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Can we add an "in the US" at the end? Since for EU countries this is not true. I'm living in sweden now and lived in germany and poland. Plant-based meat pro

by lampe3 4y ago

Can we add an "in the US" at the end? Since for EU countries this is not true. I'm living in sweden now and lived in germany and poland. Plant-based meat products are growing in numbers and the price of meat is going so high that its cheaper to buy the plant-based one. In Germany one producer of meat sausages want to turn 100% plant based[1]. I will not go into the whats better and not for you. Since this highly depends on not just one food category. You can eat "Vegan" and still eat unhealthy and you can eat meat and be healthy. The body is to complex on just saying is something is healthy or unhealthy on one factor. [1] https://www.ruegenwalder.de/vegetarische-und-vegane-produkte https://www.ruegenwalder.de/vegetarische-und-vegane-produkte

Semaphor 4y ago
Your link doesn't support your statement. Where does it say they want to turn 100% plant based?
- jansan 4y ago
  I have not found any news that would support that claim. They sold more vegan products in 2021 than meat products, but nowhere can I find anything that they aim at selling only vegan products.
  - onli 4y ago
    Source is https://app.handelsblatt.com/unternehmen/mittelstand/ruegenwalder-muehle-chef-godo-roeben-die-fleischlobby-will-veggie-wurst-verhindern/24528852.html https://app.handelsblatt.com/unternehmen/mittelstand/ruegenw..., a "we would if consumers choose that route".
    - Semaphor 4y ago
      > Letztlich wird das der Verbraucher entscheiden. Vorstellen können wir uns alles. which is far better translated to > In the end, the consumer will decide. We can imagine [doing] anything. Which is extremely noncommittal (and also the only thing that makes sense)
      - onli 4y ago
        No, this was extreme. When that interview came out it was completely astonishing to read that this option is in play at all for such a traditional meat processor. Other companies would have talked about their tradition and old strengths they should not give up, and said something like "we expect there to always be a market for our high quality meat products". But he opted for a different route. > (and also the only thing that makes sense) Companies die all the time because they refuse to adapt to a changing market, especially private german companies. Adapting to the market might be "the only thing that makes sense", but that is in no way the default position. Think about how much force was necessary to get german car companies to even just make alibi electric cars, even though it was completely obvious that not investigating that path would lead to their destruction in the next decade.
        Semaphor 4y ago
        > When that interview came out it was completely astonishing to read that this option is in play at all for such a traditional meat processor. The meat producer who had already been dominating the vegan refrigerators… It’s not as if their prediction of 40% for the next year came out of nowhere.
auggierose 4y ago
This is a gross misrepresentation. Ruegenwalder is not turning 100% plant based, in terms of sold products I would be surprised if they turned > 5% plant based, but I don't know the numbers there.
- yreg 4y ago
  It seems that they don't plan to "turn 100% plant based", but rather built a new factory that is 100% plant based. The ≤5% estimate is just as inaccurate though. > “Over the full year [2021], we sold for the first time more of our vegan and vegetarian products than of the classic meat products. Last year, the ratio had been fifty-fifty,” the spokesperson added, without giving detailed figures. https://www.just-food.com/news/germanys-rugenwalder-muhle-eyes-further-vegetarian-foods-expansion/ https://www.just-food.com/news/germanys-rugenwalder-muhle-ey...
  - auggierose 4y ago
    > The ≤5% estimate is just as inaccurate though. Well, render me extremely surprised! I am wondering if that is because the population as a whole goes vegan/vegetarian (which I doubt), or if they are one of the few producers offering a wide range for vegetarians, and so they get all the vegetarians as customers.
    - kuschku 4y ago
      > I am wondering if that is because the population as a whole goes vegan/vegetarian (which I doubt) The truth is actually somewhat close to that – not everyone goes vegetarian, but the vast majority of young adults are replacing some (not all) of the meat in their diet with replacement products. Rügenwalder isn't the only company seeing such growth, though. Nestlé (Garden Gourmet) and Iglo are seeing similar growth.
    - moby_click 4y ago
