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I don't get the point of having a veggie burger bleed. I tried an Impossible Burger a while ago and didn't find it that great. It doesn't taste like real meat

I don't get the point of having a veggie burger bleed. I tried an Impossible Burger a while ago and didn't find it that great. It doesn't taste like real meat and is just an average veggie burger. I think it's more of a gimmick.

jlawson 8y ago
The goal isn't just to have a "veggie burger bleed", it's to replicate the experience of eating meat. Perhaps they have failed so far (according to your taste test), but the goal is valid. If someone can find a way to make a product near-indistinguishable from meat without raising and killing animals, it would be a massive victory for the environment (meat production is CO2-intensive), for the cause of bringing decent food to poor people, and for reducing animal suffering. It may be one of the most underrated technological efforts happening right now IMO.
- maxxxxx 8y ago
  I think for that purpose it's better to work on lab-grown meat. Making veggies taste like meat seems misguided to me. Either eat real veggies or eat real meat.
  - astura 8y ago
    What about the people who gave up meat for health reasons? There is a market for this, just because you aren't in the target market doesn't mean it doesn't exist.
    - maxxxxx 8y ago
      Fake burgers may be not be healthier. They are highly processed food made only for taste and not nutritional value. People should eat real vegetables for health reasons.
    - wolco 8y ago
      Processed foods generally are not healthy for you. Marketing is making this product appear healthy. There is a large market for processed foods and this product seems novel and has a decent taste so I could understand it's popularity.
  - xigma 8y ago
    Let the market decide. Psychologically, "grown in a lab" is problematic. When people imagine that, they think of Frankenstein. When they imagine actual cattle, they think of green pastures. Neither fantasy is reflecting reality, but that's secondary. Mock plant-based beef is good middle-ground.
    - maxxxxx 8y ago
      I don't think mock plant-based beef is a good way. It's highly processed food with a ton of weird ingredients. Fine as a snack or novelty from time to time but not good for daily consumption. I am not worried about people's perceptions of lab grown meat. Such perceptions change quickly if a product is good. They also shouldn't think of green pastures when they see meat. They should think of the hellish life most of the animals had.
  - glass_of_water 8y ago
    Does it have to be one or the other though? What's wrong with funding projects such as the impossible burger until lab-grown meat is economically viable? I feel like your position is analogous to saying, "I think it's better to focus on nuclear fusion. Why waste time working on renewables?" Of course we'd like to power everything with fusion, but it's not there yet economically or technologically. So in the mean time, it's probably a good idea to also fund intermediate solutions. > Either eat real veggies or eat real meat. Could you explain this stance? Precisely what do you find objectionable about other people choosing to eat plant-based foods that happen to imitate meat? Edit: I see your position against the meat substitutes is primarily health-based. Almost certainly it would be harmful to one's health to consume foods such as the impossible burger frequently, but you should consider that the products that it's trying to replace aren't necessarily any healthier.
    - maxxxxx 8y ago
      I have nothing against Impossible Burgers. I just don't think it's a contribution to better nutrition or a cultural change away from meat. It's a gimmick. My objection against imitation meat is the same I have against sugary breakfast cereals. They make people believe that they are doing something healthy but in reality they are eating highly processed food that has purely been created for taste and not for nutrition.
      - glass_of_water 8y ago
        From a nutritional standpoint, I agree that it would be unfortunate if people replaced healthy foods in their diet with the impossible burger. But I think part of your position is predicated on the idea that real meat (specifically ground beef in this case) is healthier. I don't think it's clear yet whether or not that's the case. Would you be willing to elaborate on the culture change point? Do you think that too few people are concerned about animal welfare to choose the impossible burger over ground beef even if it's competitive price-wise?
        maxxxxx 8y ago
  - derekp7 8y ago
    One thing I've noticed about the cuisine from cultures that have a high number of vegetarians in them, is how they don't try to imitate meat, but they don't taste/feel like a plate of vegetables either. They manage to achieve tasty meals that are in a category of their own.
    - maxxxxx 8y ago
      I don't eat meat myself and I tell people who try to become vegetarian to not go the imitation meat route but instead learn to appreciate vegetables for themselves. Indian cooking is excellent for that.
- gorilla_fight 8y ago
