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I was brought up vegetarian, and while I gave it up when I got married and had kids, I've never really grown to love the taste of meat. The thing I'm most annoy

by thom 8y ago

I was brought up vegetarian, and while I gave it up when I got married and had kids, I've never really grown to love the taste of meat. The thing I'm most annoyed by is that nice tasting veggie dishes are often being replaced in restaurants with horrible tasting meat-substitute dishes trying to capture the taste of beef or whatever. This is probably just me against the universe though.

tdeck 8y ago
As a meat eater I fully agree. If it's going to be made of vegetables, fine. But I'm put off by foods pretending to be something they're not.
- cwbrandsma 8y ago
  One of my worst meals ever was a vegetarian Asian meal in Salt Lake City. The dish was “Chicken...” something or other. The “chicken” was tofu shaped like a chicken wing with feathers. No where on the menu did it say the place was vegetarian. I have nothing against eating tofu. I enjoy tofu. But the bait and switch ruined the meal for me.
  - greglindahl 8y ago
    These restaurants are somewhat common, and are usually run by Buddhists. I've never seen one that lacked a label; while the individual menu items might be confusing, there's usually a big clue. Here's the one near my apartment, it has vegan in the name of the restaurant: http://www.gardenfresh.us/ http://www.gardenfresh.us/
    - msteffen 8y ago
      I can't speak to the general quality of these restaurants, but I actually go to the Garden Fresh in Palo Alto pretty regularly and love it (I've heard the Mountain View location isn't quite as good).
  - breatheoften 8y ago
    Best Thai restaurant outside Thailand I’ve ever been to is called Plumeria in San Diego — it’s completely vegetarian (optional egg) with meat-like substitues. I never order chicken satay as an appetizer (even in Thailand) as I usually find it bland, the texture too dry, and generally boring — but I will always order the “chicken” satay from Plumeria ... better than meat.
  - joesb 8y ago
    So your problem is because it taste worse, and not like chicken. Your problem is not because it's made from vegetable.
- alanfalcon 8y ago
  Penn of Penn and Teller discussed on his podcast how he stopped eating meat and had a similar stance on foods pretending to be meat. Then he was compelled to try a particular meat substitute and discovered that it was actually not just trying to be meat but was actually better than meat - meat has grisle and bits you don’t really want to eat, the substitute is only “the good stuff.” Better texture, etc. It was an eye opening anecdote for me (as a meat eater).
z3t4 8y ago
I sometimes taste Raw meat to make sure its fresh. Its pretty much tasteless. Its all about how its prepared.
- david-gpu 8y ago
  You can make a brother with nothing but meat and salt and it will be flavorful. That's a big part of why making meat substitutes is so hard.
  - thom 8y ago
    This is what lifelong meat eaters experience, but I just can't comprehend. There is no meat that on its own is particularly tasty to me. Chicken, at its absolute best, tastes like a disappointing roast chestnut. What's worse is meat doesn't really marinade as well as everyone makes out, so often I'll be enjoying a dish but I keep chewing and realise I just like the sauce and then that fades and - yuck - you're left with meat. Again, this is my very narrow experience as a vegetarian who lapsed well into adulthood and just didn't learn an appreciation of the savoury flavours involved. Objectively it's clearly people love the taste of meat.
    - opportune 8y ago
      Chicken is about the worst meat to eat on its own, especially if you are baking boneless skinless chicken breasts. Dark chicken meat has actual flavor, so thighs and drumsticks are probably your best bet. If you want good meat with no extra flavoring I recommend good steak (like the $60+ steak you can get at a nice steakhouse). Pulled pork is also good, though it's usually somewhat flavored, doesn't necessarily need to be. Lamb prepared gyro style is pretty good. Pretty much any meat will taste better grilled than baked in an oven too.
      - thom 8y ago
        Again, we just have differently wired taste buds at this point, this stuff is wasted on me, and I do feel genuine sadness about it.
arawde 8y ago
I'm on the opposite side of this. I've eaten meat for the first 23 years of my life, but my current partner is vegan. A large part of our relationship has been discovering that vegetables are actually good to eat when they're not an afterthought to a meal. I go out of my way to try the meat substitutes now, because I'm holding out that one of them will actually be good enough for me to show my carnivore friends. For many years, I've wanted to try being vegetarian as a way to reduce my environmental impact. To me, meat substitutes are the last missing piece in the puzzle, the piece that shows that its possible to consume staples like hamburgers or spaghetti and meatballs. Not all of the meat substitutes are good. Not all of them have to be. But a more sustainable future, where meat (and especially seafood) are cultivated in a way that has a less harmful impact on the environment, is a future that I want to help facilitate.