      The marketing director that started the meatless program said "The [meat] sausage will become the cigarette of the future". Sales were stagnating or declining. Sales in the meatless segment were low but increasing steadily and they entered that segment, convinced, that they could produce alternatives with broader appeal. For one year, they spent all their advertisment budget on the new meatless line. Initially the target group was "reducers". The first products included a lot of egg protein, so vegans were not targeted at all. Somewhat surprisingly, they decided to launch the new line under their well-known and established brand. That probably prevented some marketing claims that may have been off-puting to their existing customers.
brnt 4y ago
Sausages always seemed such obvious candidates. Many nondry sausages are already often a majority nonmeat. They get their flavor already from plant derived flavorants. Yet mostly fake meat products are burger and chicken nugget replacements. I've got to say, the fake chicken schnitzels are the first one that I really can't distinguish from the real chicken schnitzel. (Before the purists pour in, yes, compared to supermarket chicken schnitzel, which moreover isn't a real schnitzel anyway.)
- manojlds 4y ago
  Here in the UK, there's a lot of vegan sausages. The others like vegan / vegetarian burgers and such are relatively less common.
  - petepete 4y ago
    Vegan Richmond are among the best, better than their (somewhat) meaty alternatives in my opinion.
    - TheOtherHobbes 4y ago
      Richmond are amazing. Lidl also have a range of various vegan options including pizza (surprisingly good), lasagne, and burgers. Quorn has been ubiquitous in stores for decades now. I've never been a fan, but it will do at a push. The problem elsewhere is insane pricing. I've had a lot of "I'm not paying that!" experiences looking at the veg/vegan options in supermarkets. The prices are completely out of reach for most shoppers. If there's been a "flop", that will have been a big factor.
- trompetenaccoun 4y ago
  What brand do you mean? I've never tried a vegan schnitzel I think but all the nuggets and such I tried didn't taste good to me. And yeah, you're absolutely right that it makes sense to start with sausages/cold cuts because they're easier to imitate. Depending on where you live, there is a lot of choice now and they've gotten really good. I also had vegan cheese the other day that I'd assumed was real cheese until I found out. The next step will be cultured meat (precision fermentation and similar methods). If you're in Singapore or Israel you can already try it in restaurants.
kris_wayton 4y ago
The numbers I can find do suggest high percentage growth in Europe, but growth on numbers that are small compared to the US. Something like ~$7B in sales in plant based meat in the US, and ~$3B in sales for Europe. So maybe a bit early to judge? Meaning, maybe there's a similar plateau for EU, but it hasn't gotten there yet?
- pastage 4y ago
  Those numbers tracks with GDP per capita of the US and EU. I'm guessing it is going to be different if you look at certain segments of the market. Also in this case you probably need to look at tonnage per capita. You might also be right that it is too early to say, comments here can be up to a year ahead of statistics.
  - pclmulqdq 4y ago
    You should look at gdp, not per-capital gdp, for a comparison of markets. Europe and the US aren't far apart. I'm assuming the slower uptake in Europe is because of stricter food labeling laws and the fact that most of these companies are US-centric.
    - pastage 4y ago
      There is no lack of European veggie food companies, I do not see labeling as a problem, do you know of some actual problems with that? I do think the variance between markets is just too high for me as an European to supply anecdotal evidence.
tduberne 4y ago
I wanted to say the same thing. Here i Germany the choice of vegan sausage and cold cuts is huge, even in small grocery shops. I know lot of people who eat meat regularly _and_ buy the vegan alternatives on a regular basis.
- hef19898 4y ago
  Which totally puzzles me. Nothing wrong with a vegetarian diet, but would I prefer processed food, vegan or otherwise, over unprocessed one?
  - stuaxo 4y ago
    People like variety. Also, people may still like eating meat, but want to eat less of it - not for health reasons, but for the environment and to kill less animals.
  - abcc8 4y ago
    I would prefer unprocessed food as well but it sounds like cost is a major driver in this case.
  - Felmo 4y ago
    Vegan chicken nuggets are similar easy food than processing vegetables yourself. For me, I love meat, makes it easier to buy the 'better' processed food having this option. If your supermarket doesn't have a vegi option than I can't buy it, try it etc.
  - audunw 4y ago
    I think the whole "processed" vs "unprocessed" food label is too imprecise to say anything about whether it's healthy or not. I don't think there's anything that implies that processed foods have to be unhealthy. It's just that most processed food tend to be less healthy.
