesn't sit right with me.

Your turn. Basically all cardiovascular diseases are caused by meat, right?

I've spent most of my life as a vegetation but dishonest histrionics like this do a disservice to the aim of convincing meat eaters to eat less meat.

Its not that complicated, I fail to see how this qualifies as histrionics.

Again, citation needed.

I’m not suggesting these new meat substitutes have that effect but it’s reasonable for people to be cautious. Yeah heart disease and global emissions but... also soiling yourself without warning in public.

The best thing proponents of these new foods could do is genuinely and honestly recognize and address those worries.

Caution not needed. Nothing new here

As in any other case, to persuade another person is to assert a claim. It doesn’t matter that you already have done the requisite learning to understand what you’re certain is the baseline set of facts. What matters is you want to change someone else’s beliefs.

As an example:

It would be preposterous for me to say “I am certain that biological sex is a spectrum, and binary sex is a simplification useful as a tool for some applications but inadequate for others” and just expect anyone who doesn’t know that to crack open a book or start googling my hypothesis credulously. Even though I’m certain it’s true.

I understand that while there’s sound scientific basis for the claim, it’s not a shared understanding of reality.

I also understand that it’s a claim that may be questioned, even though I’m certain it’s correct, and it’s my choice whether to give it more weight when challenged (attempt to persuade someone who doesn’t accept the claim l) or to carry on certain I’m right. But if I take the latter path, I have to accept that it’s really very unlikely the other party will learn what I’ve learned, unless they become curious and open to the possibility.

In other words, you can be right until the end of time and it wouldn’t ever matter to some people unless you give them a reason to want to be right too.

Here's the ingredients list for the impossible burger:

Water, textured wheat protein, coconut oil, potato protein, natural flavors, 2% or less of leghemoglobin (soy), yeast extract, salt, konjac gum, xanthan gum, soy protein isolate, vitamin E, vitamin C, thiamine (vitamin B1), zinc, niacin, vitamin B6, riboflavin (vitamin B2), and vitamin B12.

The only thing unusual is leghemoglobin, which is fermented soy protein.

"textured wheat protein" - no idea what it, but it sounds disgusting, and very highly processed. I'd presume it also contains gluten?

"potato protein" - again, it sounds like something highly processed.

"natural flavors" - it doesn't specify exactly what they are, so I don't even know what I'm eating - I don't like it.

"leghemoglobin" - you mentioned what this is, but otherwise it sounds like a lab-produced chemical.

"yeast extract" - makes me think of marmite, which is one of the most revolting substances on earth! Aside from that, I think of the smell of yeast; I... don't think I want to eat that.

"konjac gum" - never heard of it.

"xanthan gum" - I think it's some kind of thickening agent?

"soy protein isolate" - no idea what this is. The wheat and potato proteins don't have "isolate" in their names, so I assume this is even more highly processed. For some reason it makes me think of processes like "hydrogenation" - ways we mess around with foods to make them as cheap as possible, sometimes with negative health consequences.

"vitamin E..." - makes me think the raw ingredients on their own are so unhealthy that they had to add a few crushed multivitamins.

Overall: it sounds highly processed and devoid of nutrition. blech!

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Konjac

And if you find yeast "revolting", I take it you don't like bread or beer either?

I know it wasn't your point, but as an aside: isn't the "used" yeast slurry removed from most commercially produced beer? (depending on the style, obv)

Each of the ingredients bar "natural flavors" (which usually means a proprietary spice blend or msg) can be found with a simple Google search - as someone else said, konjac is an Asian vegetable, textured wheat protein has been a staple of vegan cooking for decades and can be bought in any health food shop, and so on.

> isn't the "used" yeast slurry removed

From beer, partially. From bread, no.

You may be familiar with these ingredients, but that doesn't mean anyone who isn't used to highly processed food is "wrong" for not knowing what they even are.

No, actually you probably can't [1]:

> Is there such a thing as a climatically-guilt-free steak? Are grazing livestock climate villains or climate saviours? A new report by an international research collaboration led by the Food Climate Research Network (FCRN), part of the Oxford Martin Programme on the Future of Food, provides an authoritative answer to these questions.

> The new report Grazed and confused? helps add clarity to the debate around livestock farming and meat and dairy consumption.

> 14.5% of all human made greenhouse gas emissions come from the livestock sector as a whole. There is however some confusion and disagreement in the debate about the climate impacts of grazing livestock (and particularly grass-fed beef).

> Some commentators have argued that well-managed grazing can remove carbon dioxide from the atmosphere and sequester it in soils, and that these removals can substantially compensate for, or even exceed, all other emissions from the livestock that are doing the grazing. In this way, grass-fed beef has been offered by some as a climate solution, rather than a problem.

> Written by FCRN’s Dr Tara Garnett in collaboration with Cécile Godde of CSIRO and a team of international experts, this report dissects claims made by different stakeholders in the debate, and evaluates them against the best available science. This report finds that better management of grass-fed livestock do not hold a solution to climate change as only under very specific conditions can they help sequester carbon. This sequestering of carbon is even then small, time-limited, reversible and substantially outweighed by the greenhouse gas emissions these grazing animals generate. Dr Garnett explains the key takeaways from this report:

> “This report concludes that grass-fed livestock are not a climate solution. Grazing livestock are net contributors to the climate problem, as are all livestock. Rising animal production and consumption, whatever the farming system and animal type, is causing damaging greenhouse gas release and contributing to changes in land use. Ultimately, if high consuming individuals and countries want to do something positive for the climate, maintaining their current consumption levels but simply switching to grass-fed beef is not a solution. Eating less meat, of all types, is.”

[1]: https://www.oxfordmartin.ox.ac.uk/news/2017-news-grazed-and-...

>Transport is a small contributor to emissions. For most food products, it accounts for less than 10%, and it’s much smaller for the largest GHG emitters. In beef from beef herds, it’s 0.5%.

Yes I have. My job as an electrician brought me to farms, slaughterhouses, and food factories. Denmark has rigorously enforced standards for ethical treatment of animals, as well as strict hygiene standards for industrial food preparation. Not disgusting at all.

Along the way, we’re tricking people into thinking that some palm oil smoothie is healthier than meat, and that sugared water filtered through oats is better than dairy.

Impossible burger: Water, Soy Protein Concentrate, Coconut Oil, Sunflower Oil, Natural Flavors, 2% Or Less Of: Potato Protein, Methylcellulose, Yeast Extract, Cultured Dextrose, Food Starch Modified, Soy Leghemoglobin, Salt, Mixed Tocopherols (Antioxidant), Soy Protein Isolate, Vitamins and Minerals (Zinc Gluconate, Thiamine Hydrochloride (Vitamin B1), Niacin, Pyridoxine Hydrochloride (Vitamin B6), Riboflavin (Vitamin B2), Vitamin B12).

These are common ingredients?

I'm not defending the plant-based industry here, but the way meat is produced in the USA is also a nightmare.

But honestly I’m not 100% sure how much better aussy and Japanese meats are.

There's still plenty good food to eat, but the fake meat is not the most exciting stuff to me.