  > If someone can find a way to make a product near-indistinguishable from meat without raising and killing animals, it would be a massive victory for the environment (meat production is CO2-intensive), for the cause of bringing decent food to poor people, and for reducing animal suffering. I'm all for reducing animal suffering (especially from CAFOs) but replacing meat with plants isn't necessarily a victory for the environment. Widespread factory farming agriculture has destroyed entire ecosystems. Ever flown over the midwest? You see miles and miles of plots of the same crops repeated over and over... monocultures with very little of the original grassland remaining. Agriculture has accomplished the wholesale destruction of entire ecosystems. "70% of all water from rivers and underground reserves is being spread onto ... irrigated land that grows one-third of the world’s food", according to _When the Rivers Run Dry: Water--The Defining Crisis of the Twenty-first Century_ by Fred Pearce. In some regions up to 90% of the water from the environment is used for irrigation. The green revolution as we know it is only possible due to fossil fuels, the Haber-Bosch process breaking down oil to create nitrogen fertilizer. With industrial farming, all in all an acre of corn requires about fifty gallons of oil according to _The Omnivores Dilemma_ by Michael Pollan. How much fossil fuel does a typical acre of wheat or soy consume? How sustainable is it compared to pastured meat, which thrives on the renewable resource of grassland? Bringing decent food to poor people is also a noble goal, but is fraught with a moral hazard. Many developed nations have agricultural subsidies, including the US at $1.173 billion for wheat and $610 million for soybeans as of the 2004 USDA report. The billions of dollars in subsidies causes an oversupply, and the developed nations are all too willing to dump onto other countries, putting local farmers out of business and advancing an imperialist dependency. Lierre Keith, vegan for 20 years (now ex-vegan), in her book _The Vegetarian Myth_ says it best: > Why should people in Cambodia be dependent on the US for their basic sustenance? It condemns them to participating in a market economy where they will have to dedicate their labor and local resources to produce raw materials, like timber and metal ore, or cheap consumer goods like sneakers or computer chips, for rich nations. With the pennies they get in return, they will then have to buy food from the same rich nations or their progeny, the grain cartels. This is a destructive, inhumane, and oppressive arrangement. I have to believe that the political vegetarians haven’t thought it through.
  - dc_gregory 8y ago
dnbgfher 8y ago
So I'm coming at this from the perspective of somebody that has been vegetarian for about a decade or so. I agree the bleeding bit seems pretty gimmicky, but if it helps convince non-vegetarians to give it shot it might make sense. Otherwise, I rather disagree with your post. It's certainly one of the better veggie burgers that, to me, tastes quite a bit like real meat. The Beyond Burger, which is in the same niche as the Impossible Burger, actually tastes too much like meat for my mother (vegetarian for far longer than me) to enjoy. I don't think I'd confuse either of those for real meat, but it does hit a lot of the same notes which is more than I can say for any other veggie burger I have tried. A friend who really enjoys his meat tried the Impossible Burger and found it almost identical to some non-burger meat. I think it was some sort of pate from an animal I don't think many Americans usually eat. I suspect you haven't tried many of the standard grocery store veggie burgers. Like so many vegetarian and vegan products, despite their branding they are really more for making a new dish that's similar to the meat version. I think if they branded themselves more as alternatives rather than exact replacements they would be far more acceptable to people. Only recently, with products like the Imposible and Beyond Burger, have we started to see products that are really starting to push into the realm of direct replacements. I don't think it's fair to call them just average veggie burgers.
- pssflops 8y ago
  Morningstar Farms have such good buffalo wings that I prefer them over the real thing. Their burger patties aren't all great, but the black bean ones were impressively tasty.
adrianmonk 8y ago
Actual animal-meat burgers don't literally have blood in them. They have myoglobin, which is similar to the hemoglobin found in blood, but different. So a burger doesn't bleed, it has moisture which makes it wet and myoglobin which makes it red, but the red liquid isn't blood. Anyway, there are 3 purposes I can think of: (1) Looks. The myoglobin substitute, leghemoglobin, that they put in the Impossible Burger will make it look more like real meat, which will visually appeal to people who like meat. (2) Flavor. Myoglobin also affects flavor, so again a more realistic imitation of meat. (Incidentally, apparently myoglobin content is the main difference between dark and light meat chicken. Myoglobin stores oxygen, so muscles that get used more need to contain more of it. Since chickens walk way more than they fly, chicken breasts have little myglobin whereas chicken legs and thighs have more.) (3) Nutrition. Myoglobin contains iron. People always talk about vegetarians getting enough protein, but iron might actually be a bigger challenge. And heme iron (as found in meat's myoglobin and in Impossible's leghemoglobin) is easier to absorb than non-heme iron (as generally found in plants).
- wes-k 8y ago
  (4) Char. I believe the heme (maybe myoglobin, I’m not a doctor) also helps when grilling to get the char and carmelization you get with normal meat burgers.
dghughes 8y ago
Many people don't care if it's meat or vegetables as long as it looks and tastes like meat to them. So the goal could be to reduce harm to the environment by reducing the amount of animals being farmed for meat. Not necessarily get rid of all animal farming just reduce it. There is a lot of waste in the meat industry in the US and Canada. Many countries all over the world eat all the animal but in the US and Canada you never or rarely see people demanding a serving of offal, liver, kidneys, tongue, eyes, brain. If a hamburger could be made out of vegetables then I bet most people wouldn't care what it was made of.
- citiguy 8y ago
  I always assumed the unpopular meat parts got turned into hot dogs, sausages or something like that. Am I wrong?
  - dghughes 8y ago
    I dont know but I'd say that's just people trying their best to discredit the industry. The only part that would be non-meat is the casing if it's a natural casing.