- meowface 8y ago
  At risk of sparking an ethics debate, why do most people who turn vegetarian out of conscientiousness seem to very disproportionately do it for environmental reasons? I mean, on one hand, it makes complete rational sense, because it's self/species-interest: reduced meat consumption should decrease the effects of global warming and other issues, and you want a world that you and future generations of people can safely and healthily live in. I get it. But are you then still not doing it for selfish reasons, or at least species-selfish reasons? If hypothetically some new technology could suck all of the excess carbon out of the atmosphere and replant things and otherwise 100% negate all of the environmental effects of all the different kinds of meat production, would you and other vegetarians with similar motivations no longer feel any reason, or ethical obligation, to be vegetarian?
  - ENGNR 8y ago
    I do it for selfish reasons. Veggies are cheap and easy to grow and full of minerals and protein. And high fibre legumes and grains are really good for gut bacteria Not anti meat, just pro plants
  - greglindahl 8y ago
    As someone who is a "save the planet" vegetarian, I am mystified by your comment. No, I wouldn't start eating meat if there was a magic machine that sucked carbon out of the atmosphere, and I am not claiming my personal reasons for not eating meat are somehow not selfish. But most of all, that's not the only reason I'm a vegetarian. I don't think you're going to end up with a good discussion if you start it like this.
SatvikBeri 8y ago
As a meat eater, yeah, agree. My wife and I have reduced our meat consumption by ~50% over the last few years, and we've done it mostly by finding dishes that were veg*n to start with, as opposed to meat substitutes.
greglindahl 8y ago
I've met a lot of vegetarians and vegans, and they're about 50/50 as to whether they want to eat meat-like things. And yeah, there are several restaurants I stopped eating at because they replaced perfectly fine veggie dishes with things that were more meat-like.
mc32 8y ago
Some Buddhist monks are known to make plant protein taste like meat and resemble the texture of meat. These are served with regular vegetables. Anyhow, some are better than others. Of course palates are quite personal.
companyhen 8y ago
I was brought up omnivore and have been vegetarian since August 2018 and love the meat substitutes. Beyond Burgers and Field Roast sausages helped me with the transition to plant based.
loceng 8y ago
There are many industrial complexes at play that's putting a constant negative pressure on the quality of our lives, including the quality of our food and food availability.
thescriptkiddie 8y ago
+1 I'm a lifelong vegetarian who has very literal tolerance for the taste of meat. Can we give it up with these meat substitutes already? Even if they absolutely nail the taste of real meat, I don't want my food to taste like that.
- thom 8y ago
  Let me tell you as a lapsed vegetarian, the worst thing isn't even the taste - these people eat stuff that doesn't even dissolve in your mouth. The first time I had lamb, I just chewed for about five minutes before realising I was going to have to overcome my gag reflex to force this tasteless brown stuff down. I'd be horrified if we started replicating _that_.
- danans 8y ago
  > Can we give it up with these meat substitutes already? Who should give up on them? The people who like them? The manufacturers? There's clearly a market for good-tasting meat substitutes. If they serve enough peoples' wants and are nutritious while being better from an environmental perspective, why not just live and let live?
elgenie 8y ago
The target market niche for meat substitutes is very plainly not former vegetarians who don’t like the taste of meat.
- thom 8y ago
  Yes, I'm aware of this, and I realise I am just an old man shouting at a particularly niche cloud. But many restaurants are foregoing some variety in vegetarian dishes that they previously had to offer meat substitutes. I happened to quite like a lot of veggie burgers, for example, but I do not like the faux beef burgers that have replaced them in some places.
praneshp 8y ago
> that nice tasting veggie dishes are often being replaced in restaurants with horrible tasting meat-substitute dishes Ha, this is a problem my wife has started having after impossible burger became popular in the bay area. All our favorite burger joints now serve that, instead of the brilliant vegan burgers they used to have (including my workplace).
screye 8y ago
So much this. I am a meal eater with a majority vegetarian friends group, so I inevitably cook a lot of veg food. Greek, Indian, Thai and Chinese customers lend themselves really well to vegetarianism and I'm surprised that it isn't catching on in the US. (Especially Indian) Meat substitutes don't hold a candle to a single one of these for items. I've tried the current state of the art in meat substitutes ( impossible) and it's still bad.