    - thiht 4y ago
      > I don't think there's anything that implies that processed foods have to be unhealthy Honestly it's just a good rule of thumb to use. Even if it's not 100% true, you're better off acting like it's 100% true in the end.
rob74 4y ago
I'm from Germany, and I can confirm that the number of vegan alternatives to any imaginable animal product have increased sharply both in quantity and quality over the last years, to the point that you can get good vegan alternatives at discount supermarkets now. Even in the US, I wonder if what Bloomberg is calling a "flop" is a real flop or just some companies falling short of their over-ambitious forecasts (or the even more ambitious goals of their investors/stockholders)? But I'm not really qualified to talk about the situation in US supermarkets...
- myspy 4y ago
  Aldi has a great chicken replacement and the meatballs packaged with a pack of ketchup are excellent. I would wish for them to be available in a larger version without the ketchup. Another problem I have with all of this is the plastic packaging for everything. Getting something like that at a veggie butcher would be cool.
  - giantg2 4y ago
    "Getting something like that at a veggie butcher would be cool." Wouldn't it just be shipped in plastic and repacked in plastic?
    - myspy 4y ago
      They could ship a lot of them in less plastic to a vendor where you could get them in a paper bag.
      - giantg2 4y ago
        How does that work if they use fake blood?
  - whazor 4y ago
    In a podcast I heard that The Vegetarian Butcher initially had experimental biological degradable packaging, but after buying hundreds of thousands they all went bad, and had to be thrown out. Now they use plastic packaging and they only try to solve one problem at a time.
taylorius 4y ago
It's a bit of a flop in the UK too tbh. It's been pushed fairly hard, but not that much uptake.
- Oxidation 4y ago
  I've avoided it because of the push. A tech-adjacent company that's pushing a "disruption" that hard makes me very suspicious. In principle I'm all for it ethically, and it's probably no "worse" then any other ready meal/processed food à la Unilever that I sometimes eat. But I'd rather just eat tofu (which I do very much like anyway) than whatever some "founder" is pushing on me so he can get another funding round in.
- OJFord 4y ago
  It's a flop for me because of the 'plant-based' marketing. I make my own burgers with jackfruit or chickpeas and things quite often, but I call them what they are, not 'plant-based', which is about as appetising to me as 'meat-based'. (What's the meat?! Surprise mix of whatever was going cheapest plus horse?).
  - A4ET8a8uTh0 4y ago
    The whole thing is reminiscent of Simpsons marketing joke: "It has over 60 ingredients!"
- Nursie 4y ago
  https://www.statista.com/outlook/cmo/food/meat/meat-substitutes/united-kingdom https://www.statista.com/outlook/cmo/food/meat/meat-substitu... The size of the meat-substitute market in the UK appears to have grown steadily to about 1.5 billion quid. With the UK beef products market hitting around 4.4 billion quid, I'd say that's pretty sizeable.
- onion2k 4y ago
  You must live in a very different part of the UK to me then. Every supermarket has extensive plant-based options, Greggs has been expanding their vegan range, McDonalds has the McPlant on the menu permanently now..
unity1001 4y ago
I second this. Where I am in Europe, plant based 'meat products' are growing in number and variety, and their prices are falling. Their taste is as good as or better than meat, and actually they constitute pretty well fleshed out, tasty dishes in themselves. Especially when old housewives start buying a product, you know that it has succeeded in the taste department. This brand seems to be the one that is pretty successful where Im at (a Mediterranean country), and you know that Mediterranean cuisine is quite tasty and housewives are very picky. This brand is able to replicate Mediterranean taste in all its meat products. https://heurafoods.com/ https://heurafoods.com/ These two ones are its particular hits: https://heurafoods.com/es/productos/burgers-epices https://heurafoods.com/es/productos/burgers-epices https://heurafoods.com/es/productos/bocados-mediterraneos https://heurafoods.com/es/productos/bocados-mediterraneos
the_mitsuhiko 4y ago
There is definitely more and more meat alternatives in the stores now. One other curious development are these blended meats like 50% meat, 50% mushrooms or 50% meat and 50% plant.
- scythe 4y ago
  Taco Bell has been selling this as "seasoned beef" for quite a while now.
  - onlyrealcuzzo 4y ago
    McDonald's has been selling it as "McNuggets" for ages. The nugget is 100% chicken breast - but that's only ~55% of what you're eating - and only about ~23% of the calories.
