Perhaps the meat lobby has a point? | Hacker News Reader

Perhaps the meat lobby has a point?

shkspr.mobi

19 pointsedent10 comments

I almost bought Bacon from Costco one time. At the last second I realized it wasn't bacon, it was some soy/TVP thing called bacon. I don't think it was Costco brand but I can't remember the brand. There is marketing, then there is deception, to me this was deception.

While I agree some words change meaning, like hamburgers not coming from Hamburg, it doesn't seem beneficial to anybody to change the core accepted meanings and make things more confusing. Burger = meat, veggie patty = not meat. Sausage = meat, veggie links = not meat.

While I get shaping veggie/vegan stuff to fit buns and bread, I really don't get the attempts to make it look like meat.

1) Neither vegans nor meat eaters want to be tricked. But are we to conclude that some vendors just don't care which customers they trick?

2) It wouldn't be weird, though it might be hard, to create a regulation that says, "'veggie burger' means burger made without meat". What would be hard is getting restaurants to stop acting like they have to trick customers into buying food they wouldn't voluntarily buy, like vegetarian burger == beef-based burger accompanied by vegetables, or as legend has it, mahi mahi that turns out to be dolphin fish (has gills) but people think it's the air-breathing, womb-having, mammal dolphin.

> It wouldn't be weird, though it might be hard, to create a regulation that says, "'veggie burger' means burger made without meat".

This reminds me of the time I tried to Google the difference between jam, jelly, and marmalade and wound up on the FDA website. After reading the "Requirements for Specific Standardized Fruit Butters, Jellies, Preserves, and Related Products"[1] I'm of the opinion that these sorts of regulations end up costing the government a lot of money and do absolutely nothing to clear up consumer confusion in the market.

I'd even go so far as to guess it causes more confusion. For example, I've Googled "the difference between jam, jelly, and marmalade" twice now and I still don't really know the answer.

[1] https://www.accessdata.fda.gov/scripts/cdrh/cfdocs/cfCFR/CFR...

I know you were making a point about food regulations, but in case you were actually wondering about the difference, this is what i've always known.

https://www.mrswages.com/the-difference-between-a-jelly-jam-...

>Jellies are made from fruit juice and sugar, most are cooked but there are some recipes for jellies that are refrigerated without cooking. Jellies are clear and should hold their shape yet be tender. The flavor should be a good fruit flavor with the right amount of sweetness.

>Jams are made by crushing fruit with sugar. Jams are usually thick and sweet but not as firm as jelly. Jams should be spreadable. Preserves, on the other hand, use whole small fruits or pieces of fruit in a gelled syrup. The pieces of fruit should be transparent to clear and the color should be characteristic of the fruit from which it is made.

>Conserves are a lot like jam but are made from combining fruit and sometimes raisins, nuts, and coconut.

>Marmalades are usually made of citrus fruits and contain pieces of the peel suspended in a transparent jelly.

>Fruit butter utilizes the pulp of the fruit, cooked with sugar into a thick spreadable mixture. Many fruit butters are enhanced by adding spices to them.

>Fruit honey and syrup are made when fruit juice and sugar is cooked to a thickened consistency that can be poured.

I’m of the opinion that meat should be clearly labeled as a simple percentage on the front of anything that contains it.

Imagine: 100% meat hot dogs, or 90% meat hot dogs, or 0% meat hot dogs. 0% meat pizza, 5% meat pizza, 15% meat pizza.

For bonus points, decompose the meat percentages into broad categories... red meat/beef, white meat/pork/chicken, etc.

By weight or by volume. I foresee that age old alcohol measurement thing creating that exact confusion. Vendors will choose the mbw or mbv rating by which one sounds better for each particular product.

Worse (to me) than the meat / not meat shenanigans, are the many ways in which manufactures hide artificial sweeteners in food.

Once, I had one bite (that I spat out) of a sweetened bake good at a hotel breakfast, and it gave me a mild migraine later in the day.

I don’t get migraines, but I have a family history of artificial sweetener induced migraines.

Also, friends have been prescribed medication that can cause adverse side effects when mixed with artificial sweeteners.

Clearer (and maybe standardized) labeling is needed across the food industry, especially for allergens (serious meat and soy allergies both exist, and are somewhat common).

> the many ways in which manufactures hide artificial sweeteners in food.

Likewise for soy and for msg.

I didn’t expect to agree with this post. Glad I took the time to read it, as he has a very good point.

Giving everything a unique identifiable name is tricky business.

What we need is clear and common labels. Vegitarian, Vegan and contains meat. If they all had a logo that we all go used to all the confusion is gone. At least in prepacked supermarket foods.

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