jlawson 8y ago

The goal isn't just to have a "veggie burger bleed", it's to replicate the experience of eating meat. Perhaps they have failed so far (according to your taste test), but the goal is valid. If someone can find a way to make a product near-indistinguishable from meat without raising and killing animals, it would be a massive victory for the environment (meat production is CO2-intensive), for the cause of bringing decent food to poor people, and for reducing animal suffering. It may be one of the most underrated technological efforts happening right now IMO.

maxxxxx 8y ago
I think for that purpose it's better to work on lab-grown meat. Making veggies taste like meat seems misguided to me. Either eat real veggies or eat real meat.
- astura 8y ago
  What about the people who gave up meat for health reasons? There is a market for this, just because you aren't in the target market doesn't mean it doesn't exist.
  - maxxxxx 8y ago
    Fake burgers may be not be healthier. They are highly processed food made only for taste and not nutritional value. People should eat real vegetables for health reasons.
  - wolco 8y ago
    Processed foods generally are not healthy for you. Marketing is making this product appear healthy. There is a large market for processed foods and this product seems novel and has a decent taste so I could understand it's popularity.
- xigma 8y ago
  Let the market decide. Psychologically, "grown in a lab" is problematic. When people imagine that, they think of Frankenstein. When they imagine actual cattle, they think of green pastures. Neither fantasy is reflecting reality, but that's secondary. Mock plant-based beef is good middle-ground.
  - maxxxxx 8y ago
    I don't think mock plant-based beef is a good way. It's highly processed food with a ton of weird ingredients. Fine as a snack or novelty from time to time but not good for daily consumption. I am not worried about people's perceptions of lab grown meat. Such perceptions change quickly if a product is good. They also shouldn't think of green pastures when they see meat. They should think of the hellish life most of the animals had.
- glass_of_water 8y ago
  Does it have to be one or the other though? What's wrong with funding projects such as the impossible burger until lab-grown meat is economically viable? I feel like your position is analogous to saying, "I think it's better to focus on nuclear fusion. Why waste time working on renewables?" Of course we'd like to power everything with fusion, but it's not there yet economically or technologically. So in the mean time, it's probably a good idea to also fund intermediate solutions. > Either eat real veggies or eat real meat. Could you explain this stance? Precisely what do you find objectionable about other people choosing to eat plant-based foods that happen to imitate meat? Edit: I see your position against the meat substitutes is primarily health-based. Almost certainly it would be harmful to one's health to consume foods such as the impossible burger frequently, but you should consider that the products that it's trying to replace aren't necessarily any healthier.
  - maxxxxx 8y ago
    I have nothing against Impossible Burgers. I just don't think it's a contribution to better nutrition or a cultural change away from meat. It's a gimmick. My objection against imitation meat is the same I have against sugary breakfast cereals. They make people believe that they are doing something healthy but in reality they are eating highly processed food that has purely been created for taste and not for nutrition.
    - glass_of_water 8y ago