scythe 4y ago
>and the price of meat is going so high Sounds like a contributing factor. But this isn't a normal situation; there's a war going on, and before that there was a huge disruption to global trade due to COVID-19. These aren't the sort of conditions that anyone wants to see continue indefinitely. "Plant-based meat" already existed before 2015. Then Impossible Burger came up with synthetic heme and thought it would be a game-changer. Long story short, it raised a few eyebrows, but it didn't produce the desired uptake. I might be missing something, but aside from that, I don't know what the core innovation is supposed to be in the recent products, aside from a big PR push and an economic crisis.
nxpnsv 4y ago
Similar in Austria, veg products are increasing in quality and availability. There is even a 100% vegan burger king...
- AstralStorm 4y ago
  It actually is not, they use standard mayo.
Maken 4y ago
I am not so sure about that. In Spain we have also seen a remarkable increase of vegan offerings, with even the smaller supermarkets having a good selection of vegan food and vegan precooked dishes. However, I have barely seen anybody ever buying those. So, I can't tell if that increment in supply is a response to an increment in demand by the consumers, or those companies are burning money fast hoping for a market to appear.
InCityDreams 4y ago
*upvotes in European * Fucking hell, i was eating vegan sausages 30 years in the uk...
FranzFerdiNaN 4y ago
Yep, i've almost completely stopped eating meat because the vegan and vegetarian replacements are so good.
robjan 4y ago
Same in Hong Kong. Recently Impossible, Beyond and (our local equivalent) OmniFoods have been introduced to almost all restaurant menus. It's died down a bit, but still quite popular. And this is the place with the highest meat consumption per capita in the world.
- bwv848 4y ago
  Interesting! Can you order faux meat for claypot rice?
- vgatherps 4y ago
  I live in Hong Kong and can only remember one time I saw a fake meat on a restaurant menu, and it was at an extremely western health-focused restaurant of a large gym chain (nood food). It's definitely not "almost all" restaurant menus.
  - robjan 4y ago
    I think it depends on the restaurant, I'm definitely not the kind of person who goes to nood food, Mana or the other upper-middle class restaurants where plant based is in their branding. We have restaurants which are quick, cheap eats (Cha Chaan Tengs and other fast food) and restaurants where you can sit down an talk for a bit. The latter is what I am referring to. Saying that, even CCT chains like Cafe de Coral and MX are starting to introduce these options and these lower end restaurants are the companies that OmniFoods have been targeting with their partnerships. They are also on the permanent menus of McCafe and KFC these days. I've also noticed that Park n Shop and Wellcome now have dedicated plant based option freezers.
dfxm12 4y ago
I live in the US and I know it's a big country, so I can only speak for my little slice of the country, but we've always had vegetarian & vegan options at our restaurants, and only recently has plant based meat entered into the picture. Lots of food brought to the US from other places, like Mexico, China, India, Italy, etc. is already vegetarian or vegan, so we don't need to have fake sausage on a restaurant menu when we can have huitlacoche quesadillas, sesame noodles, chana masala, tomato pie, or vegetarian variations of other dishes.
- orf 4y ago
  Mostly the same for Europe. Varies by country but lots of dishes don’t rely on meat. But you’re missing the point. The bulk of American sausages sold are fake as hell. If I’m eating fake meat, why not actually eat fake meat
  - dfxm12 4y ago
    But you’re missing the point. The bulk of American sausages sold are fake as hell. If I’m eating fake meat, why not actually eat fake meat No one is making this point, lol. If you want to try to bash America for no reason in particular, at least wait for it to be on topic.
    - orf 4y ago
      > so we don't need to have fake sausage on a restaurant menu The point is you already do have “fake sausage on the restaurant menu”.
  - LBJsPNS 4y ago
    "The bulk of American sausages sold are fake as hell" What in the world are you talking about?
    - orf 4y ago
      I’m talking about how the bulk of American sausages would be classed as “fake as hell”? It’s in the comment you read, replied to and quoted.
bawolff 4y ago
In the us, "plant based meat" refers to a specific type of fake meat product (impossible burger and friends), not all meat substitutes.
drakonka 4y ago
I'm also in Sweden and agree. There are so many great plant-based alternatives everywhere now, and I'm constantly seeing new products and varieties on the shelves. I've found excellent alternatives for everything except whole eggs.

