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Comment by slyn | Hacker News Reader

Slightly OT: Maybe I'm just underestimating to the power of familiarity as a plus in marketing, but I've never been able to wrap my head around meat-imitation vegetarian and vegan options.

I understand things like veggie dogs or burgers, patty and tube shaped foods are just plain convenient to store and eat. But I don't really get: "... Beyond Meat™, the first plant protein that looks, feels, tastes, and acts like meat." Wouldn't it be more prudent to create an identity for next level plant-based products than essentially "It's like meat but not"?

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From my experience a lot of this is to do with people's "food culture" (I can't think of a better way to express that). People have ideas about what constitutes food or a "proper meal". (I've heard people say "My dad would be offended if I cooked him dinner and there wasn't any meat in it").

Give people something they recognise and they can handle it.

It's not just convenient to store and it, it's convenient to think about and fit into the (heavily marketed) idea of a proper meal (for vegetarians and vegans too).

(I've heard people say "My dad would be offended if I cooked him dinner and there wasn't any meat in it").

I love meat but I wouldn't be offended if somebody cooked me a meal and there wasn't any meat in it. But I might be a little offended if somebody cooked me a meal and there was fake meat in it.

Fake meat is like wearing a mask with my mother's face on it and expecting me to pretend you're her. It's not that simple.

It really isn't that profound. People take sugar and turn it into Red Vines. They're shaped, flavored and textured to be more enjoyable. Frankly, the heartiness, saltiness and other qualities of meat are good, so if you can take ingredients and make them more like that, it's not that different from taking flour and making a cupcake shaped the way a cupcake always looks.

Do you get offended by imitation vanilla, Mrs. Butterworth's and stevia? Lots of foods are imitations of other foods.

I'd say that a lot of the vegetarian food community is leaning towards that! Morningstar Veggie Patties (my favorite "faux-meat") doesn't taste like meat, nor does it really try to. It tastes like a tasty patty of mushrooms and veggies (and a bunch of soy thrown in for extra protein).

I'm a vegetarian and I like faux meat and veggie "burgers" for the convenience. But I don't want them to look or taste too real. :)

A great example of fake meat that isn't actually anything like meat is Morningstar's black bean burgers. They taste nothing like meat (which is good, because overly realistic veggie meat is uncanny valley to me), but they still give the effect of a hamburger and taste delicious.

Well, I don't know about the other ones, but if this actually acts like meat, then that can be pretty damn convenient in adapting recipes to be Vegan.

I can't imagine it actually acts like meat at a chemical level though. Like, if you cook this stuff at 60-65 celsius, it's probably not going to cook the same as a cut of meat.

It makes a lot more sense when you observe that veg%ans are not opposed to eating meat but rather to killing animals. Witness PETA's push for lab-grown meat replacements.

That said, many veg%ans (myself included) nevertheless find meat-mimicking products off-putting and prefer lesser-processed protein sources.

Is "veg%an" different than "vegan"? I thought this was a typo until you used the same spelling twice. (I'm a vegetarian.)

The SQL statement:

  select * from diets where name like 'veg%an'

Will match both 'vegan' and 'vegetarian'. The '%' wildcard matches any string of zero or more characters.

Incidentally, it's more commonly written as veg*n among non-nerds.

Unfortunately writing it twice causes HN to italicize stuff: vegn vegn :/

> are not opposed to eating meat but rather to killing animals

That is not at all true. It may be true for some people, but it's hardly universal. Some people don't like meat, some people don't digest it well, some people avoid it for health reasons.

It's only a small subset that avoid meat because they are opposed to killing animals. You can tell based on if they avoid leather as well.

Yes, but based on the GP's question I assume he was focusing his question on the subset that is opposed to killing animals – the other subsets would not seem at odds with their impetus for being veg%an by enjoying fake meat.

Based on the Obvious posting, I assume that Beyond Meat is targeted at all the meat-eaters who are saying things like, "I would love to become vegetarian... But I could never give up chicken." To get large quantities of people to drop meat you'll need a product that appeals to those that don't really want to.

I've been a vegetarian for 3 or 4 years now. The hardest part for 'meaters' to understand is that I don't want imitation meat. There is far too much good food for me to be eating pretend meat.

Also, the state of imitation meat products is already quite good. I 100% guarantee that the average person couldn't tell the difference between ground beef and 'ground round' in chili. I've fooled too many people to count now. Chicken is bland anyway, so why bother simulating them when you can use tofu or some other meaty vegetable instead.

I'm not a "meater" and yet I like imitation meat. Maybe a fake hot dog on the rare occasion. I concur with everything else you said though.

Interesting that nobody tries to make meat look, feel & taste like vegetables. And that carnivores don't have support groups.

Sure we do! We have insanely good support groups! Ever been to a rib cook off? http://www.nuggetribcookoff.com/ Every year man. Every year.

Most meat eaters have the option of eating vegetables without violating any code of ethics or health, so there's little point in imitating them. Nonetheless, people do go out of their way to make meat taste like vegetables — or do you take your meat with no seasoning at all?

Also, meat-eaters do have a support group — it's called the whole world. Just mention vegetarian food and more likely than not somebody will come out and slag them or their choices. Conversely, the most likely response when you mention getting some In-N-Out is "Mmm, that sounds good."

"or do you take your meat with no seasoning at all?"

Good meat cooked right needs no seasoning. Even when adding flavors to improve sub-par meat, we don't make it taste like carrots or lettuce etc.

> I've never been able to wrap my head around meat-imitation > vegetarian and vegan options

I was inching towards becoming a vegetarian. Being a foodie is a pretty effective strategy.

Substitutes are great because vegetarian food is (can be) great. Thai panang curry made with seitan tastes great. Brown rice and Field Roast (tm) tastes great. Deep fried tofu tastes great.

Then it's not about giving up meat. It's more like choosing something else and not having time for meat.

An different example. I'm now working towards the troglodiet, informed by Dr Terry Wahls, Eat To Live, 4 Hour Body, etc. Veggies, veggies, and more veggies. Meat. Seeds and nuts. Legumes.

Wahls suggests eating 9 cups of fruit and veggies a day (in addition to the rest). If you can do that, you don't have time, attention, appetite, craving, etc for simple carbs like treats, rice, pasta, potato.

(I coined the term "troglodiet". Hysterical, right?)

It depends on the reason. I've known vegetarians who didn't eat meat because they were disgusted at the thought of consuming animal flesh. For them, fake animal flesh has about the same appeal as serving to a carnivore a beef product that has been formed to resemble a human forearm.

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