I for one eat a mix of real meat, plant-based meat, and non-meat protein options— tofu stirfry, falafel burger, etc.

But you are not getting them close enough for that. They taste different. They also have different nutritional composition, so if you will just replace meat by then brainlessly you are setting yourself up to failure.

Vegetarians who did not eate meat for years claim the taste is similar, but nobody else. And these could be good, if someone did not raised expectations up to "like meet" to sell it and then failed to execute.

Have you actually tried Beyond Meat or Impossible Burger? If you haven't please do. Just go to your nearest Burger King and order an Impossible Whopper and a regular Whopper and compare them.

They're very close to the taste and texture of real ground beef now, and I think they'll get even better with time, and that they can become as tasty as the real deal, as nutritious as the real deal, and cheaper.

I think this is too generous. Maybe I'm reading it wrong, but the implicit message here is that people actually care about the animals and sustainability of meat farming.

My spouse is vegetarian and I'm whatever. I don't buy meat but if it finds itself in front of me I'll eat it. I have had the conversation of the horrors of meat production many times at the dinner table with a spectrum of people, and nobody changed their habits. Yes, this is anecdotal, and I'm willing to read a source and change my opinion if there is some evidence that people actually give a shit about the animals. As far as I can tell, it is all just virtue signaling at best.

I agree with OP. I think we would be better served in the long run creating good consumables that have the caloric density and amino acid profiles found in meats and encourage people to eat those instead of trying to replicate something we should be horrified about.

This doesn't mean that people don't care about the horrors of the animal industry. It just means that they don't care enough to change their habits. Huge difference.

Which is why meat alternatives are so important, because they allow people to stop eating meat without changing their habits!

Neither you nor the GP really eat meat, which means that neither of you belong to the target group for this product! You are not the consumer! You clearly do not understand the whole point of these plant-based meat alternatives! Your thoughts and opinions on the product development and marketing of these are 100% irrelevant, because they're not competing for your dollars! This product is not for you.

This product is for people who want meat, who love meat, people who wants to eat greasy, tasty, juicy, meaty burgers, and who don't want to substitute that for a "delicious" salad.

> and encourage people to eat those instead

No!

First you need to develop meat alternatives so that everyone can replace most of the meat in their diets without hassle, without sacrificing anything, without changing their diet. Then you can encourage people to branch out into other vegetarian dishes, since they're actually already practically vegetarians.

As for sustainability, the answer to that is to develop systems that price in environmental externalities. The issue isn't going to be solved through a meat boycott. Farm raised fish is also quite sustainable.

I'm personally looking forward to economically viable lab-grown meat. Once perfected it'll likely be the most sustainable option with none of the nutritional deficits and none of the ethical concerns. Plus we'll be able to engineer meat with tastes that don't exist in nature, endless variety!

This is such a non-argument, and I'm saying this as a(n occasional) meat-eater.

> nature almost by definition is living things eating other living things

The default state for most living beings is scarcity. I think we all intuitively judge the morality of people's actions depending on scarcity. If two people were on an uninhabited island with no chance to escape, and the island only produces enough food to sustain one person, then I don't think it's immoral for them to fight to the death over the scarce resources, neither of them has the duty to sacrifice their life for the other. But if the island produces enough for two people, then killing the other so you can have more food is clearly murder.

Humans evolved the ability to eat meat because it increased their chances of survival in a hostile environment with scarce resources. In this dog eat dog world, I don't think eating meat was immoral. But the scarcity that justified it has disappeared for many (but sadly not nearly all) of us.

> humans evolved to be omnivorous for various nutritional reasons

There is no evidence that vegetarian diets are less healthy than those that incorporate meat. Again, eating meat no doubt increased the chances of survival for ancient hunter-gatherers living in harsh conditions, but that's no longer our environment, so it is irrelevant.

To be clear, I'm not offended by the fact that you eat meat; I am irritated by the weak justification though, which is worse than no justification at all. Just have the honesty to admit that you are merely putting your comfort above the well-being of the animals you eat. Comfort is the only reason why healthy people eat meat.

Pot, kettle.

>Humans evolved the ability to eat meat because it increased their chances of survival in a hostile environment with scarce resources.

It doesn't stop there. Humans have subsequently evolved to thrive on fatty foods. Our understanding of nutritional evolution is incredibly weak. Despite agriculture predominantly giving us access to carbohydrates, human brains are mostly fat-adapted. Many of today's health epidemics are linked to a lack of fat and an excess of carbohydrates. Try finding fatty fruits and veggies: they were incredibly scarce for most the human population until the last 100 years. Several people have noticed significant improvements going predominantly meat. There's more going on here than just the scarcity argument, the scarcity argument is a gross simplification.

>Comfort is the only reason why healthy people eat meat

No. Plenty of people are eating meat to be healthy. People are, in fact, getting frustrated by listening to the advice of the average western diet, listening to dietitians when they get fat, and unable to get in shape despite putting in an insane amount of effort listening to their dietitians putting their hormones out of whack, making them hungry and agitated 24/7, while they keep saying "just keep going". We don't process meat-based products the same way we do plant-based products.

This is not to moralize meat. Rather, this is to indicate people jump on the "meat is bad / lazy / immoral" bandwagon way too quickly, being spoonfed the common narrative without doing an ounce of research and frequently without experience. Just like the average person doesn't eat meat for any other reason than their own comfort, so does the average person stop eating meat because everyone and their mother claims eating plants will save the world. It's becoming a story of "my propaganda is better than yours".

I'm genuinely curious as to what you're getting at. When you say "excess of carbohydrates", are you referring specifically to processed foods or refined sugars?

>Try finding fatty fruits and veggies: they were incredibly scarce for most the human population until the last 100 years.

Maybe fatty fruits and veggies were scarce for most humans 100+ years ago, but I highly doubt nuts and seeds were. But that doesn't really matter if we're talking about what we can do today. Things like avocados, olives, coconuts, and the above-mentioned large categories of nuts and seeds, are readily available for most people making these sorts of arguments. Plus, if you're vegetarian and not vegan, then you have access to cheese, yogurt, milk, and eggs. It's easy to eat high fat and low carb while avoiding meat, so the argument for eating meat to be healthy on these grounds seems quite weak to me.

Long story short: many diseases are insulin linked. Insulin spikes highest by repeatedly eating carbohydrates throughout the day. Fiber decreases those spikes somewhat, but still doesn't compare at all to a fat-based diet or protein-based diet. There are ways to cope with an excess in carbohydrates (heavy exercise is one, fasting is another), but there is no way to cope with a lack of fat. Additionally, mitigation strategies can cause their own problems (many joggers, especially vegetarian and vegan ones, start developing iron deficiencies). The whole "it is just processed sugar" thing is just the tip of the iceberg.

>I highly doubt nuts and seeds were.

Put in perspective: foraging for nuts and seeds is a lot more difficult and intensive than hunting a giant mammal. Plus, the former is a lot more seasonal than the latter.

>But that doesn't really matter if we're talking about what we can do today.

