"they're lower in sodium and saturated fat than your average hamburger patty"
If you buy a Beyond patty, it has way more sodium than ground beef you'd buy at a grocerty store. Comparing it with a fast food burger isn't really fair.
If you buy a Beyond patty, it has way more sodium than ground beef you'd buy at a grocerty store. Comparing it with a fast food burger isn't really fair.
We're not comparing fairly here. A finished hamburger patty is not pure ground beef. Did you ever make a hamburger patty yourself? You add salt and spices at a minimum.
A more fair comparison would be looking at store-bought hamburger patties. That's the same category of food.
I just compared Beyond (0.75g salt per 100g) and block house American Burger (0.88g per 100g). The patties are somewhat similar in weight, too (113g and 125g). So both in absolute, and weight relative amounts the Beyond burger has less sodium.
I don't eat that these days, my burgers are actually 25% beef and 75% lentil/seasoning. Still under 0.5g/100g
What matters is not so much the natural form, it is how the product is typically consumed.
But of course I see your point that with home made meat-based patties, you are in control of how much salt you want to add, while with factory made patties, you have to take what you get, it's typically not possible to "take away" salt. Mind you, though, the latter argument holds for both plant-based and meat-based factory-made patties.
Also, do you expect the vegan alternative to have exactly the same nutritional values as their meat counterparts?
Look, I don't even know why I'm defending Beyond here, I'm certainly not a fan (as a matter of fact, I don't like their beef patties). But I think the arguments you've made are not entirely fair.
If you're salting your recipe with traditional ground beef, you're doing the same with Beyond. If not, same.
I do not expect or even encourage the content of any alternative to match the nutritional value of the real deal.
A typical pinch of salt is 300mg. Not 2300mg.
When the base product has 3x as much sodium, that is a problem. It doesn't need that much because as you stated, you can add salt during cooking. As a great example, let's take a use case for Beyond which is taco meat. I add taco seasoning (my own which is about 30% sodium compared to a traditional) and now the Beyond version is still roughly 250% the sodium content.
I can't remove the sodium they add. It's not a product I like or desire. It's more expensive. It's less healthy (note how often I mention reduced salt) for myself.
Also, I have been a strict vegan in life for about 5 years. I still didn't eat Beyond (aside from tasting it) during that period (it was available).
I'm not really trying to attack Beyond here, it's all personal preference at the end of the day. I make 95% of my food, from bread to tomato sauce to pickled peppers and hot sauce. When I am reaching for a vegan protein, I reach for lentils.
It's good to eat sans salt on bbq with your desired (typically salty) toppings.
I know people salt the patty while cooking, but the topic at hand is Beyond and their patties.
The whole "salt" angle is bikeshedding - no one advocated Beyond for salt, they pick it for all of the other health benefits (fats, cholesterol)
Nothing whatsoever is stopping Beyond from removing salt and allowing people to salt their own burgers, as they already do.
I'm on blood pressure meds. I regularly check in with doctors on things. No, you shouldn't be eating unlimited salt, but sugar and cholesterol are killing (and debilitating) many more of us.
But anyway, I think a pre-seasoned vegan ready made burger patty should only be compared to a pre-seasoned meat burger patty. It's an Apples and Oranges comparison with little meaning.
If you compare the high sodium of a vegan ground beef replacement with ground beef, that's fair game. The one from Beyond here is actually a good example of too high sodium. I won't judge. I only care about the comparison, not the company.
The comparison here is shop-bought burgers or those you would buy in a burger restaurant, which WILL have salt and likely more than a Beyond burger.
I have no opinion about the economics of the brand itself; as a vegetarian I've always thought they were over-priced, and also that it was a shame I don't have a huge range of alternatives, as I actually like spicy bean burgers and can't find them any more*. In fact, because of the limited alternatives in my local markets, I got a kit for making my own burgers from dehydrated soy mince and/or mashed kidney beans.
* I don't know how much of this is "bean burgers are no longer popular" vs. "I moved country and Berlin has never heard of them"; for Quorn I do at least know it's the latter.
Do you have a link or name for this? I also prefer black bean or lentil burgers, but I've been making them by hand really.
There's probably also a cheaper source for the form and squasher if that's all you need, but it came with them so I didn't look for that separately.
People who buy burgers or eat out are likely to get less healthy burgers, if you look at highest selling supermarket burgers, both meat and vegan options are ALL high in salt for example.
The vast, vast, vast majority of people do not have any reason to restrict salt intake.
"Increases likelihood" is bullshit at best (manipulation more typically) without quantifying how much, and how much would it need to be to be remotely significant.
The health-conscious are famous for their hamburger usage.
If you're comparing the healthiness of a premade vegan burger patty, you need to compare it to a premade (or equivalent homemmade) beef patty. You can't take salt out of the beef patty comparison and say "look it's better"
Edit: But you can compare it to actual products on shelves. The first frozen burger brand I can think of that would be a good comparison is frozen Bubba burger. If we compare the sodium content, Beyond patty is 3-4x higher in sodium. Beef wins! :) Although Beyond has half the fat.
https://www.heart.org/en/healthy-living/healthy-eating/eat-s...
Also, I like the taste of Natto (soybeans fermented in straw) though that's generally thought of as an acquired taste.
Meat: 1. Those who buy from butcher (health conscious) 2. Those who buy packaged products from supermarket.
Vegan: 1. Those who make homemade plant-based alternatives (eg.lentil burgers) 2. Those who buy Beyond burgers from supermarket.
Hence I think most people are trying to compare apples to oranges, which is not the correct comparison to make when weighing up each type.
Ingredients: beef
https://www.beyondmeat.com/en-US/products/the-beyond-burger
Ingredients: a bunch
Who's buying Burger King more than grocery shopping?
You asked "Who's buying Burger King more than grocery shopping?"
My point was that groceries in general don't matter, only burgers. Some people almost never eat burgers at home and eat them exclusively at places like Burger King.