Completely agree with this. I find it really annoying when friends switch over and then their diet becomes McPlants, pizzas and ready meals with meat substitutes in them and any mention of something new ends up with a shrivelled up face. Philistines the lot of them. I mean they’re not terrible but there’s so much other good food out there that doesn’t look exactly like what you were eating before.

I think becoming a more adventurous eater and becoming a more plant-based eater are orthogonal life choices.

Nowadays it's perfectly reasonable for people to eat more plant-based dishes without giving up too many of the flavors and textures and general structures of the meals that they were used to. That's a good thing, not a bad thing, assuming you agree with the philosophy that getting people to eat more plants is better for the environment.

Challenging people to eat dishes that are very different from what they grew up with - not just in the ingredients, but in the textures and flavors and preparations - that's a different discussion altogether. In my experience a lot of people are not very interested in trying dishes from unfamiliar cuisines, even if there is a chance they might like them. That's true whether we're talking plant-based or not.

I think for a lot of people it's easier to get them to eat more plant-based versions of the dishes they already like than to get them to experiment with dishes they're unfamiliar with.

What you're saying does make sense. But personally I cannot stand the taste of most substitutes I've used and I imagine many other cheese- and meat-heads would probably be as picky. My wife went vegan for a few years so I tried a number of cheeses and soy and egg things and I find them revolting, personally.

(That said, I'm becoming addicted to warm soy milk especially in the winter. It's just hard to find vendors that make homemade soy milk around here...)

BUT getting exposed to curries (I prefer Thai style rather than Indian) or paneer masala or the spicy paneer burgers in Indian McDonalds makes me feel I could easily give up meat if I was eating food this yummy.

And those spicy paneer burgers at Indian McDonalds, man they're good. I can't believe they haven't introduced them in the US. I think they'd be a massive hit. It tastes similar to spicy Chick-fil-a chicken but it's a type of cheese instead of meat.

I agree that there are a lot of delicious curries, but personally I've really struggled to introduce spicier dishes to people with - for want of a better word - very bland palates. There is definitely a type of person for whom just salt and pepper is considered "spicy" and there is a huge resistance from them to try anything more "exotic" than that. This isn't just limited to Americans and Canadians either, you will find people like this in Latin America, Africa and Europe too. I'm not sure if it's genetic or cultural, but it is a strong preference. For these people, even a mediocre fake meat burger might hit the spot better than a curry.

I am fascinated by which foreign dishes end up becoming popular in different countries. For example, one of the most popular dishes in China is 番茄炒蛋 tomato and egg rice, which has the ingredients prepared in exactly the way most Europeans and Americans are familiar with, yet you rarely if ever find that same dish at Chinese restaurants in Europe or the US.

Incidentally, if you like paneer burgers, you might also enjoy haloumi burgers, which are a similar dish quite popular in Europe.

Yeah I do know what you mean. I still try to introduce people to the spicier things when I can.

But I don't think it even needs to be spicy to be good. Korean banchan dishes are mostly sesame oil, garlic and maybe vinegar or soy sauce and they make so many vegetables taste so amazing. We've been making a spinach banchan the last few weeks and it's just so tasty.

Also, I only recently realized that baked brocolli (to the point it's crispy) with a bit of oil and salt is the best vegetable I've ever tasted. It tastes like a healthier version of a good chip.

> Incidentally, if you like paneer burgers, you might also enjoy haloumi burgers, which are a similar dish quite popular in Europe.

Ooo I'm curious to try it. But while some people compare haloumi and paneer I think haloumi is waayy saltier and can be eaten easily on its own by frying it (honey on top optionally). Whereas paneer tastes like tofu on its own to me, completely tasteless. I imagine the haloumi burger would be very salty.

It's not just meat that is animal-derived. There's egg, milk, cheese, whipped cream, cream cheese. And without using substitutes/alternatives cooking a truly vegan meal becomes a challenge. Even for vegetarian dishes like cupcakes, veg pizza or veg pasta cannot be made without the animal-derived ingredients. Even the McDonalds spicy paneer burgers use paneer, mayo, butter.