It does. Human evolution and mutation is slow. By looking at what our primary diet was up until recently, we can understand the macronutritional and micronutritional needs of our body and how a vegetarian/vegan diet may or may not influence that.

>Things like avocados, olives, coconuts, and the above-mentioned large categories of nuts and seeds, are readily available for most people making these sorts of arguments. Plus, if you're vegetarian and not vegan, then you have access to cheese, yogurt, milk. It's easy to eat high fat and low carb while avoiding meat, so the argument for eating meat to be healthy on these grounds seems quite weak to me.

The main thing currently under scrutiny is the bioavailability and toxins (for lack of better term) of plant-based foods compared to meat. Turns out a lot of plants don't want to be eaten, and when you can't move, you start developing ways to protect yourself without requiring locomotion. Not only are various of these toxins decreasing bioavailability (zinc is a big one, eating beans with oysters is a terrible way to decrease bioavaialability of zinc), these toxins are actively causing harm and inflammation, whereas a meat-based diet is seen as the "ultimate restriction diet". Avocados, coconuts, olives and nuts stand out here, being more fat heavy, but as most of the population does not have a history with these compared to animal products, it is difficult to say its all good. Beyond that, it is very difficult to get all your minerals and vitamins just on those alone, which isn't the case for meat and seafood, which results in either tapping into the remainder of the veggies and fruit, or tapping into animal products.

Obviously, the argument is more than macros. If macros were all that mattered, you could just stuff your face with whey protein and vegetable oil and call it a day. The argument in favor of meat is a lot more nuanced and without that nuance, will be ruthlessly picked apart by the pro-vegan gang who tend to be a lot more zealous than their carnivorous counterparts (the carnivores have nothing to lose if vegan diets prove to be better, they are already on the moral low). To explain this in its entirety would take far more than a HN comment.

What's concerning is just how much meat-eaters have to play the defense. We don't know that much about vegan and vegetarian diets compared to an ancestry and entire tribes of carnivores. We put forward theoretical models devoid of animal products, using obscure plants to fill in some deficiency, but never test whether it will work on the larger scale. The ecology argument is thrown about as if people don't understand how carbon cycles work. It's humans going vegetarian and vegan which deviates from the status quo, not the other way around. We should be questioning the long term (multi-generational) effects of it as long as we haven't put hoards of people on a vegan or vegetarian diet that didn't include some shady 10 ingredient meat-replacement containing added sugar. We should also be questioning our current understanding of the "cows bad beans good" narrative, and what truly is the cause of the problem (human greed).

> Human evolution and mutation is slow. By looking at what our primary diet was up until recently, we can understand the macronutritional and micronutritional needs of our body and how a vegetarian/vegan diet may or may not influence that.

What was "our" primary diet though? Depending on where a group of humans lived, presumably the diet varied greatly. It seems to me that humans can successfully adapt to a wide variety of foods. I'm sure early humans ate meat, but vegetarianism and pescetarianism date back at least to antiquity. And just because a diet kept us alive doesn't mean it's "good" for us in the modern sense. Say, hypothetically, that a meat-heavy diet increases the risk of early death. That would be irrelevant in the context of natural selection if that age is much older than that of typical reproduction. Our "goals" are different now, too. Does a person sitting at a desk all day require the same nutritional profile as a hunter?

> The main thing currently under scrutiny is the bioavailability and toxins (for lack of better term) of plant-based foods compared to meat.

This is interesting to me and something I've been researching too. It does seem that a lot of the "toxins" can be mitigated by using very old cooking techniques: soaking beans/lentils, cooking vegetables (rather than eating raw), sprouting, fermenting. These techniques can weaken the plants' defense systems, so to speak.

> Avocados, coconuts, olives and nuts stand out here, being more fat heavy, but as most of the population does not have a history with these compared to animal products, it is difficult to say its all good. Beyond that, it is very difficult to get all your minerals and vitamins just on those alone, which isn't the case for meat and seafood, which results in either tapping into the remainder of the veggies and fruit, or tapping into animal products.

To be pedantic: meat doesn't really have a lot of vitamins, right? If you want a complete mix of vitamins and minerals, you would need to eat the kidney, liver, brain, heart, etc, which for whatever reason we don't really do anymore (in the US at least). For the average person (again in the US), this means you will need to step into non-meat sources for e.g. vitamin A or vitamin C. I only bring this up because the topic at hand is specifically about meat, not necessarily eschewing all animal products, so they are presumably allowed in this context.

This argument is not very powerful though. For one, it only justifies eating meat for those who have tried to cut meat from their diet and noticed adverse health effects (which should be safe for most people who don't already suffer from some risk factor, like anemia, to try); in my anecdotal experience a tiny minority of the people who make health-based arguments. And secondly, it only justifies the minimal meat consumption necessary to be healthy, and no more.

Often many, many small animals get basically wood chipped by agricultural machinery or poisoned by pest traps and pesticides. If you go by pure numbers of "non-insect brains" made to feel pain or die in horrible ways from human agricultural activity, vegetable farming would actually far outpace meat farming.

Also a lot of meat ranching can use land that is plain unusable for vegetables, but cows, chickens, sheep and pigs can use just fine. That will not go away. Also meat such as cows especially are not subject to the 'cows living in shit up to their knees' type of reality everyone thinks most cheap cow meat lives in, which is actually a small minority of badly run farms. All cow meat lives in a pasture for at least %70 of their lives. That last %30 is the difference between 'grass fed' and conventional beef.

All food has blood on its hands, and in the end, that is the way of life in human and non-human reality. I think a big part of the push to be vegetarian or vegan comes from a disconnect on how food is made. Societies used to be +%90 agricultural workers and processed their food in far more raw forms than the typical "abstract shapes of meat" that we typically deal with today, so a lot of the rhetoric did not connect, because it conflicted with their lived experience.

No it isn't. [1]

It really isn't. [2]

[1]: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=YtnlwqEii2I

[2]: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=LQRAfJyEsko

So the solution is to pay more. Got it.

For years I knew I was inconsistent - I thought it was wrong to eat meat, but I did so anyway because I like hamburgers and chicken (and was focusing will power on other things). The pandemic gave me the opportunity to make the change.

The impossible burger is perfect for me because it’s close enough to satisfy the fix. I hope more meat substitutes trend in this direction (or even more so with lab grown meat).

Most people believe crazy things and hold wildly inconsistent views so it’s not a surprise that people don’t change their behavior. Having consistent views that are tied to reality is hard. Changing behavior is hard too.

In the extreme cases (particularly with true unknowns) perfect consistency isn’t even necessarily achievable or desirable. That said, trying to understand the world as it truly is and be pragmatic is still good. In the animal case, I think trying to reduce unnecessary suffering is a worthwhile goal.

Related: https://slatestarcodex.com/2014/08/14/beware-isolated-demand...

People's tastes are largely driven by the foods they ate when they were young, which with notable exceptions, will prominently feature meat dishes. People on sites like this are likely to underestimate this effect, we are likely to be embedded in subcultures that are unusually high in openness to experience.