by lampe3 4y ago

Semaphor 4y ago

Your link doesn't support your statement. Where does it say they want to turn 100% plant based?

jansan 4y ago
I have not found any news that would support that claim. They sold more vegan products in 2021 than meat products, but nowhere can I find anything that they aim at selling only vegan products.
- onli 4y ago
  Source is https://app.handelsblatt.com/unternehmen/mittelstand/ruegenwalder-muehle-chef-godo-roeben-die-fleischlobby-will-veggie-wurst-verhindern/24528852.html https://app.handelsblatt.com/unternehmen/mittelstand/ruegenw..., a "we would if consumers choose that route".
  - Semaphor 4y ago
    > Letztlich wird das der Verbraucher entscheiden. Vorstellen können wir uns alles. which is far better translated to > In the end, the consumer will decide. We can imagine [doing] anything. Which is extremely noncommittal (and also the only thing that makes sense)
    - onli 4y ago
      No, this was extreme. When that interview came out it was completely astonishing to read that this option is in play at all for such a traditional meat processor. Other companies would have talked about their tradition and old strengths they should not give up, and said something like "we expect there to always be a market for our high quality meat products". But he opted for a different route. > (and also the only thing that makes sense) Companies die all the time because they refuse to adapt to a changing market, especially private german companies. Adapting to the market might be "the only thing that makes sense", but that is in no way the default position. Think about how much force was necessary to get german car companies to even just make alibi electric cars, even though it was completely obvious that not investigating that path would lead to their destruction in the next decade.
      - Semaphor 4y ago
        > When that interview came out it was completely astonishing to read that this option is in play at all for such a traditional meat processor. The meat producer who had already been dominating the vegan refrigerators… It’s not as if their prediction of 40% for the next year came out of nowhere.

auggierose 4y ago

This is a gross misrepresentation. Ruegenwalder is not turning 100% plant based, in terms of sold products I would be surprised if they turned > 5% plant based, but I don't know the numbers there.

yreg 4y ago
It seems that they don't plan to "turn 100% plant based", but rather built a new factory that is 100% plant based. The ≤5% estimate is just as inaccurate though. > “Over the full year [2021], we sold for the first time more of our vegan and vegetarian products than of the classic meat products. Last year, the ratio had been fifty-fifty,” the spokesperson added, without giving detailed figures. https://www.just-food.com/news/germanys-rugenwalder-muhle-eyes-further-vegetarian-foods-expansion/ https://www.just-food.com/news/germanys-rugenwalder-muhle-ey...
- auggierose 4y ago
  > The ≤5% estimate is just as inaccurate though. Well, render me extremely surprised! I am wondering if that is because the population as a whole goes vegan/vegetarian (which I doubt), or if they are one of the few producers offering a wide range for vegetarians, and so they get all the vegetarians as customers.
  - kuschku 4y ago
    > I am wondering if that is because the population as a whole goes vegan/vegetarian (which I doubt) The truth is actually somewhat close to that – not everyone goes vegetarian, but the vast majority of young adults are replacing some (not all) of the meat in their diet with replacement products. Rügenwalder isn't the only company seeing such growth, though. Nestlé (Garden Gourmet) and Iglo are seeing similar growth.
  - moby_click 4y ago
    The marketing director that started the meatless program said "The [meat] sausage will become the cigarette of the future". Sales were stagnating or declining. Sales in the meatless segment were low but increasing steadily and they entered that segment, convinced, that they could produce alternatives with broader appeal. For one year, they spent all their advertisment budget on the new meatless line. Initially the target group was "reducers". The first products included a lot of egg protein, so vegans were not targeted at all. Somewhat surprisingly, they decided to launch the new line under their well-known and established brand. That probably prevented some marketing claims that may have been off-puting to their existing customers.