I am from India. And most people here can't have meals without ghee, or tea/coffee without milk.

True. It isn't my goal at the moment to be vegan but just to eat _less_ meat and animal products.

Thank you! This was the whole concept behind EatKind. To get people to easily switch a plant-based diet without having to change what they eat on a daily basis. This is especially difficulty when usually it's one person in a household that decides to eat vegan and the rest of the family isn't ready to make a shift in their meals.

> I find it really annoying when friends switch over and then their diet becomes McPlants, pizzas and ready meals

And then they quit and warn others against trying it because it made them "feel like shit." Not realizing it wasn't the lack of meat and cheese, but rather eating a bunch of processed garbage.

Yeah seen that too. Six years here and I’m walking and running 50k a week without a problem. More energy than I’ve ever had.

I actually just ate home made vegetable paella and chocolate cake for dinner.

In the long run you are right, in the short run the various fake/substitute foods and ingredients are good intermediate steps to a vegetarian/vegan diet.

I think the bridge many aspiring vegans/vegetarians find hard to cross is finding really 'hearty' foods that don't have to taste like a steak but give you a similar experience (or feeling?) So the easiest first step is the substitute products.

FWIW, some things that you think of as necessarily dairy-forward have just become that way through modern culture. Pizza, for example, used to commonly have no cheese, and still is somewhat common without cheese in Italy (Pizza Marinara from Naples, for example).

I'm no huge advocate of vegan "cheese" and "meatloaf", but vegan pizza can be perfectly normal and traditional.

Yeah, "tomato pie" is common in places with a lot of transplants from that part of Italy as well, especially places with old school Catholics who didn't eat any animal/dairy products during lent (Philly, NYC and the surrounding NJ suburbs to name a few). I grew up eating the stuff. I've since tried vegan pizza with fake cheese, from a place with great vegan sandwiches, and it's not worth it compared to a pizza with no cheese. When I make focaccia, I toss some pizza sauce on top before throwing it in the oven and it's amazing.

Yup. I come from a culture (Ukrainian) that, due to religious reasons (even though no one is particularly religious nowadays), has a bunch of traditional, vegan lenten dishes. When you expand to all the traditional (ie. Orthodox) Christian communities, plus Buddhist communities, there's a massive range of traditional tried and true vegan foods out there.

As a vegan who used to enjoy eating meat, sometimes I just want some meaty food without the dead animal, and fake meat like an impossible burger solves this for me. But also so does tofu and tempeh.

You would also like jackfruit then!

I do like jackfruit! I make bbq jackfruit tacos, jerk jackfruit etc :)

Agreed. Not sure if the vegan replacements have the same properties (fattiness, moisture, etc.) that the recipe expects, and many vegan dishes from South/Southeast Asia and so on are delicious.

Vegan replacements work slightly differently. I think tips on how to substitute from brands and chefs are what's important to build trust in using these alternatives in recipes. We are working on introducing chef tips, will also try including tips from brands themselves.

I'm not a vegan. I love lions mane "crab" cakes and king oyster "scallops". I hear you can also smoke king oyster to make pulled "pork". Not exact replacements, but definitely some interesting and delicious recipes out there for mushrooms.

I've had some excellent "pulled pork" made out of jackfruit. The consistency is similarly chewy/stringy, and if you are looking for American-style BBQ flavor then a lot of that flavor comes from the sauce anyway, so it's pretty easy to sub out the meat. When I lived in a country where it was trivial to buy fresh jackfruit, I just sliced it and threw it into a stir fry and it worked pretty good as a meaty consistency in those too.

One thing I still haven't found is a good plant-based version of carnitas, which is a sort of pulled pork from Mexico where they crisp up the top of it as well as have it swimming in lard. I think you could probably get somewhere close to it by using toasted pepitas (pumpkin seed) or something to get the crispy aspect, but to nail all the textures and flavors you'd be getting into a big time-consuming exercise for home cooking. Although, to be fair, I'd never cook meat carnitas at home either due to the time requirement.