All else being equal, many people prefer doing the more ethical thing (or if you want to be cynical about it, the thing that makes them feel more ethical). Many people believe that plant based meat is more ethical.

Currently, all else isn't equal. Plant-based meat is more expensive to the consumer, and most find it to be less enjoyable to eat. Recent trends have been closing those gaps, producing more enjoyable plant-based meats at high but dropping prices.

As plant-based meat's quality/price ratio improves it will be increasingly common, and will displace a large amount of meat consumption that would be difficult to displace by other vegetarian dishes.

Many people who drive electric cars now do so because they are “cool.” A large part of that is thanks to Tesla, making electric cars that are comparable and maybe even simply superior to gas cars, depending on how you look at it. The hype behind impossible foods may be largely unwarranted, as great plant-based foods are already available. However, the thing that is great about impossible foods and similar ventures is that it doesn’t ask you to compromise, and it’s cool and trendy. Someone may not care about the moral side of things and yet will probably still feel enticed to try it just to see, and if it’s good enough they could legitimately switch on a whim. This is not the same as asking someone who has eaten a diet involving one thing for decades and asking them to replace it with totally different things.

Many people have more strongly held convictions about having to change their diet in ways that impact their eating experience than they have convictions against the actual concept of plant-based diets. These meat alternatives could be very useful if a plant-based diet is to be the future (perhaps alongside lab grown meats?)

You’re conclusion is faulty. There can be many reasons for these people to keep eating meet, from they don’t believe you, they don’t like your argument, they still think it worth the animals pain, they don’t think they have a choice, or they’ve always done it.

For someone to conclude from their own argument at a dinner table anything substantive is very strange.

For what it's worth. I had a conversation at the dinner table about the ethics of eating meat with another meat eater. We both decided there and then stop, this was almost a decade ago and neither of us have eaten meat since. It does happen.

Given what I see people saying and doing - in person and online - seems that too many people don't even care about other people. People don't want to raise minimum wage because a burger would cost a few cents more. I have a hard time imagining them giving up their burgers because of the animals.

For most products, and virtually all that aren't particularly modern, they suffer from being set up as direct replacements for meat. Take fake deli meats, for example. There are options that make a good sandwich. But they don't make a good $specific-meat sandwich. If they found a way to position themselves more in the vein of ham vs turkey vs plant-based sandwich they would do far, far better. Instead they position themselves as fake-ham or something, and then some unsuspecting person trying out plant-based alternatives goes in expecting a ham sandwich and ends up with their expectations rather violated. People don't like that, particularly with food. But they went in just expecting some kind of sandwich, I think they very well might enjoy it.

I've been vegetarian-tending-towards-vegan for over a decade and I still occasionally fall into that trap if I'm not careful.

Products like Impossible are the exception. They are so notable because they are getting into the realm where a direct comparison with meat actually works in their favor. I think that's great. I think you are right that this is the key for convincing many people to move away from meat. It's so much easier to market something as another version of meat, rather than a whole new thing. But I also think it's worth keeping in mind that they are exceptional products, and what works for them may not be the best for others.

I will honestly say that I typically prefer vegetarian food that isn't fake meat. Indian food with paneer is really good, black bean burgers are fantastic, pad thai with tofu is really good.

I am somewhat partial to the vegetarian spiced meats, though. Vegetarian chorizo is remarkably close. I think because the spices are an overwhelming part of the flavor, all it's really missing is a little more chewiness.

I realize I didn't clarify this with my original statement, but I meant 'folks I know who are avowed meat-eaters, and not vegetarians'.

To be honest, this surprised me a little, too. But I've come to realize a lot of 'meat>*' people really love the veggie dishes I share with them, as long as it's an upfront, honest vegetable dish, and not trying to pretend it's something else.

I'm certainly a counter-example, and know a few others. Though I also do know one person that has no desire for them, but they also tend to avoid more prepared or processed foods entirely.

I've noticed the vegan foods I enjoy most are the ones that aren't trying to be something else. They just use tasty vegan ingredients like potatoes or avocados. I think more people would consider reductarian diets if they were aware of this.

> If you want to get people to switch to meat alternatives, you have to keep everything that's great about meat (taste, texture, proteins), while removing everything that's bad about meat (slaughter, livestock industry).

I think one thing is making sure it's great, and another thing is making sure it's the same, and you can have something that's great and heavily impacts the market without having it be the same.

Just thinking of a random example where this worked; MDF is very much not wood, but it's pretty great for most things. People still buy a lot of wooden furniture, surfaces, etc but for a lot of use-cases MDF does just fine. MDF isn't trying to have the same weight, the exact same texture, or be as solid as wood. It's another material and it's marketed as another material, not as "replacement wood" or something along those lines.

Thinking of an example where this hasn't worked; Stadia. Google is very much trying to replace consoles and is focusing on AAA games, but the thing is, as it stands today, Stadia is not a console replacement. The way google is positioning Stadia though puts it in the eyes of hardcore gamers who care about the details: the latency, the streaming resolution, etc. Perhaps if they weren't trying to sell it as your next AAA-game console, they would attract a section of the population that just wants to play games easily, and don't care so much about the specifics.

The goal here is to not fully replace the market, but shrink it.

Another point worth making is that it's hard to imagine we can reverse the trend in global warming keeping excessive consumer habits— people need to change too. Sure, electric cars will consume less CO2 and they are an easy short-term solution in a car-centric society, but cities need to be planned better so car use in general decreases. Sure, recycled plastics can reduce or plastic waste, but we shouldn't be producing so many water bottles in the first place. Plant-based "meat" are likewise a step in the right direction, but it's also the case meant consumption is just very high. Trying to offer solutions that don't tackle the underlying problem make hard to guarantee long-term sustainability.

Maybe, but solutions that go against human nature are doomed to fail in the first place. Asceticism doesn't work. Asking people to do the right thing only has a tiny marginal effect.

The only solution to get long-term sustainability is to offer people a better, greener, more sustainable alternative, that doesn't inconvenience people. To overcome the force of habit, your alternative has to be both better and cheaper if you want to see mass adoption. Otherwise you'll just get niche adoption, which is pretty much useless on the grand scale of things.

What you say might be true of the wolf nature—hence you shouldn’t feed your dog with vegetarian diet. But humans are not dogs, and only insular population of us living in harsh climates such as the arctic have historically eaten meat as our primary diet. And even then, plant based food is brought to these populations, people there very much consume it. If there is any human nature that rules our eating habits it is the fact that we are omnivores and eat what is available.

All the nomadic tribes, people living in mountainous areas, hunter gatherer societies in temperate climates,...

Though the question itself is pretty meaningless or misleading, since on average people today do not eat meat in almost every meal at all.

I doubt that hunter gatherers in temperate climate ate 100 kg of meat per year. This kind of meat consumption only existed were plant based diet wasn’t available at all. To contextualize, 100 kg (average yearly USA meat consumption per person) is around 2 kg per week, that is around 150 grams per meal (given 14 meals per week). I would say that qualifies as meat in almost every meal.

