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Wow, does that article ever bury the lead by not describing what Hampton Creek's product is until the very last paragraph. For those who didn't make it all the

Wow, does that article ever bury the lead by not describing what Hampton Creek's product is until the very last paragraph. For those who didn't make it all the way down, Hampton Creek makes a vegetarian mayo alternative called 'Just Mayo' that is a threat to egg-based mayonnaise, and is evidently gaining popularity. As such, the American Egg Board has been attempting to destroy them.

deleted 11y ago
[deleted]
dang 11y ago
Lots of previous articles on this, if you want to read more: https://hn.algolia.com/?query=hampton%20creek&sort=byDate&prefix&page=0&dateRange=all&type=story https://hn.algolia.com/?query=hampton%20creek&sort=byDate&pr...
tveita 11y ago
I'd be pretty surprised if I bought a product named "Just Mayo" that didn't contain actual mayonnaise, but I guess it fits into the same pattern as American "cheese".
- dghughes 11y ago
  I'd be upset too as a consumer and an egg producer that a product was using the name of a popular product with eggs but no eggs are in it. Margarine with yellow dye trying to look like butter (also dyed yellow). "Milk" products such as almond milk and soy milk when both are just juice since neither almonds or soybeans have nipples. There must be some law to prevent such desception.
  - FreeFull 11y ago
    Almond milk has been called almond milk quite a bit before the US even existed. I don't think it would make sense to rename it now.
  - deleted 11y ago
    [deleted]
  - makomk 11y ago
    The label even has an egg as its most prominent feature. They're really going out their way to make people assume that it's got eggs in it.
  - plonh 11y ago
    Magnesia also lacks nipples.
    - dghughes 11y ago
      I'm not convinced since it sounds like a stripper that makes you forget.
- amyjess 11y ago
  If you look carefully, it's not actually called "American cheese". It's usually something like "American slices (pasteurized processed cheese product)" instead.
- socksy 11y ago
  I just... don't understand this mindset at all. To all intents and purposes, egg is an entirely utilitarian ingredient in mayonnaise, as an emulsifier for the oil and water. In the past, this would be our only emulsifier readily available for such a dish, and now we have many more alternatives. This product (supposedly, I don't live in the US so have never tried it) tastes and feels exactly like a good mayonnaise, and shares the two largest parts of the ingredients, why shouldn't it be referred to as a mayonnaise? I think the American "cheese" thing is a bit of red herring too. What people are actually referring to is the fact that it's actually a cheap, heavily processed product that doesn't really bare any resemblance to cheese as we have known it before. This complaint about American cheeses is not usually dished out to, say, Treeline's nut cheese brand — presumably because it looks like "real cheese". It seems incredibly arbitrary to just pick one ingredient and say "hey, this is what makes this a real version of [x]", especially when that ingredient is apparently so unimportant to the actual consistency and flavour of the product. It's as if we'd arbitrarily decided that something would stop being mayo if the type of oil wasn't canola or something.
  - tveita 11y ago
    The yolk affects taste, color and texture. I'm not sure what more you could demand from an ingredient. No one has "arbitrarily" picked a single ingredient to define real mayonnaise, you'd have the same reaction if someone tried to replace the vegetable oil with lard, or the vinegar with sulphuric acid. The basic recipe for mayonnaise is pretty uncontroversial. As for having the same taste, I'll believe that when I taste it. That's what Coca-Cola says about Zero as well. It's just marketing, they're not going to say that the product they're passing off as real mayo doesn't taste like mayo.

deleted 11y ago

[deleted]

dang 11y ago

Lots of previous articles on this, if you want to read more: https://hn.algolia.com/?query=hampton%20creek&sort=byDate&prefix&page=0&dateRange=all&type=story https://hn.algolia.com/?query=hampton%20creek&sort=byDate&pr...

tveita 11y ago

I'd be pretty surprised if I bought a product named "Just Mayo" that didn't contain actual mayonnaise, but I guess it fits into the same pattern as American "cheese".

dghughes 11y ago
I'd be upset too as a consumer and an egg producer that a product was using the name of a popular product with eggs but no eggs are in it. Margarine with yellow dye trying to look like butter (also dyed yellow). "Milk" products such as almond milk and soy milk when both are just juice since neither almonds or soybeans have nipples. There must be some law to prevent such desception.
- FreeFull 11y ago
  Almond milk has been called almond milk quite a bit before the US even existed. I don't think it would make sense to rename it now.
- deleted 11y ago
  [deleted]
- makomk 11y ago
  The label even has an egg as its most prominent feature. They're really going out their way to make people assume that it's got eggs in it.
- plonh 11y ago
  Magnesia also lacks nipples.
  - dghughes 11y ago
    I'm not convinced since it sounds like a stripper that makes you forget.
amyjess 11y ago
If you look carefully, it's not actually called "American cheese". It's usually something like "American slices (pasteurized processed cheese product)" instead.
socksy 11y ago
I just... don't understand this mindset at all. To all intents and purposes, egg is an entirely utilitarian ingredient in mayonnaise, as an emulsifier for the oil and water. In the past, this would be our only emulsifier readily available for such a dish, and now we have many more alternatives. This product (supposedly, I don't live in the US so have never tried it) tastes and feels exactly like a good mayonnaise, and shares the two largest parts of the ingredients, why shouldn't it be referred to as a mayonnaise? I think the American "cheese" thing is a bit of red herring too. What people are actually referring to is the fact that it's actually a cheap, heavily processed product that doesn't really bare any resemblance to cheese as we have known it before. This complaint about American cheeses is not usually dished out to, say, Treeline's nut cheese brand — presumably because it looks like "real cheese". It seems incredibly arbitrary to just pick one ingredient and say "hey, this is what makes this a real version of [x]", especially when that ingredient is apparently so unimportant to the actual consistency and flavour of the product. It's as if we'd arbitrarily decided that something would stop being mayo if the type of oil wasn't canola or something.
- tveita 11y ago
  The yolk affects taste, color and texture. I'm not sure what more you could demand from an ingredient. No one has "arbitrarily" picked a single ingredient to define real mayonnaise, you'd have the same reaction if someone tried to replace the vegetable oil with lard, or the vinegar with sulphuric acid. The basic recipe for mayonnaise is pretty uncontroversial. As for having the same taste, I'll believe that when I taste it. That's what Coca-Cola says about Zero as well. It's just marketing, they're not going to say that the product they're passing off as real mayo doesn't taste like mayo.