      From a nutritional standpoint, I agree that it would be unfortunate if people replaced healthy foods in their diet with the impossible burger. But I think part of your position is predicated on the idea that real meat (specifically ground beef in this case) is healthier. I don't think it's clear yet whether or not that's the case. Would you be willing to elaborate on the culture change point? Do you think that too few people are concerned about animal welfare to choose the impossible burger over ground beef even if it's competitive price-wise?
      - maxxxxx 8y ago
- derekp7 8y ago
  One thing I've noticed about the cuisine from cultures that have a high number of vegetarians in them, is how they don't try to imitate meat, but they don't taste/feel like a plate of vegetables either. They manage to achieve tasty meals that are in a category of their own.
  - maxxxxx 8y ago
    I don't eat meat myself and I tell people who try to become vegetarian to not go the imitation meat route but instead learn to appreciate vegetables for themselves. Indian cooking is excellent for that.
gorilla_fight 8y ago
> If someone can find a way to make a product near-indistinguishable from meat without raising and killing animals, it would be a massive victory for the environment (meat production is CO2-intensive), for the cause of bringing decent food to poor people, and for reducing animal suffering. I'm all for reducing animal suffering (especially from CAFOs) but replacing meat with plants isn't necessarily a victory for the environment. Widespread factory farming agriculture has destroyed entire ecosystems. Ever flown over the midwest? You see miles and miles of plots of the same crops repeated over and over... monocultures with very little of the original grassland remaining. Agriculture has accomplished the wholesale destruction of entire ecosystems. "70% of all water from rivers and underground reserves is being spread onto ... irrigated land that grows one-third of the world’s food", according to _When the Rivers Run Dry: Water--The Defining Crisis of the Twenty-first Century_ by Fred Pearce. In some regions up to 90% of the water from the environment is used for irrigation. The green revolution as we know it is only possible due to fossil fuels, the Haber-Bosch process breaking down oil to create nitrogen fertilizer. With industrial farming, all in all an acre of corn requires about fifty gallons of oil according to _The Omnivores Dilemma_ by Michael Pollan. How much fossil fuel does a typical acre of wheat or soy consume? How sustainable is it compared to pastured meat, which thrives on the renewable resource of grassland? Bringing decent food to poor people is also a noble goal, but is fraught with a moral hazard. Many developed nations have agricultural subsidies, including the US at $1.173 billion for wheat and $610 million for soybeans as of the 2004 USDA report. The billions of dollars in subsidies causes an oversupply, and the developed nations are all too willing to dump onto other countries, putting local farmers out of business and advancing an imperialist dependency. Lierre Keith, vegan for 20 years (now ex-vegan), in her book _The Vegetarian Myth_ says it best: > Why should people in Cambodia be dependent on the US for their basic sustenance? It condemns them to participating in a market economy where they will have to dedicate their labor and local resources to produce raw materials, like timber and metal ore, or cheap consumer goods like sneakers or computer chips, for rich nations. With the pennies they get in return, they will then have to buy food from the same rich nations or their progeny, the grain cartels. This is a destructive, inhumane, and oppressive arrangement. I have to believe that the political vegetarians haven’t thought it through.
- dc_gregory 8y ago