Which is almost everywhere on the planet beside tropics and subtropics before agriculture came to existence. It was natural for humans to live on a predominantly meat diet for a lot longer than it became fashionable to live from plants only.

>To contextualize, 100 kg (average yearly USA meat consumption per person) is around 2 kg per week, that is around 150 grams per meal (given 14 meals per week). I would say that qualifies as meat in almost every meal.

The population of the USA is only 4% of world population and Americans probably eat more than 2 two meals a day. So no, on average we do not eat meat almost every meal.

a) You underestimate how forested the temperate regions were before humans started significantly altering them well after the agricultural revolution.

b) You underestimate how well humans can gather and store non meat foods without agriculture. I bet an average group of humans knew where there were fruitful nut trees, know when they were ripe, know how to store the nuts, and know how to sprout and grow knew once in a favorable location. I bet roots have the same story. See you don’t need agriculture to grow things, and I bet humans have been doing it for hundreds of thousands of years.

c) You underestimate how hard it is to hunt with stone and bone tools. Apart from fishing, game is mostly seasonal in the temperate regions, so there would always be seasons where meat was scarce. It takes a ton of effort and coordination to hunt a single animal, you are not always succesful, and when you are, then storing the meat becomes an issue. So your best bet is to share the meat with the whole group, and probably leave some for other scavengers.

As I said, I’m not an expert, but realistically I don’t see how pre neolithic humans could have eaten even close to 100 kg a meat per year.

"Furthermore, before the advent of farming, pre-Neolithic hunter–gatherers throughout Europe had been subsisting on animal-based diets with a substantial aquatic contribution, in contrast to the plant-heavy diets of recent European farmers."

Temperate climate means 4 distinct seasons and plants rest from autumn to spring. Which makes it impossible find and eat fruits of plants for 6 months. Sure you could store some nuts, but that will not cover you dietary needs for long.

[1] https://www.nature.com/articles/s41559-017-0167.epdf?author_...

EDIT: I would also like to add, that the original claim was that it is in human nature to eat meat. If that were true, people wouldn’t have stopped doing it after the neolithic revolution as farming spread and plant based food became even easier. I mean we kept feeding meat to our dogs as it is definitely in the wolfs nature to eat meat.

I disagree on two fundamental points. Firstly, current levels of meat consumption, I'd argue, are very much not "human nature". It's more to do with advertisement, and cultural trends which are artificial. Secondly, I'd argue "human nature" has been _modified_ or _overcome_ plenty of times before.

In short-term thinking, yeah, finding a replacement is the straightforward solution. In the long term, the only certain and the most sustainable solution is to address the consumption problem.

Now that they're getting close, I agree with you and it makes more sense to call it "meat" because it's very close to being indistinguishable.

I love a good hamburger or steak, but I'll happily give it up when there's something not-animal-based that's as good.

You can still prepare and spice tofu just like you would do with meat, and get a complete meal that replaces meat with something else that adds to the quality of the meal just like meat would, regardless of whether the substitute replicates the texture or taste at all.

Yes, I bet meat eaters say the same about beef burgers, there is difference in texture and flavor of each patty. Difference in quality of the meat, the coarseness of the ground, etc. But knowing that, makes me thing that meat eaters don’t actually like the meat part in their diet, and trying to replicate the meat part of a beef burger when making veggie patties just seems like a lack of imagination and an unnecessary limitation.

Have you considered the possibility that it is you who are missing out on experiences by refusing to eat these vegetarian alternatives that taste like meat?

"Oh, but real vegetarian food is so much better bla bla bla"

Ignoring your knee-jerk reaction, have you actually tried the Impossible Burger or the Beyond Meat burger?

Because it has the taste and texture of meat, which you don't eat. So eating these would be a way for you to experience this taste and this texture, and that should at least have some novelty value for you.

Backing up to the meta discussion, I love how these meat alternatives, and near-future things like cultured meat or synthetic milk test everyone's convictions and prejudices. Why do we eat the things we eat? Habit? Ethics? Preference? Virtue signaling? It's a good way to examine your principles.

You seem to have landed in that these meat alternatives are bad because they're "processed", and everything "processed" is bad. Alright. But would you eat clean cultured meat? Muscle tissue that has never been inside a living animal, and yet is indistinguishable from meat that's been cut out of a slaughtered animal?

And going further out, would you eat cultured human meat?

Food for thought.

I’m generally against fake and highly processed things, I don’t want them in my life, and definitely not on my plate. That would definitely include lab meat. So I’ll keep eating regular meat until the fake meat industrial complex gets it outlawed, and then I can just eat vegetarian food.

Imagine that many of your favourite dishes, those you grew up with, were suddenly unavailable to you because some ingredient no longer existed. If a new ingredient hit the market that was not quite the same but was a convincing substitute in taste and texture, would you consider it silly and avoid it?

But that’s not quite what we’re discussing. Meat exists but some people want to go vegetarian without sacrificing anything. I suppose it’s pretty similar to the logic of people who want to lose weight without giving up sweets or soda, so they switch to aspartame versions.

Yes, how dare they?!? How can you call yourself a vegetarian without sacrificing anything? If anyone could be a vegetarian, there wouldn't be any moral superiority for the real vegetarians! Oh the horror!

I just happen to think fake meat and fake sweeteners are some of the most absurd things in modern society. I prefer food to be natural and unprocessed.

> I’m not vegetarian and it’s not about feeling superior.

Well, clearly you have some martyr complex issues around it.

I just think people should eat authentic and low processed food.

Which delicious vegetarian dishes offer the same taste and texture as meat dishes?

That’s what I did when I was a vegetarian. There is enough delicious vegetarian food to last you a lifetime.

This is completely ridiculous.

From your comments, and from other obvious vegetarians/vegans in this thread, there's a weird sense of "sour grapes" combined with some sort of martyr complex.

You're angry, because you've sacrificed to be vegetarian, and now terrible horrible meat-eating people like me can just swoop in, eat stuff that tastes like meat, and be vegetarian without any sacrifice! Without any hassle! Without any virtue signaling possibilities whatsoever! THE HORROR!

Look at this subthread. It's full of people who like meat and eat meat who are singing the praises of these new meat alternatives. And then there's you, and people like you, contrarians who complain that people "shouldn't" like these meat alternatives because "we're missing out on real delicious vegetarian food".

I'm not going to stop you from eating and enjoying your little salads, so why the hell do you have an opinion on what I should and should not eat? Other than the fact that you're losing your moral superiority that you're currently enjoying?

Why else would you encourage people who like meat to eat more meat? Because you want to keep feeling superior. That's what this is really about.

I’m not encouraging people to eat more meat, in fact I think people eat way more meat than is healthy or reasonable.

The thing I have against fake meat is that it’s fake. And of course that it’s ultra processed. I prefer authentic, natural things, especially food.

Despite being a meat eater at home, any time I'm in India, I don't eat meat - none at all, for up to 4 weeks at a time. And I don't miss it one bit! Fact is that India veg food is much more common, but also IMO much more tasty.