There's a tasty jackfruit carnitas recipe in the cookbook, "La Vida Verde". You may need to work on an improved method to make them crispy...perhaps adding a final step of putting the skillet under a broiler.

You can also use jackfruit to substitute pulled pork

This addon indeed seems more like an affiliate link pipeline entry.

Although this does seem like product promotion, we don't provide affiliate links (just takes you to Google). We don't at this point make money off product purchases.

Having said that - I also don't like this perception of the product. We will be adding more natural substitutes such as jackfruit or mushroom, so you're not driven away by what may seem too promotional.

That sounds a lot more promising, best of luck!

It's not bad to make money. It's good to make money providing a service that helps people.

Thank you for the feedback!

What would be great for us to do is to create a feed of recipes (both vegan and non-vegan recipes) that need minimal (may be just cream or milk) to no replacements. This way people could discover a variety of recipes from across the globe than to be confined to a few recipe blogs.

> […] by the cultures that have great veggy dishes like in South Asia.

Or any country really. A good vegetarian lasagne doesn't mean replacing ground meat with a non-meat substitute; you'd want a different recipe.

> Or any country really.

Ha, really? What are some iconic German or Kazakh vegan dishes? I'd say the opposite is true, most countries have no vegan main dishes.

Can't speak for Kazakhstan, but Germany and surrounding countries have sauerkraut, pretzels, beer, cider, wine, french fries, dumplings, pumpernickel and many other breads and brötchen, apple sauce, veges like asparagus and kohlrabi, desserts with rhubarb, red currants, berries... Certainly most meals are meat- and dairy-forward, but it's not like there is nothing else in the cuisine.

You'll note I specifically talked about main dishes. Yes, of course, every country will have some food that just happens to be vegan. But only a few countries and regions of the world have actual cuisines and main meals which are vegan.

I'm not sure what your point is? The issue is if someone can continue eating the food of their own region or culture while also following a more plant-based diet. In all but the most arid and inhospitable parts of the world, there are already a fair amount of local plant-based dishes.

It's true that people may need to supplement their diets with some kind of substitute that provides a similar nutritional content to meat and dairy, or add alternative dishes from outside their region, but for the most part it shouldn't be all that difficult for most people from most parts of the world to eat plant-based without fully changing up their entire diet.

Strongly agree with this.

I do not understand vegans who eat "imitation" meats. If you are ethically opposed to the slaughter of animals, why are you OK with pretending that you are still slaughtering them by actively buying things called "chik'n" and the like? That seems extremely perverse to me: 'I don't want to actually eat animals, but I want to pretend like I do'. Seriously, what?

> I do not understand vegans who eat "imitation" meats. If you are ethically opposed to the slaughter of animals, why are you OK with pretending that you are still slaughtering them by actively buying things called "chik'n" and the like? That is perverse.

I'm a (25+ years) vegan who eats "imitation" meats.

Here's why ...

I like how they taste.

And you genuinely see nothing ethically questionable with supporting products which pretend that they are made from animals?

They don't pretend they're made from animals. The labelling is quite clear that they are plant-based. What they do is mimic the form factor of animal-based foods. And generally that is just a sausage shape, or ground up stuff. There's no imitation T-bone steak AFAIK. If we all transformed into vegans tomorrow, I don't see why we wouldn't be allowed to eat items in a hotdog or hamburger form factor.

> They don't pretend they're made from animals.

Food and brand names like "chick'n" "mock duck" by their very titles literally pretend they're made from animals.

> don't see why we wouldn't be allowed to eat items in a hotdog or hamburger form factor.

The problem isn't the shape, whether it is a burger or sausage, the problem is the attempted replication. We should be moving away from the concept that it is OK to eat, or to pretend to eat, animals, not reinforcing this perverse belief. Vegan foods should, and do, stand on their own.

That's just a branding gimmick, isn't it? I don't think anybody is fooled (or if they are then it's unobservant meat-eaters, not vegans).