by thom 8y ago

tdeck 8y ago

As a meat eater I fully agree. If it's going to be made of vegetables, fine. But I'm put off by foods pretending to be something they're not.

cwbrandsma 8y ago
One of my worst meals ever was a vegetarian Asian meal in Salt Lake City. The dish was “Chicken...” something or other. The “chicken” was tofu shaped like a chicken wing with feathers. No where on the menu did it say the place was vegetarian. I have nothing against eating tofu. I enjoy tofu. But the bait and switch ruined the meal for me.
- greglindahl 8y ago
  These restaurants are somewhat common, and are usually run by Buddhists. I've never seen one that lacked a label; while the individual menu items might be confusing, there's usually a big clue. Here's the one near my apartment, it has vegan in the name of the restaurant: http://www.gardenfresh.us/ http://www.gardenfresh.us/
  - msteffen 8y ago
    I can't speak to the general quality of these restaurants, but I actually go to the Garden Fresh in Palo Alto pretty regularly and love it (I've heard the Mountain View location isn't quite as good).
- breatheoften 8y ago
  Best Thai restaurant outside Thailand I’ve ever been to is called Plumeria in San Diego — it’s completely vegetarian (optional egg) with meat-like substitues. I never order chicken satay as an appetizer (even in Thailand) as I usually find it bland, the texture too dry, and generally boring — but I will always order the “chicken” satay from Plumeria ... better than meat.
- joesb 8y ago
  So your problem is because it taste worse, and not like chicken. Your problem is not because it's made from vegetable.
alanfalcon 8y ago
Penn of Penn and Teller discussed on his podcast how he stopped eating meat and had a similar stance on foods pretending to be meat. Then he was compelled to try a particular meat substitute and discovered that it was actually not just trying to be meat but was actually better than meat - meat has grisle and bits you don’t really want to eat, the substitute is only “the good stuff.” Better texture, etc. It was an eye opening anecdote for me (as a meat eater).

z3t4 8y ago

I sometimes taste Raw meat to make sure its fresh. Its pretty much tasteless. Its all about how its prepared.

david-gpu 8y ago
You can make a brother with nothing but meat and salt and it will be flavorful. That's a big part of why making meat substitutes is so hard.
- thom 8y ago
  This is what lifelong meat eaters experience, but I just can't comprehend. There is no meat that on its own is particularly tasty to me. Chicken, at its absolute best, tastes like a disappointing roast chestnut. What's worse is meat doesn't really marinade as well as everyone makes out, so often I'll be enjoying a dish but I keep chewing and realise I just like the sauce and then that fades and - yuck - you're left with meat. Again, this is my very narrow experience as a vegetarian who lapsed well into adulthood and just didn't learn an appreciation of the savoury flavours involved. Objectively it's clearly people love the taste of meat.
  - opportune 8y ago
    Chicken is about the worst meat to eat on its own, especially if you are baking boneless skinless chicken breasts. Dark chicken meat has actual flavor, so thighs and drumsticks are probably your best bet. If you want good meat with no extra flavoring I recommend good steak (like the $60+ steak you can get at a nice steakhouse). Pulled pork is also good, though it's usually somewhat flavored, doesn't necessarily need to be. Lamb prepared gyro style is pretty good. Pretty much any meat will taste better grilled than baked in an oven too.
    - thom 8y ago
      Again, we just have differently wired taste buds at this point, this stuff is wasted on me, and I do feel genuine sadness about it.

arawde 8y ago

I'm on the opposite side of this. I've eaten meat for the first 23 years of my life, but my current partner is vegan. A large part of our relationship has been discovering that vegetables are actually good to eat when they're not an afterthought to a meal. I go out of my way to try the meat substitutes now, because I'm holding out that one of them will actually be good enough for me to show my carnivore friends. For many years, I've wanted to try being vegetarian as a way to reduce my environmental impact. To me, meat substitutes are the last missing piece in the puzzle, the piece that shows that its possible to consume staples like hamburgers or spaghetti and meatballs. Not all of the meat substitutes are good. Not all of them have to be. But a more sustainable future, where meat (and especially seafood) are cultivated in a way that has a less harmful impact on the environment, is a future that I want to help facilitate.