brnt 4y ago

Sausages always seemed such obvious candidates. Many nondry sausages are already often a majority nonmeat. They get their flavor already from plant derived flavorants. Yet mostly fake meat products are burger and chicken nugget replacements. I've got to say, the fake chicken schnitzels are the first one that I really can't distinguish from the real chicken schnitzel. (Before the purists pour in, yes, compared to supermarket chicken schnitzel, which moreover isn't a real schnitzel anyway.)

manojlds 4y ago
Here in the UK, there's a lot of vegan sausages. The others like vegan / vegetarian burgers and such are relatively less common.
- petepete 4y ago
  Vegan Richmond are among the best, better than their (somewhat) meaty alternatives in my opinion.
  - TheOtherHobbes 4y ago
    Richmond are amazing. Lidl also have a range of various vegan options including pizza (surprisingly good), lasagne, and burgers. Quorn has been ubiquitous in stores for decades now. I've never been a fan, but it will do at a push. The problem elsewhere is insane pricing. I've had a lot of "I'm not paying that!" experiences looking at the veg/vegan options in supermarkets. The prices are completely out of reach for most shoppers. If there's been a "flop", that will have been a big factor.
trompetenaccoun 4y ago
What brand do you mean? I've never tried a vegan schnitzel I think but all the nuggets and such I tried didn't taste good to me. And yeah, you're absolutely right that it makes sense to start with sausages/cold cuts because they're easier to imitate. Depending on where you live, there is a lot of choice now and they've gotten really good. I also had vegan cheese the other day that I'd assumed was real cheese until I found out. The next step will be cultured meat (precision fermentation and similar methods). If you're in Singapore or Israel you can already try it in restaurants.

kris_wayton 4y ago

The numbers I can find do suggest high percentage growth in Europe, but growth on numbers that are small compared to the US. Something like ~$7B in sales in plant based meat in the US, and ~$3B in sales for Europe. So maybe a bit early to judge? Meaning, maybe there's a similar plateau for EU, but it hasn't gotten there yet?

pastage 4y ago
Those numbers tracks with GDP per capita of the US and EU. I'm guessing it is going to be different if you look at certain segments of the market. Also in this case you probably need to look at tonnage per capita. You might also be right that it is too early to say, comments here can be up to a year ahead of statistics.
- pclmulqdq 4y ago
  You should look at gdp, not per-capital gdp, for a comparison of markets. Europe and the US aren't far apart. I'm assuming the slower uptake in Europe is because of stricter food labeling laws and the fact that most of these companies are US-centric.
  - pastage 4y ago
    There is no lack of European veggie food companies, I do not see labeling as a problem, do you know of some actual problems with that? I do think the variance between markets is just too high for me as an European to supply anecdotal evidence.

tduberne 4y ago

I wanted to say the same thing. Here i Germany the choice of vegan sausage and cold cuts is huge, even in small grocery shops. I know lot of people who eat meat regularly _and_ buy the vegan alternatives on a regular basis.

hef19898 4y ago
Which totally puzzles me. Nothing wrong with a vegetarian diet, but would I prefer processed food, vegan or otherwise, over unprocessed one?
- stuaxo 4y ago
  People like variety. Also, people may still like eating meat, but want to eat less of it - not for health reasons, but for the environment and to kill less animals.
- abcc8 4y ago
  I would prefer unprocessed food as well but it sounds like cost is a major driver in this case.
- Felmo 4y ago
  Vegan chicken nuggets are similar easy food than processing vegetables yourself. For me, I love meat, makes it easier to buy the 'better' processed food having this option. If your supermarket doesn't have a vegi option than I can't buy it, try it etc.
- audunw 4y ago
  I think the whole "processed" vs "unprocessed" food label is too imprecise to say anything about whether it's healthy or not. I don't think there's anything that implies that processed foods have to be unhealthy. It's just that most processed food tend to be less healthy.
  - thiht 4y ago
    > I don't think there's anything that implies that processed foods have to be unhealthy Honestly it's just a good rule of thumb to use. Even if it's not 100% true, you're better off acting like it's 100% true in the end.