If I can try to summarize your opinion (tell me where I'm wrong), it sounds like the crux of your issue is that it's not just the action of eating meat that's bad, it's also the idea of eating meat and the rituals associated with eating meat. In other words, if someone eats a "tofurky" for Thanksgiving, they're engaging in something similar to eating meat, which reinforces the norm that eating meat is an acceptable thing, or suggests that there is a genuine (superior) non-plant-based version of the facsimile you're eating. The objection isn't purely "you could be eating tastier stuff", you think the end goal of more widespread veganism is actually undermined by the existence of meat substitutes.

> if someone eats a "tofurky" for Thanksgiving, they're engaging in something similar to eating meat, which reinforces the norm that eating meat is an acceptable thing, or suggests that there is a genuine (superior) non-plant-based version of the facsimile you're eating. The objection isn't purely "you could be eating tastier stuff", you think the end goal of more widespread veganism is actually undermined by the existence of meat substitutes.

Yes, that's an excellent summary of my thinking! Thank you for helping me articulate it.

I don't think people are literally fooled by fake meat, but I just believe we should be moving away from the concept of eating meat imitations to eating vegan dishes which do not attempt to replicate animal products, but stand on their own, because ultimately the notion that we are still replicating flavors and concepts around meat I find very sad. Specifically, it is upsetting to me that people still view animal consumption as desirable, if objectionable. It is deeply upsetting to me any time I hear other vegan friends say 'man, I wish I could have a burger' or 'that bacon smells soooo good', because this still perpetuates the desire to consume meat.

I'm a meat eater. Let's say I want to significantly reduce my meat consumption. I'm used to eating meals that are meat centric. Growing up most dinners would be a meat, a starch, and some vegetables. The easiest way for me to reduce my meat consumption would be to replace the meat with something else. Should I replace my chicken with mushrooms, tempeh, tofu, something else? How firm should the tofu be? What's the deal with pressing your tofu? Maybe I'll just stick to chicken. If you want to encourage me to stop eating animals giving me an easy, clear substitution, like chick'n, seems like a reasonable thing to do. Would you prefer people ate chicken or chick'n? Would you say the two are morally equivalent? Would I be a horrible person if I said I won't eat animals anymore because it's unethical while still viewing them as very tasty?

Indeed, and thinking that

> the end goal of more widespread veganism is actually undermined by the existence of meat substitutes

as the GP says and OP agrees with, does not make any sense because offering a substitute that allows more meat eaters to ease into vegan eating can (from a vegan point of view) be a strictly morally superior action over meat eaters continuing to eat meat.

It's an interesting perspective, I have to acknowledge. I'm viewing it from an extreme outside position (I literally kill and eat wild animals as a hobby), but an interesting comparison I can see might be to cannibalism. There's nothing practically wrong with making a facsimile human leg out of pork, calling it "I can't believe it's not human flesh", and selling it in a grocery store...but I mean, most people would find it distasteful and upsetting. They're not engaging in cannibalism of course, but the ritual of cannibalism, the idea of cannibalism, is unsettling in its own right to most people. If someone said "man, I wish I could eat people" unironically, I might not want to attend their next barbecue.

Your view seems perfectly consistent to me -- if you believe killing animals is morally equivalent to killing humans, then meat eating could be considered morally equivalent to cannibalism. Even fake human leg is still creepy to such a non-cannibal -- even fake turkey thus may be creepy to a vegan.

Perhaps it's because of the variety of reasons people are vegans -- many aren't truly abstaining from eating animal meat because they think it's wrong. Some are vegan for health reasons, or for environmental reasons, or because it's fashionable in their social tribe, or because they vaguely agree with anti-animal-eating philosophy but still internalize contradictory opinions. I know multiple adventurous vegans who would be ok eating roadkill deer if I served it to them (from their perspective, it does not contradict their belief that killing animals for meat is wrong -- it died in an accident, after all). But they would have a different opinion if I served them roadkill human, even if I showed them the human's death was purely accidental.

That reminds me of another cruelty-free animal product: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Eignblunzn

A blood sausage made from human blood. Nothing wrong with it ethically, but upsetting enough for performance art.