AFAIK people usually don’t like the flavor nor texture of meat. If that was the case, you would see more people boiling the meat and not spice it. But AFAIK meat eaters tend to spice their meat a lot, to an extent where there it is the spice is the primary taste. They then oil the meat and prefer it fried or grilled which alters the texture as well.

With plant based food you have all these options and more.

If that was true, steaks would not be a thing. A good steak has some coarse salt and pepper for seasoning, but not much else.

Boiling meat is pretty much the worst way to prepare any cut of meat, and will ensure that it has a tough and unpleasant texture, strip all of the fats making it dry, and overall ruin a perfectly good cut of meat.

> But AFAIK meat eaters tend to spice their meat a lot, to an extent where there it is the spice is the primary taste.

That's just like saying "if people liked the taste of vegetables they wouldn't put salt or pepper on them."

Most people wouldn't eat plain tofu either, but it doesn't mean that it's bad, just means that it needs to be prepared as part of a dish, just like any other ingredient.

However, sous vide is an absolutely marvelous way to prepare meat. It keeps it tender and juicy and then you can just sear it in a skillet or with a kitchen torch to get that nice Maillard reaction taste.

[0] https://www.seriouseats.com/recipes/2016/08/sous-vide-salmon...

Pulled chicken and pork would like to have a word. The trick is to let the meat cool down in the water after boiling so that it reabsorbs the fluid it lost. You get wonderfully tender and juicy pulled meat, plus a good stock. And the world of braising is a deep and delicious one. Not to mention meat-based stews, soups, and chowders. I’d suggest that if you hate meat that’s been boiled, it’s been from someone who doesn’t know how to do it. Which I mean not as a dig, but as a way of saying that there’s a lot of good cooking out there waiting to be discovered!

Also, salt is a very powerful spice.

I honestly don't get the point you're even trying to make here... because people do less to prepare vegetables they're somehow superior?

GP is saying that people like the taste and texture of meat. I’m saying that they only do after they have altered the taste and the texture of if. My point is that there is nothing inherent about meat that people like.

This is relevant to OP as the above claim is that there is no need to replicate the texture and taste of meat as you you have infinitely many ways to structure the taste and structure of plant based food, including ways that are superior in both taste and texture to how people prepare meat.

Why are you interpreting what I wrote as if I claimed that people like the taste and texture of *raw* meat? That's probably the most uncharitable possible interpretation of my argument. Stop being ridiculous.

> there is no need to replicate the texture and taste of meat as you have infinitely many ways to structure the taste and structure of plant based food, including ways that are superior in both taste and texture to how people prepare meat.

This is so absurd I don't even know where to start.

The whole point of the article and the plant-based meat alternatives it talks about is that finally there's something that's close enough to ground beef in taste and texture that it can be substituted, but it still needs to come down in price to be a viable everyday alternative. Every alternative that came before simply wasn't good enough, and only really appealed to people who were already vegetarian. And the success of Beyond and Impossible shows that there is clearly a market for products that replicate meat, because a lot of people want to buy stuff that tastes like meat.

When it comes to actual beef, there's absolutely nothing like it yet, in neither taste nor texture, and texture is the part that is hardest to get right. If there was something even remotely comparable, we wouldn't be having this discussion, because everyone would already be happily eating that alternative.

I'm sure you're happy eating your little salads, thinking they're superior to every other dish in existence. But you clearly don't understand why people like meat, and what they like about it, which is why you appear bewildered by these products and claim that there is "no need" for them.

These products will be a cornerstone of future environmental policy and ensure we can meet our sustainability goals for the entire planet.

Sorry, you—and GPs—are putting words in my mouth. I never stated such a thing. People think they like meat, but they don’t. They only like meat after the taste and texture has been altered. Even then they probably mostly like it from force of habit.

> When it comes to actual beef, there's absolutely nothing like it yet, in neither taste nor texture, and texture is the part that is hardest to get right

This is actually the point of the debate, and it is highly opinionated so I don’t think we can see each others point of view here. But in Europe there is a trademark soy based alternative called Oumph! which is not trying to replicate meat in any way, but it is simply delicious. In my opinion the impossible meat we have here in America is simply disgusting next to it. There are so many ways to make good food with plant based food and trying to mimic one type of food that people only like after it has been prepared and spiced, just seems a little short sighted.

There is actually, otherwise people wouldn't try to make a plant based version of it. It's savory (as in umami), has a higher fat content than plants, and also can have a variety of textures depending on the cut and cooking method, among other things.

I'd disagree with that, I don't think plant based foods are seasoned or prepared that differently. Maybe you're thinking of barbecue where meat can be rubbed, smoked, then slathered in barbecue sauce, but most people don't eat that on a daily basis. Besides, it's not as if vegetarian and vegan dishes don't have any spices, a curry or a chili will have just as many spices as a rack of ribs or a brisket, if not more.

A plant based burger is prepped just as a meat based one, fried chicken isn't that far removed from tempura vegetables, cream of celery isn't that different from cream of chicken, and so on. Honestly, I can't think of a plant based dish that wouldn't have a meat based equivalent, other than salad.

> Also, salt is a very powerful spice.

Depends on how you want to look at it. It's not really a spice in the sense that it's not aromatic or pungent, it's in the category of ingredients that enhance taste, like monosodium glutamate.

In short: There is nothing inherent about meat that people like. People only like meat after they have altered the taste and texture of it. People can do the same (and more) with plant based food. In conclusion: Striving for the taste and texture of meat in particular is a poor goal for plant based food, as superior options exist.

I don't think your knowledge on this subject goes very far, because you seem to have very weird views of how and why meat is best prepared.

> With plant based food you have all these options and more.

A perfectly seared medium rare centercut piece of beef tenderloin is such a great experience that my mouth starts watering just thinking about it.

It is also currently completely impossible to recreate this experience using vegetarian options.

But that is not the point. I bet you only love seared medium rare centercut piece of beef tenderloin because you have learned to appreciate it. I on the other hand haven’t. The mere thought of eating beef gives bad taste in my mouth.

I bet there are million things that exists that you could learn to love even more then seared medium rare centercut beef tenderloin and I bet more then 95% of these are plant or mushroom based. Things like seared medium rare centercut matsutake mushrooms, or lightly baked eggplant paste, or raw kelp, or whatever.

You don't like meat, eating meat disgusts you, you don't understand how people can like meat, and yet you butted into this discussion with your completely unfounded opinion on whether or not other people actually like meat or not.

You also seem to think that people liking cooked meat somehow means they actually don't like meat, as if liking raw meat is the only thing that counts, for some weird made-up reason?

Are you so bad at understanding other people that you can't fathom that they actually, genuinely, like things you don't like?

...and to tie this back to the article we're discussing: If you don't eat meat or don't like meat, then Beyond Meat and Impossible Burger are not products for you! You are not the target group! And that also means that the marketing of those products won't be appealing to you. That's fine! They're not trying to get you as a customer anyway! They're trying to get me as a customer!

> I bet you only love seared medium rare centercut piece of beef tenderloin because you have learned to appreciate it.

Nope, it's just fantastic, no taste acquiring needed.