dnbgfher 8y ago

So I'm coming at this from the perspective of somebody that has been vegetarian for about a decade or so. I agree the bleeding bit seems pretty gimmicky, but if it helps convince non-vegetarians to give it shot it might make sense. Otherwise, I rather disagree with your post. It's certainly one of the better veggie burgers that, to me, tastes quite a bit like real meat. The Beyond Burger, which is in the same niche as the Impossible Burger, actually tastes too much like meat for my mother (vegetarian for far longer than me) to enjoy. I don't think I'd confuse either of those for real meat, but it does hit a lot of the same notes which is more than I can say for any other veggie burger I have tried. A friend who really enjoys his meat tried the Impossible Burger and found it almost identical to some non-burger meat. I think it was some sort of pate from an animal I don't think many Americans usually eat. I suspect you haven't tried many of the standard grocery store veggie burgers. Like so many vegetarian and vegan products, despite their branding they are really more for making a new dish that's similar to the meat version. I think if they branded themselves more as alternatives rather than exact replacements they would be far more acceptable to people. Only recently, with products like the Imposible and Beyond Burger, have we started to see products that are really starting to push into the realm of direct replacements. I don't think it's fair to call them just average veggie burgers.

pssflops 8y ago
Morningstar Farms have such good buffalo wings that I prefer them over the real thing. Their burger patties aren't all great, but the black bean ones were impressively tasty.

adrianmonk 8y ago

Actual animal-meat burgers don't literally have blood in them. They have myoglobin, which is similar to the hemoglobin found in blood, but different. So a burger doesn't bleed, it has moisture which makes it wet and myoglobin which makes it red, but the red liquid isn't blood. Anyway, there are 3 purposes I can think of: (1) Looks. The myoglobin substitute, leghemoglobin, that they put in the Impossible Burger will make it look more like real meat, which will visually appeal to people who like meat. (2) Flavor. Myoglobin also affects flavor, so again a more realistic imitation of meat. (Incidentally, apparently myoglobin content is the main difference between dark and light meat chicken. Myoglobin stores oxygen, so muscles that get used more need to contain more of it. Since chickens walk way more than they fly, chicken breasts have little myglobin whereas chicken legs and thighs have more.) (3) Nutrition. Myoglobin contains iron. People always talk about vegetarians getting enough protein, but iron might actually be a bigger challenge. And heme iron (as found in meat's myoglobin and in Impossible's leghemoglobin) is easier to absorb than non-heme iron (as generally found in plants).

wes-k 8y ago
(4) Char. I believe the heme (maybe myoglobin, I’m not a doctor) also helps when grilling to get the char and carmelization you get with normal meat burgers.

dghughes 8y ago

Many people don't care if it's meat or vegetables as long as it looks and tastes like meat to them. So the goal could be to reduce harm to the environment by reducing the amount of animals being farmed for meat. Not necessarily get rid of all animal farming just reduce it. There is a lot of waste in the meat industry in the US and Canada. Many countries all over the world eat all the animal but in the US and Canada you never or rarely see people demanding a serving of offal, liver, kidneys, tongue, eyes, brain. If a hamburger could be made out of vegetables then I bet most people wouldn't care what it was made of.

citiguy 8y ago
I always assumed the unpopular meat parts got turned into hot dogs, sausages or something like that. Am I wrong?
- dghughes 8y ago
  I dont know but I'd say that's just people trying their best to discredit the industry. The only part that would be non-meat is the casing if it's a natural casing.