> And you genuinely see nothing ethically questionable with supporting products which pretend that they are made from animals?

No, I don't. Honestly, I don't even understand how someone could. As others have noted, this is just branding. No one is being fooled, and the idea that eating "mock duck" somehow normalizes eating actual duck seems pretty unlikely to me.

What exactly is the moral dilemma here? The products are not made from animals, so what's the problem? I don't understand why if they just pretend to be made from animals that that would make them morally questionable.

You'd similarly not see any issues with human meat substitutes being sold at your local grocery store? Curious how that's not a thing, huh?

No I wouldn't, because there's no human meat actually involved. If a store sold something they say tastes like human, but doesn't actually contain human parts or harm humans in any way, then there's no moral dilemma, I'd buy that substitute and eat it just fine.

You're ignoring my point. Why is imitation human meat not an acceptable thing, but imitation animal meat is?

It is acceptable, where did anyone say it wasn't?

Please show me one grocery store where you can buy imitation human meat. Or ten strangers on the street who'd be OK with it compared to those who'd be OK with imitation animal meat. It is absolutely not acceptable.

The reason we don't have it is not due to morality, it's due to not needing to since we have other foods. And either way it's not actual human flesh, it's simply a substitute. You could make the argument that anything could be a human meat substitute, since animal meat is not much different from human meat, and as such, animal meat substitutes would also be human meat substitutes.

Are you really confused why people want to continue eating the food they've eaten their whole lives minus the animal suffering?

The food wasn't the problem, the suffering was.

Veganism is not about suffering (if it were about suffering, suffering-free animal consumption would be acceptable, and it is not) , it is about a rejection of the commodification and exploitation of nonhuman species. Fake meats partake in that commodification, albeit as an imitation.

Veganism is about many things in different ratios for different people. I don't think you get to decide why people are vegan and why they aren't.

Can you give an example of suffering-free animal consumption?

> Veganism is about many things in different ratios for different people. I don't think you get to decide why people are vegan and why they aren't

If everyone gets to decide on the meaning of a concept to them personally, then that concept loses meaning. I'm using an almost textbook definition.

> Can you give an example of suffering-free animal consumption?

Sure, harvesting honey which has fallen off a honeycomb beneath a tree.

> harvesting honey which has fallen off a honeycomb beneath a tree

I never had this opportunity, but I don't see an ethical problem here. As a more realistic example (in my environment), I suggest dumpster diving. I think it would be okay, ethically, but I would not do it because it grosses me out in a way that vegan substitutes don't, and that feeling is not related to the dumpster part.

I may have to do some more introspection, but I honestly don't think, that my acceptance of vegan substitutes is based on a desire to harm animals.

Interesting view point. But by that logic - you shouldn't use contraceptives if you're against having babies. Or kill people on video games if you're against murder. It's not like vegans imagine killing animals while eating fake meat. They are just taking care of their taste buds. In fact nobody thinks of animals when they eat. If people did, more people would eat less meat. And that's why all meat should look exactly like the animals they come from. And not random shapes that they are made into.

My point is that veganism is an ideology and a philosophy, it's not just a lifestyle choice. Not eating or otherwise using animal products does not make someone a vegan--it's a necessary prerequisite, of course, but not the sole requirement. Actively fighting against animal exploitation is at the very core of veganism. Supporting and reinforcing a culture which normalizes animal consumption, or the imitation thereof, actively fights against this cause. We should be working to highlight how fucked up it is that people want to pretend to eat animals, because they 'taste good', not reinforcing the view that it's OK to do so.

", or the imitation thereof," is doing a lot of heavy lifting in this ideology.

Because people like the taste of meat and at the same time don't want to hurt animals. They also want to maybe cook the same kind of food but without animals. What's wrong in that?

The fact that veganism is not about solely harming animals, it is a philosophy which encompasses a wholesale rejection of animal subjugation; this includes suffering yes, but it also includes commodification and exploitation en masse. It is ethically extremely questionable to claim that you support animals, but to want to pretend to eat them.