I am trying to debunk the idea that “[p]eople eat meat because they like the taste and the texture” which you commented after a parent said that “calling plant-based things "meat" [is] a terrible idea”. To quite:

> We can have all kinds of flavors for these products, instead of "meat" flavor, not having to "live up to" the meat taste, and mouth feel. We can live up to great flavors vegetables, fruits, and herbs.

You started this debate by stating as a matter of fact that people “like the taste and the texture [of meat]”. I am trying—albeit really poorly—to say that that simply isn’t true. My choice of attack was perhaps poor, since I cannot seem to get my point across, but I chose to use that fact the people alter the both the taste and texture of meat a lot before they consume it. And for some reason people seem to think what I mean here is that they shouldn’t. As if I’m trying to invoke a No True Scotsman in favor raw meat.

> If you don't eat meat or don't like meat, then Beyond Meat and Impossible Burger are not products for you!

Sure, they are not. But I really doubt that the people who these are for like it because of the meat part. I honestly don’t know why they like it (I bet there are a million reasons), but I doubt that more than a few of these is because it reminds of meat actually. Because—as I’m trying (poorly) to convey—there is nothing inherent about the meat part they like.

I won’t be eating the Beyond or Impossible products because, honestly, they suck compared to the alternatives. Although I haven’t found anything that comes close to a good Oumph! here in America (if this is this how a meat eater feels when they can’t access meat, then I honestly don’t see the big deal here, just eat something else).

The popularity of these products, compared to the multitudes of veggie patties that came before, proves you wrong.

The market for these meat-tasting meat-textured vegetarian alternatives is much bigger than the market for veggie-tasting bean patties, because there are a lot more people who like the taste and texture of meat than people who like the taste and texture of bean patties.

If it were not so, these new products would have failed as horribly as the ones that came before. But they're not, because the closer they get to the taste and texture of meat, the more popular they become! Why? Because people like the taste and texture of meat!

I understand that you are sad and angry and upset that people like the wrong food, and that people should like the right food, just like you do! But you're in the minority opinion on this one, so suck it up, buttercup.

> I won’t be eating the Beyond or Impossible products because, honestly, they suck compared to the alternatives.

The one thing that comes through in this discussion, which I also laid out in another subtree, is your intense food snobbery.

These new meat alternatives technically make people vegetarian, but they're doing it "wrong", so they're not "real" vegetarians, they're not yet enlightened to the glorious "infinite" tastes and textures of real vegetarian food. So if these horrible lowbrow troglodytes could just go back to eating real dead cow meat, people like you can go back to feeling smug and morally superior again, and then everything is right in the world and you don't have to descend from your ivory tower to scold the masses again.

Get outta here.

Not completely wrong, You mentioned earlier attemps failing and as a person who opened their mind and wallet, I ate at a vegan restaurant in the 90s and can say it ruined tofu and taro root for me.

Also the livestock industry is not all bad, many industrial livestock operations could be considered "bad" but there are still ethical people that raise animals for food just like I'm sure there are unethical vegans out there...some sell drugs. Some commit crime. Some are rapists. And some, I assume, are good people.

But I'm pretty sure you're wrong -- I doubt that these companies would be selling these premium meat-replacement products with the word meat if they didn't have lots of market research on it.

It tells you what you can use the things for -- the impossible and beyond products can be used to replace ground beef in pretty much any recipe, and will do the job. People can use it immediately with the recipes and cooking techniques they are familiar with, it makes the product comfortable and familiar instead of a new thing that requires them to adjust their palettes and learn new cooking techniques.

I think you're right that someone who has committed to a meat-free diet doesn't want or need the label meat. (but they'll buy the stuff anyway if they like it and can afford it, they are kind of a captive market). But when you say "meat consumption reduction" -- if every meat eater replaces say 20% of their meat consumption with this stuff, it would be a gigantic reduction in animals killed (for those who care about that). Assuming there is less greenhouse gas and other ecological damage from these meat replacements, a gigantic reduction in that too.

I dont think you can lump together committed vegetarians with ominivores who may replace a portion of their consumption with these products. Perhaps an ever-increasing portion, perhaps eventually they will become vegetarians. But calling the non-animal-based stuff "meat" is squarely aimed at current omnivores -- and it seems hard to argue that it won't work when it is literally working, as the OP outlines in talking about market share and grocery space. Burger king is selling impossible burgers because they can sell them as burgers; and if they tried instead introducing some new product that isn't meant to resemble a beef burger but is just some kind of "vegetarian food", I guarantee it would sell less not more.

But this new fake meat stuff reduced my meat intake significantly. It’s is FANTASTIC for replacing low-quality meat in a lot of cases. I have no need for ground beef/turkey/pork if I have beyond meat ground “beef” in a lot of cases. It’s a straight substitute, and I wouldn’t have thought about it that way if it was posed more narrowly.

Overall impression was that had some fastfood chains replaced their patties with this, not only nobody would notice that what they're eating isn't actually meat, but also they would be happy with how the quality improved.

There's of course the question of price, but I'm sure with adequate scale it can be brought down.

I'm not going to pay more for lower quality protein (from a body building perspective).

a: FOOD especially : solid food as distinguished from drink

b: the edible part of something as distinguished from its covering (such as a husk or shell)

The same as with milk. Nobody had problems with coconut milk until dairy lobby started fearing plant milk competition. And when one buys oat yogurt they know exactly what they'll get and what to compare it with. Or do you think fat free or lactose free cow milk yogurt shouldn't be called as such, since it's its own thing?

How we name things is important and naming things by their appearance and function is completely fine and useful and has been done since ever. Things like turkey ham or turkey bacon aren't new inventions.

I guess things can have multiple definitions and we can use context to distinguish between them?

You may wish to read the full entry at: https://www.merriam-webster.com/dictionary/meat

If you still consider it wrong, perhaps you may wish to write Merriam-Webster and suggest a change.

Option Base 1

I would like to see when Merriam Webster added this obscure definition, let alone have it listed first.

This is THE original definition. Language later evolved and people started using the word meat to mostly mean animal flash. But that's just proof that language evolves over time and now it's evolving again to include broader range of food.

But in any case, I'm sure you've heard of meat of a fruit or nut.

If someone asked me to buy some meat and I returned with a few apples I'd receive a Merriam-Webster dictionary to the head!

The US meat industry is fighting that battle.[1] So far, they're not winning. In the EU, dirt farmers have been able to prevent the use of the term "organic" for hydroponic farms, though.

We can live up to great flavors vegetables, fruits, and herbs.

There's a bright future ahead for new classes of junk foods. Plant-based bacon flavored chips, coming soon to a convenience store near you.

[1] https://www.foodnavigator-usa.com/Article/2021/02/03/Highly-...

I'm probably misunderstanding something, but my potato chips have hopefully always been plant-based (even if bacon-flavored - no idea if that requires animal ingredients)?

Can you imagine trying to market tofu as a cottage cheese alternative? In hindsight, it makes way more sense to market tofu as its own thing, and there's a lot of dishes that only work with tofu.

