Comment by Emma_Goldman | Hacker News Reader

Comment by Emma_Goldman | Hacker News Reader

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How far is that from pre-existing products, like Quorn[1], which here in the UK is probably the main producer of vegan/vegetarian meat simulacra? The problem is that people don't like eating straight fungus, and so it is serially transformed through elaborate processing, to create meat-like products. Which it turns out are extremely unhealthy.

I think you are on more promising ground in your final remark. There are plenty of whole food plant-based sources of protein that are tested, economical and low-carbon, while possessing none of the health drawbacks of 'high tech' alternatives.

[1] https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Quorn

It should be pointed out that most Quorn products aren't vegan. They use eggs as a binding agent.

> people don't like eating straight fungus

What do you mean? People love eating all kinds of mushrooms!

100g at 2.3g carbs, 1.7g fat, and 13g protein? What's extremely unhealthy about that?

Food, and therefore nutrition, is significantly more complicated than a ledger of macronutrients. In this particular case, I was getting at this:

https://www.bmj.com/content/384/bmj-2023-077310

> Ultra-processed foods, as defined using the Nova food classification system, encompass a broad range of ready to eat products, including packaged snacks, carbonated soft drinks, instant noodles, and ready-made meals.

I'm not seeing the relevance.

Quorn and other meat substitutes most certainly fit the criteria of ultra-processed foods, and as such may be implicated in poor health outcomes if they make up a significant portion of one's diet.

We can do better than "it's processed so it's bad".

The SWAP-MEAT trial concluded that processed alt-meat products improved health markers over animal meat: https://pubmed.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/32780794/

> Among generally healthy adults, contrasting Plant with Animal intake, while keeping all other dietary components similar, the Plant products improved several cardiovascular disease risk factors, including TMAO; there were no adverse effects on risk factors from the Plant products.

The list of illustrative examples may be misleading you. It is a wide category. Look at the Nova classification, then look at the ingredients list of meat substitutes. There is no debate on this point.

See also:

https://www.theguardian.com/lifeandstyle/2018/feb/12/quorn-r...

Are there other macronutrients in that much mass of food?

30g of Hemp Hearts (shelled hemp seeds) have 10g protein, 12g polyunsaturated fats (Omega 3 and 6), 1g sugar, and a bunch of other vitamins and minerals; but some brands have 2.3g Manganese (which 100% RDI) and Manganese toxicity occurs beyond 11mg (UL) and other brands don't have those nutrients listed on the nutrition facts label for their similar product: https://images.app.goo.gl/a2v9imfaWWyG5hSn8

Flax has a better Omega 6:3 PUFA polyunsaturated fats ratio, but only 2g protein out of 11g.

Manganese and MSG both have something to do with Glutamate, which apparently affects motivation; https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=35885204 :

>> High glutamine-to-glutamate ratio predicts the ability to sustain motivation: The researchers found that individuals with a higher glutamine-to-glutamate ratio had a higher success rate and a lower perception of effort.

That is interesting about the manganese and glutamate-to-glutamine angle, although it's worth noting that manganese in foods has very poor bioavailability:

Humans absorb only about 1% to 5% of dietary manganese. Infants and children tend to absorb greater amounts of manganese than adults. In addition, manganese absorption efficiency increases with low manganese intakes and decreases with higher intakes

https://ods.od.nih.gov/factsheets/Manganese-HealthProfession...

Another interesting tidbit from the links you provide, 90% of glutamine synthesis happens in muscle cells (from glutamate and ammonia). So in theory, building more muscle mass (while getting adequate dietary glutamine and glutamate) be beneficial for regulating glutamine-to-glutamate ratios. Although it doesn't look like this has been studied specifically as of yet.

On the other hand, over-training and extreme endurance training without proper protein intake leads to depletion of circulating glutamine levels. It is suggested that depleted glutamine may be the cause of increased risks of infection and chronic fatigue during periods of over-training (even in elite athletes).

https://pubmed.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/9562160/

TIL there are vegan sources of MSG, and that peas, tomatoes, and processed meats have high amounts of glutamate: https://www.webmd.com/diet/high-glutamate-foods

Muscles burn Lactic Acid before they burn glucose.

FWIU LAB Lactic Acid Bacteria use Glutamate to control pH by GABA production.

And GABA, well https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/%CE%93-Aminobutyric_acid :

> [GABA] is the chief inhibitory neurotransmitter in the developmentally mature mammalian central nervous system. Its principal role is reducing neuronal excitability throughout the nervous system.

So, IIUC, when you feed LAB glutamate, you get GABA?

> Are there other macronutrients in that much mass of food?

By convention, those three are the macronutrients. Dietary fibre is sometimes included, 100g of quorn mince has 7.5 g.

The Wiki article has a detailed breakdown of the protein fraction by amino acid, but only breaks fats out into 'saturated' and 'not', which is reasonably common.

https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=34674644 :

> Omega-3s and Omega-6s would be listed under "Polyunsaturated Fats" if it were allowed to list them on the standard Nutrition Facts label instead of elsewhere on the packaging.

Maybe someone else should ask FDA to allow food labelers to optionally include a breakdown of PUFAs Polyunsaturated Fats into at least Omega 6 and Omega 3 next time there is a public comment register on Nutrition Facts labels. There may be more justifying research on Omegas' relevancy to health now?

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