meowface 8y ago
At risk of sparking an ethics debate, why do most people who turn vegetarian out of conscientiousness seem to very disproportionately do it for environmental reasons? I mean, on one hand, it makes complete rational sense, because it's self/species-interest: reduced meat consumption should decrease the effects of global warming and other issues, and you want a world that you and future generations of people can safely and healthily live in. I get it. But are you then still not doing it for selfish reasons, or at least species-selfish reasons? If hypothetically some new technology could suck all of the excess carbon out of the atmosphere and replant things and otherwise 100% negate all of the environmental effects of all the different kinds of meat production, would you and other vegetarians with similar motivations no longer feel any reason, or ethical obligation, to be vegetarian?
- ENGNR 8y ago
  I do it for selfish reasons. Veggies are cheap and easy to grow and full of minerals and protein. And high fibre legumes and grains are really good for gut bacteria Not anti meat, just pro plants
- greglindahl 8y ago
  As someone who is a "save the planet" vegetarian, I am mystified by your comment. No, I wouldn't start eating meat if there was a magic machine that sucked carbon out of the atmosphere, and I am not claiming my personal reasons for not eating meat are somehow not selfish. But most of all, that's not the only reason I'm a vegetarian. I don't think you're going to end up with a good discussion if you start it like this.

SatvikBeri 8y ago

As a meat eater, yeah, agree. My wife and I have reduced our meat consumption by ~50% over the last few years, and we've done it mostly by finding dishes that were veg*n to start with, as opposed to meat substitutes.

greglindahl 8y ago

I've met a lot of vegetarians and vegans, and they're about 50/50 as to whether they want to eat meat-like things. And yeah, there are several restaurants I stopped eating at because they replaced perfectly fine veggie dishes with things that were more meat-like.

mc32 8y ago

Some Buddhist monks are known to make plant protein taste like meat and resemble the texture of meat. These are served with regular vegetables. Anyhow, some are better than others. Of course palates are quite personal.

companyhen 8y ago

I was brought up omnivore and have been vegetarian since August 2018 and love the meat substitutes. Beyond Burgers and Field Roast sausages helped me with the transition to plant based.

loceng 8y ago

There are many industrial complexes at play that's putting a constant negative pressure on the quality of our lives, including the quality of our food and food availability.

thescriptkiddie 8y ago

+1 I'm a lifelong vegetarian who has very literal tolerance for the taste of meat. Can we give it up with these meat substitutes already? Even if they absolutely nail the taste of real meat, I don't want my food to taste like that.

thom 8y ago
Let me tell you as a lapsed vegetarian, the worst thing isn't even the taste - these people eat stuff that doesn't even dissolve in your mouth. The first time I had lamb, I just chewed for about five minutes before realising I was going to have to overcome my gag reflex to force this tasteless brown stuff down. I'd be horrified if we started replicating _that_.
danans 8y ago
> Can we give it up with these meat substitutes already? Who should give up on them? The people who like them? The manufacturers? There's clearly a market for good-tasting meat substitutes. If they serve enough peoples' wants and are nutritious while being better from an environmental perspective, why not just live and let live?

elgenie 8y ago

The target market niche for meat substitutes is very plainly not former vegetarians who don’t like the taste of meat.

thom 8y ago
Yes, I'm aware of this, and I realise I am just an old man shouting at a particularly niche cloud. But many restaurants are foregoing some variety in vegetarian dishes that they previously had to offer meat substitutes. I happened to quite like a lot of veggie burgers, for example, but I do not like the faux beef burgers that have replaced them in some places.

praneshp 8y ago

> that nice tasting veggie dishes are often being replaced in restaurants with horrible tasting meat-substitute dishes Ha, this is a problem my wife has started having after impossible burger became popular in the bay area. All our favorite burger joints now serve that, instead of the brilliant vegan burgers they used to have (including my workplace).

screye 8y ago

So much this. I am a meal eater with a majority vegetarian friends group, so I inevitably cook a lot of veg food. Greek, Indian, Thai and Chinese customers lend themselves really well to vegetarianism and I'm surprised that it isn't catching on in the US. (Especially Indian) Meat substitutes don't hold a candle to a single one of these for items. I've tried the current state of the art in meat substitutes ( impossible) and it's still bad.