rob74 4y ago

I'm from Germany, and I can confirm that the number of vegan alternatives to any imaginable animal product have increased sharply both in quantity and quality over the last years, to the point that you can get good vegan alternatives at discount supermarkets now. Even in the US, I wonder if what Bloomberg is calling a "flop" is a real flop or just some companies falling short of their over-ambitious forecasts (or the even more ambitious goals of their investors/stockholders)? But I'm not really qualified to talk about the situation in US supermarkets...

myspy 4y ago
Aldi has a great chicken replacement and the meatballs packaged with a pack of ketchup are excellent. I would wish for them to be available in a larger version without the ketchup. Another problem I have with all of this is the plastic packaging for everything. Getting something like that at a veggie butcher would be cool.
- giantg2 4y ago
  "Getting something like that at a veggie butcher would be cool." Wouldn't it just be shipped in plastic and repacked in plastic?
  - myspy 4y ago
    They could ship a lot of them in less plastic to a vendor where you could get them in a paper bag.
    - giantg2 4y ago
      How does that work if they use fake blood?
- whazor 4y ago
  In a podcast I heard that The Vegetarian Butcher initially had experimental biological degradable packaging, but after buying hundreds of thousands they all went bad, and had to be thrown out. Now they use plastic packaging and they only try to solve one problem at a time.

taylorius 4y ago

It's a bit of a flop in the UK too tbh. It's been pushed fairly hard, but not that much uptake.

Oxidation 4y ago
I've avoided it because of the push. A tech-adjacent company that's pushing a "disruption" that hard makes me very suspicious. In principle I'm all for it ethically, and it's probably no "worse" then any other ready meal/processed food à la Unilever that I sometimes eat. But I'd rather just eat tofu (which I do very much like anyway) than whatever some "founder" is pushing on me so he can get another funding round in.
OJFord 4y ago
It's a flop for me because of the 'plant-based' marketing. I make my own burgers with jackfruit or chickpeas and things quite often, but I call them what they are, not 'plant-based', which is about as appetising to me as 'meat-based'. (What's the meat?! Surprise mix of whatever was going cheapest plus horse?).
- A4ET8a8uTh0 4y ago
  The whole thing is reminiscent of Simpsons marketing joke: "It has over 60 ingredients!"
Nursie 4y ago
https://www.statista.com/outlook/cmo/food/meat/meat-substitutes/united-kingdom https://www.statista.com/outlook/cmo/food/meat/meat-substitu... The size of the meat-substitute market in the UK appears to have grown steadily to about 1.5 billion quid. With the UK beef products market hitting around 4.4 billion quid, I'd say that's pretty sizeable.
onion2k 4y ago
You must live in a very different part of the UK to me then. Every supermarket has extensive plant-based options, Greggs has been expanding their vegan range, McDonalds has the McPlant on the menu permanently now..

unity1001 4y ago

I second this. Where I am in Europe, plant based 'meat products' are growing in number and variety, and their prices are falling. Their taste is as good as or better than meat, and actually they constitute pretty well fleshed out, tasty dishes in themselves. Especially when old housewives start buying a product, you know that it has succeeded in the taste department. This brand seems to be the one that is pretty successful where Im at (a Mediterranean country), and you know that Mediterranean cuisine is quite tasty and housewives are very picky. This brand is able to replicate Mediterranean taste in all its meat products. https://heurafoods.com/ https://heurafoods.com/ These two ones are its particular hits: https://heurafoods.com/es/productos/burgers-epices https://heurafoods.com/es/productos/burgers-epices https://heurafoods.com/es/productos/bocados-mediterraneos https://heurafoods.com/es/productos/bocados-mediterraneos

the_mitsuhiko 4y ago

There is definitely more and more meat alternatives in the stores now. One other curious development are these blended meats like 50% meat, 50% mushrooms or 50% meat and 50% plant.

scythe 4y ago
Taco Bell has been selling this as "seasoned beef" for quite a while now.
- onlyrealcuzzo 4y ago
  McDonald's has been selling it as "McNuggets" for ages. The nugget is 100% chicken breast - but that's only ~55% of what you're eating - and only about ~23% of the calories.

scythe 4y ago

>and the price of meat is going so high Sounds like a contributing factor. But this isn't a normal situation; there's a war going on, and before that there was a huge disruption to global trade due to COVID-19. These aren't the sort of conditions that anyone wants to see continue indefinitely. "Plant-based meat" already existed before 2015. Then Impossible Burger came up with synthetic heme and thought it would be a game-changer. Long story short, it raised a few eyebrows, but it didn't produce the desired uptake. I might be missing something, but aside from that, I don't know what the core innovation is supposed to be in the recent products, aside from a big PR push and an economic crisis.

nxpnsv 4y ago

Similar in Austria, veg products are increasing in quality and availability. There is even a 100% vegan burger king...

