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Comment by bjoli | Hacker News Reader

I can't access the article, but I'll mention something else. One year ago I met a guy who was working with trying to make bacteria produce caseine and whey. He had some experience making cheese and said that the proteins found in milk are really the secret behind making cheese taste and feel like cheese.

The goal was to just have bacteria, feed them molasses (which is cheap and easy to come by) and get raw milk protein as a result. Much more efficient than actually going through a cow.

"I would love to say that products in stores is only 2 years away, but let's say 5 to be on the safe side".

Milk is substitutable. You loose the taste for it in a year or so. Cheese? I have tried many vegan cheeses. They all suck.

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> Milk is substitutable. You loose the taste for it in a year or so. Cheese? I have tried many vegan cheeses. They all suck.

I think there's also a marketing issue with these things. This reminds of two anecdotes.

A few months ago, I got curious and tried one of those "alternative milks". As "milk", they all tasted terribly. Some tried to mimic the taste more than others. Some had tons of seed oils, which, I've heard, aren't all that great for the body. But one of these, I actually liked. It didn't really taste like milk, and it had next to nothing aside from oats and water.

A few years ago, I was out at a bar in Paris and caught a discussion between three people, one French, one Italian and one Wisconsinite. The subject was the cheese brought from the US. And the part that stuck with me was along the lines of: "This doesn't taste like Parmigiano at all. / But it's still very, very good cheese. / I think you'd have much more success selling it as its own name".

My point is that maybe instead of trying to recreate "vegan steaks" or "vegan cheese" or whatever, call it something new and let it stand on its own. It will probably never be the same as "the real thing", and that's OK. Even better if it can forego all those weird, highly processed ingredients needed to try to give it a semblance of texture, etc.

I noticed this with turkey bacon. It's a poor substitute for pig bacon, but it's pretty good as its own thing.

I think it is good that they exist, because sometimes you want something that is similar to food you had growing up. A staple food when I grow up was milk-boiled macaroni with a special kind of sausage (falukorv) and ketchup. I have been able to make it for my kids, and I really like to present at least a small part of my culinary heritage. And sometimes I just want a friggin burger. Which I can get almost everywhere by now, and it is greasy and savoury in all the right ways.

But in general I do think there are great products out there already. In the last years in Sweden tempeh started becoming available, and more brands of tofu (especially smoked varieties) started showing up in the groceries.

People have been eating those for hundreds or thousands of years, and they are amazingly versatile products. I have come to the realization that I don't need new products. I just need to discover the ones that are already available.

This page seems to have the entire article

https://rightsandwrongs.co.uk/28357-2/

> Milk is substitutable. You loose the taste for it in a year or so. Cheese? I have tried many vegan cheeses. They all suck.

I've been trying to make more environmentally conscious food choices: pretty much cut out meat, I didn't drink milk in the first place, but cheese... cheese is my nemesis.

Living in Switzerland cheese is the main reason I don't know anyone here who has been actually vegan for more than a year or so.

This company is working on producing casein in genetically modified soy: https://www.nobellfoods.com/

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