Hacker News Reader

> Asian and African cuisine are far less reliant on meat (as a percent of their diet) to bring flavor to their food. However, I rarely see vegans driving adoption for Indian/Haitian/west-african food. Instead it is the same old efforts towards mastering the vegan beef patty/sausage and vegan pizza. Guess what, India has had an amazing mc Aloo Tikki & mcVeggie in McDonald's for 20 years and they taste better than any vegan burger that is readily available. Let alone native dishes that are far more aligned with vegan ingredients.

I agree with this. It's odd when you think about it that many people expect cow, chicken, pig or cheese to be part of every meal they eat.

The alternative to meat shouldn't be Beyond burgers, it should be plants, vegetables, tofu, tempeh, setain etc. and a change in mindset about food.

> However, I rarely see vegans driving adoption for Indian/Haitian/west-african food.

I really question if you actually know any/many vegans saying this. "Meat substitutes" are far more common among people who aren't very serious about it, are only just trying to shift their diet, or are only really doing it for dubious 'health' reasons.

Any vegan I've ever known who's been vegan for more than a couple years has a diet that consists almost exclusively of meals designed around vegetables, with maybe one or two things like you're talking about as nostalgia-pleasers.

That said, "alternative milks" are not like beyond burgers. Liquids that contain fat, protein, and sugar are almost universally called milks and have been for a very long time, and are very useful in daily use and for cooking.

Just because something resembles a meat or dairy product doesn't mean it exists solely to be a placating replacement. Sometimes it's just a convenient form factor. Like, a black bean patty is nothing like a beef patty. But you eat it the same way. Oh no they're copying meat!

If by "driving adoption" you mean being the cause of a shift to these things I dunno what you really expect. Vegans are a vanishing minority of all people in terms of "western" diets, they can't drive the market to the corner store.

I agree almost exactly with everything you said, except

> Vegans are a vanishing minority of all people in terms of "western" diets, they can't drive the market to the corner store.

I think Vegans (and memes about how they tell everyone) are shifting big-city cuisine more, and they're successful in mainstreaming the idea of no-animals. Even if vegan food isnt successful, they're making the idea of not needing meat products more mainstream (and i think milk is the real success story of this).

I dunno, I think health food fad diets have done far more to move that needle than actual vegans. The idea that meat is bad to eat because it's "bad for you" is pretty distinct to me from the moral arguments most vegans are interested in. I'd honestly expect the number of people out there who use soy milk instead of normal milk because they heard "fat is bad" or "lactose is bad" alone easily outweigh even loosely defined vegans.

(likewise, vegans frequently get blamed for labour issues involved in production of superfoods like quinoa but I'm pretty sure the vast majority of people eating those are doing so with no interest at all in completely eliminating animal food sources from their own diets, let alone from the entire culture)

Anecdotally,

> I rarely see vegans driving adoption for Indian/Haitian/west-african food.

As a vegan-ish non-indian american person, i am a huge advocate for more indian food. I LOVE indian food.

But not everyone is onboard. I see the issue more to do with culture and flavor than anything. Americans want american food not indian food (at least in part). Thats why impossible burgers are more popular than Aloo burgers.

On the flip side, i see tofu appearing in all sorts of dishes, even Tofu tacos and the like. This is because tofu is less imposing. You can make tofu whatever you want (like meat), which is not as true of more flavorful alternatives from eg. india. This makes it a better "gateway" alternative". Thats why alt-milk is getting popular now - its just milk, but made differently and now better. Everyone already knows and likes Almonds and Oats, so why be nervous about the change?

Not vegan/vegetarian, but I never really understood this either. I absolutely love Indian food, vegan or not. Whereas most “western” vegan foods I see don’t look overly appealing or seem to just want to emulate meat .

> hereas most “western” vegan foods I see ... seem to just want to emulate meat .

You're looking at the wrong stuff. Most vegans don't eat that stuff its for recent converts and people who don't know how to eat. Most vegans make meals that aren't "we had meat and potatos and substituted fake meat" they're meals meant to be filling and nutritious without meat. They just use other better proteins. Silly example, but a ham sandwich vs a peanut butter sandwich. PB is way better than "ham sub" but still protein filled.

I have noticed that very few of the products launched are actual ingredients in food. They sort of are the food. With tofu, there are a gazillion ways to cook and prepare it. With these other foods there is one way, and then you serve it differently.

I have a tendency to always come back to tofu, tempeh and seitan. They are extremely versatile, and at least the first two feel "healthy". Soy mince makes me extremely full and leaves me feeling bloated all day. Sure, I eat it sometimes (it is probably the only one of the more modern products In regularly eat), but it is never my preferred food.

There are plenty of vegans who don't regularly use meat substitutes. Imo, it seems like most of them are more directed to curious meat-eaters rather than vegans.