AstralStorm 4y ago
It actually is not, they use standard mayo.

Maken 4y ago

I am not so sure about that. In Spain we have also seen a remarkable increase of vegan offerings, with even the smaller supermarkets having a good selection of vegan food and vegan precooked dishes. However, I have barely seen anybody ever buying those. So, I can't tell if that increment in supply is a response to an increment in demand by the consumers, or those companies are burning money fast hoping for a market to appear.

InCityDreams 4y ago

*upvotes in European * Fucking hell, i was eating vegan sausages 30 years in the uk...

FranzFerdiNaN 4y ago

Yep, i've almost completely stopped eating meat because the vegan and vegetarian replacements are so good.

robjan 4y ago

Same in Hong Kong. Recently Impossible, Beyond and (our local equivalent) OmniFoods have been introduced to almost all restaurant menus. It's died down a bit, but still quite popular. And this is the place with the highest meat consumption per capita in the world.

bwv848 4y ago
Interesting! Can you order faux meat for claypot rice?
vgatherps 4y ago
I live in Hong Kong and can only remember one time I saw a fake meat on a restaurant menu, and it was at an extremely western health-focused restaurant of a large gym chain (nood food). It's definitely not "almost all" restaurant menus.
- robjan 4y ago
  I think it depends on the restaurant, I'm definitely not the kind of person who goes to nood food, Mana or the other upper-middle class restaurants where plant based is in their branding. We have restaurants which are quick, cheap eats (Cha Chaan Tengs and other fast food) and restaurants where you can sit down an talk for a bit. The latter is what I am referring to. Saying that, even CCT chains like Cafe de Coral and MX are starting to introduce these options and these lower end restaurants are the companies that OmniFoods have been targeting with their partnerships. They are also on the permanent menus of McCafe and KFC these days. I've also noticed that Park n Shop and Wellcome now have dedicated plant based option freezers.

dfxm12 4y ago

I live in the US and I know it's a big country, so I can only speak for my little slice of the country, but we've always had vegetarian & vegan options at our restaurants, and only recently has plant based meat entered into the picture. Lots of food brought to the US from other places, like Mexico, China, India, Italy, etc. is already vegetarian or vegan, so we don't need to have fake sausage on a restaurant menu when we can have huitlacoche quesadillas, sesame noodles, chana masala, tomato pie, or vegetarian variations of other dishes.

orf 4y ago
Mostly the same for Europe. Varies by country but lots of dishes don’t rely on meat. But you’re missing the point. The bulk of American sausages sold are fake as hell. If I’m eating fake meat, why not actually eat fake meat
- dfxm12 4y ago
  But you’re missing the point. The bulk of American sausages sold are fake as hell. If I’m eating fake meat, why not actually eat fake meat No one is making this point, lol. If you want to try to bash America for no reason in particular, at least wait for it to be on topic.
  - orf 4y ago
    > so we don't need to have fake sausage on a restaurant menu The point is you already do have “fake sausage on the restaurant menu”.
- LBJsPNS 4y ago
  "The bulk of American sausages sold are fake as hell" What in the world are you talking about?
  - orf 4y ago
    I’m talking about how the bulk of American sausages would be classed as “fake as hell”? It’s in the comment you read, replied to and quoted.

bawolff 4y ago

In the us, "plant based meat" refers to a specific type of fake meat product (impossible burger and friends), not all meat substitutes.

drakonka 4y ago

I'm also in Sweden and agree. There are so many great plant-based alternatives everywhere now, and I'm constantly seeing new products and varieties on the shelves. I've found excellent alternatives for everything except whole eggs.