After I got married, my chinese wife related some of her experience with food growing up. In China, they have these veggie cakes that are somewhat similar in texture and seasoning to meatballs, but no one was ever under any impression that they were anything but veggie cakes. They are not marketed as meatballs, nobody thinks of them as meatballs, and yet they are still great.

This idea of trying to market veggie patties as something they are not is very puzzling. It's also a bit sad that it feels like BigFood is trying to tell westerners that they shouldn't get creative with culinary. "Burgers are all you need" is what the messaging sounds like.

So while you may get spicy veggie cake hotpots elsewhere in the world, in the US you get... air quotes burgers? To really understand what I mean, it would likely be eye opening to see what american fast food chains look like in Asia: they have an insane amount of variety that makes their counterparts in the US look like bad jokes. It took ages for McD to wake up to breakfast culture, and likewise for Lays to pick up on mexicans' taste for spicy snacks and now these are huge segments for them. I'm still dumbfounded that food company execs don't see the lost opportunity of not introducing more variety rather than trying to make everything conform to pre-establish molds.

Food tastes vary a lot from person and place, so I do think it's very risky. To give you a successful example, poke bowls became popular in the urban US in the early 2010s, and reached my college town around 2015 or so? But my guess is that the locals don't eat there much, just the students. I think it's because people are less adventurous in aggregate than you might think, and the economics don't work out.

See McDonald's international menu, which is in my opinion kind of terrible. There must be something holding them back.

Even without creating culture, I think there are food items that big food companies could conceivably offer in a market like the US and still be relatively well accepted: chicken pot pie, pastas/lasagnas, crepes, fish and chips, are all things that americans are warm to and don't necessarily involve a huge slab of red meat as the core of the dish. One of those can even be made in a McD restaurant with existing ingredients today.

A common stigma with vegan or vegetarian diets is that of the food not being as good or limited and having something that compares to meat is a plus because it brings light to the endless possibilities in food and texture that a vegan diet without animal meat really has...

I love the taste of meat, so even though I want to reduce my carbon footprint I also want to keep eating burgers. Impossible burgers and other highly processed foods give me the best balance of those two competing desires.

And not all people from meat cultures do either. When I was vegetarian for a few years I simply ate vegetarian dishes. It probably depends on why you became vegetarian in the first place.

People buying veggie burgers not going to take away other vegetarian foods in the process.

It’s fake, that’s what’s silly. A piece of pretend meat. And it’s especially silly to contort yourself to make a fake hamburger when you can just have a real arrabbiata. Or a delicious margherita.

I think the main reason for assigning the name to these plant based substitutes is to give the public a better understand of it uses and that its a valid substitute. To me, both meat and milk are generic names and its just a matter of time before expanding the definition becomes a non issue

[0]https://www.ecowatch.com/eu-vegan-dairy-law-2650162992.html

That's an anecdote, but I don't think I am an edge case, many people have tried an Impossible Burger who had little to no interest in trying a vegetarian burger.

I mean, why isn't there any falafel fast food (outside the guys selling out of carts in front of bars), just a crispy delicious falafel patty on a burger bun and fixings? Some of the most delicious vegetarian food there is stays siloed into ethnic restaurants that the median American either lacks access to get it or interest to try it.

Funny that we have to resort to baiting and switching your big mac instead to get some to try vegetarian food.

>We can live up to great flavors vegetables, fruits, and herbs.

But that's a whole thing altogether. That's like completely missing the point. You aren't going to get meat eaters to switch to plant-based meat patties if they taste like vegetables or fruits.

Vegetarian patties, mushroom-based recipes, etc can be good and stand up on their own without comparing them to meat, but meat substitutes are good too.

The problem, really, is to increase the textural variety of plant-based proteins. Currently you have bean products on a spectrum from soft tofu to faux-chorizo, which taste essentially like beans at varying levels of chewiness. (Generally, the two ends of this spectrum are my favorites.) The interest in meats depends at least somewhat on there being a variety of textures (fish, chicken, pulled pork, ground beef); producing just one texture only gets you so far.

A reasonably cheap plant-based mimic of bone broth, Greek yogurt, egg white (protein-based), or parmesan cheese could probably have as much impact as a single meat substiute. A few of these have been made with starches (aquafaba for eggs; various gums for yogurt), but not proteins.

I love soy, tofu, cheese, but I do not want to taste or feel the texture of any meat. So I don't think I will ever be eating anything which resembles meat, taste/content/texture wise.

On the other hand, however, I think that keeping things like "chicken", "beef", etc in the names is what is confusing and misleading. I'm a vegetarian but everytime I pickup plant meat and see the words "chicken", etc. on the labels, I freak out.

As a meat eater, these recreations are a joke. They can just about compete with chicken nuggets. I don’t like nuggets. So I’ve come to regard them as inedible. Same goes for vegan “cheese”. Bleurgh.

And the thing is, I love falafel. There’s bound to be plenty more plant-based patty things. Veggie dishes that don’t pretend to be something they’re not are delicious. Give me baked onions, baba ghanoush, and celery all day.

I can also see why some people wouldn't like them. Take almond milk. To me, it's pretty good as a milk replacement in most cereal, but there are some where it kinda tastes off and dairy milk tastes great. I imagine veggie meat is similar.

YMMV of course.

Also a meat eater, and the impossible burger is great - certainly way better than many cheap meat burgers I've eaten. Not as good as a premium or homemade burger though, I agree.

However, it's early days. These products have only just started to be made in the last couple of years. It's hardly surprising they are not yet perfect.

Nutmeats will now be known as nutguts.

So far my favorite restaurant experience ever was going to Fu He Hui in Shanghai. It's a michelin star vegetarian restaurant, there was no fake meat, but it was extremely flavorful and I keep wishing I could go back.

Why would someone choose to eat some mix of pea protein and coconut oil if not to replace meat or make a political statement?

If I am asked to replace meat with plants, these plants have to compete with meat.

Personally I think we shouldn't sell juice that's from concentrate as 100% juice, but I can easily find out by reading the ingredients so I don't care. And for those who don't already specifically buy juice that isn't from concentrate, enjoy discovering that almost all juice is from concentrate (and hopefully realize how much better it tastes when it's not). It's like ice cream that's been melted and refrozen. It may have the same ingredients but it doesn't have the same taste.

While we do informally refer to the edible portion of certain vegetables as meat, that is absolutely not the same thing as meat from animal sources and I doubt there are few who would confuse that in an informal setting.

But do the plant-based meat replacements contain enough material from those same “meaty” vegetable sources to justify calling them meat more formally in the same manner that we would call animal protein meat?

Given that food is one of the things we have to have to survive, along with air and water, it seems disingenuous to argue that manufacturers and marketers should be able to so blatantly lie about the source materials of that food. Using a formal term, other than meat, would help to reduce confusion about the source material and set it apart from animal proteins, allowing the consumer to make a more informed choice.

Is there significant consumer confusion over this, though?

Why?

I think if Fake meats aren’t classified as meat they wont get the mind share required to shift people’s habits.