Would you try meat substitutes?

That is exactly what is wrong with them.

If they are against eating real meat, why do they need to imitate it?

Pretend “meat” vegan foods have been around for many years including pretend sausages, pretend beef patties, and so on

But these people now need to have their pretend 'meat" look like, taste like, and even bleed like real meat.

As the old saying goes, “If you cannot handle the heat, then stay out of the kitchen”.

Well a lot of people who are vegan or vegetarian like the taste and textures, just not the actual fact that an animal has to be killed to eat it. At the end of the day if having closer imitations makes them happy then more power to them! Why get offended at someone else’s tastes?

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I wonder if we should include chicken nuggets and seafood extender or crab sticks in the same category. It’s only a short step from being something it is not.

Ham flavoured baked beans, ham flavouring no ham!

Oyster Sauce, no oysters apparently! (edit, **They do contain extract of Oyster, thanks @grahroll)

Little boys, aka cheerios, no children and lots of stuff that is not meat derived! Worse if you believed my gran and her view of how the butcher cleaned the shop floor?

We take great pride apparently in misrepresenting what is in our food products and giving them faux labels.

If it seems like a new idea, Mock Turtle Soup was big in the USA and England from the mid 18th Century. No turtle within a thousand miles of the cook!

Campbells even made a canned version. Calf’s head and horn soup with brains, and forcemeat might be a more apt description.

Given history and tradition, I’m not so sure any one of us can be strict on what we prepare, how it is presented or how it is described.

Who could say no to a big bowl of bacon ice cream?

edit note - **Oyster Extract
Traditional Oyster sauce is, made from oysters. It’s a mixture of caramelized oyster juices (a byproduct of cooking oysters in water for a prolonged period of time), salt, sugar, and sometimes soy sauce that is thickened with cornstarch . What you end up with inside the bottle is a dark, syrupy sauce that resembles whatever the love child of soy sauce and barbecue sauce would look like.

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The oyster sauces we buy always have oyster extract as part of the ingredient list, I guess there are ones that don’t but none of ours so far have not had oyster extract in them.

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I agree. Traditionally the sauce and extract is similar to making and using a stock from chicken or roast vegetables to make a soup. Only you then leave the chicken or vegetables out of the stock and rely on the flavour extracted as you would for a clear broth.

The modern commercial version of oyster sauce reverses this cooking technique for obviious reasons.

Oyster sauces today are usually made with a base of sugar and salt and thickened with corn starch. Oyster extracts or essences are then used to give flavour to the base sauce. Other ingredients, such as soy sauce and MSG, may also be added to deepen the flavour and add colour.

Yum! :rofl: ?

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no monkeys were harmed …

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It could be that humans are omnivores (and the digestive system has evolved to handle meat and vegetable based diets), and there is a psychological desire to have something which look like meat. Tricking the body into thinking it is meat may give one the psychological fix needed for food enjoyment.

Don’t know, but it could be possible …it could be something which is programmed into our DNA, just like other animals which are borne and know exactly what foods to eat and not eat.

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A post was split to a new topic: Soy price increase

In the UK in the 1970s our family often ate “meat” made of soy which tasted like beef.

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An article regarding researchers warning that some of these pretend meat products are not actually healthy.

They could be, but to make them be tasty, they have succumbe to salt/sodium and fats to provide a better?) eating experience. For example:

  1. Vegie Delights Vegie Sausages - (480mg/100gm sodium/10.4 g/100gm fats)
  2. Vegie Delights Classic Hot Dogs - (685mg/100gm sodium/8.0 g/100gm fats)
  3. Coles Nature’s Kitchen Original Meat Free Sausages - (420mg/100gm sodium/9.5 g/100gm fats)
  4. Coles Nature’s Kitchen Meat Free Chicken Style Tenders - (490mg/100gm sodium/7.0 g/100gm fats)
  5. Linda Mccartney Vegetarian Sausages - (650mg/100gm sodium/5.4 g/100gm fats)
  6. Funky Fields Mince - (480mg/100gm sodium/10 g/100gm fats)
  7. Fry’s Meat Free Quinoa & Brown Rice Protein Burgers - (651mg/100gm sodium/13.6 g/100gm fats)
  8. Linda Mccartney Vegetarian Country Pie - (407mg/100gm sodium/13.5 g/100gm fats)

and the list goes on.

One has to remember that non-meat food products are highly processed and contain a lot of additives/ingredients which are not present in the meat product. If one takes mince for example, the difference in ingredients shows the level of processing…

Funky Fields Mince: Rehydrated SOY protein/-isolate (58 %), water, coconut oil, SOY flour, WHEAT gluten, ALMONDS, porcini mushrooms, tomato, fermented dextrose, tapioca starch, salt, malt extract (BARLEY), color (beetroot), natural aroma, maltodextrin, stabilizer (methylcellulose)

Beef Mince - 100% Australian Beef

(note:fresh beef mince can’t be imported, however, non-meat mince can be).

If one compares the nutritional panels of the two above minces:

image

One can see that the meat free mince contributes more salt and sugar to ones diet compared to the regular beef mince.

Food for thought.

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I love the synopsis. Well done Choice testers for persevering.

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Surprised how long ‘fake meat’ has been around?

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Whilst at Coles today, I saw these two pretend meats.

Pretend Roast Pork and Pretend Roast Duck both labelled as “Authentic Flavour”.

About as authentic as Captain Cook’s axe after the head was replaced 3 times and the handle was replaced 9 times.

What next?. A 1971 Ford Falcon GTHO made out of plant materials and passed off as an authentic supercar?

Did you taste test it? If not how can you confirm whether the flavour was authentic? :thinking: :thinking:

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While I haven’t tried those brands, I have tried faux duck at some restaurants in Cabramatta. Surprisingly realistic and very tasty!

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No. I would not even feed it to our little dog.

The only fake meat I have ever eaten, and will ever eat, is mock chicken.

Something fake cannot be authentic.

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On the contrary! My mother makes a killer vegetable based pasta sauce which most people don’t even realise is vegetable based. (Works great on little kids :wink: )

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Me too … it was amazingly realistic, especially the beef! I wonder why we can’t produce it now …

I can’t eat a lot of red meat or processed meat because I have a VERY sensitive stomach, and meat protein is one of the things that will cause me pain and burning for hours. As much as I love and crave a good steak burger, it just isn’t worth it (burger buns are off the menu too :confounded:)
I like the concept of fake meat products, because a lot of the time I can make my brain believe I’m eating the burger I psychologically crave whilst not upsetting my stomach at the same time.
I had to have it with massive modifications, but the Rebel Whopper at maccas is fantastic. I’m also a fan of soy bacon, and I’ve tried a few plant based sausages that haven’t been bad.
Usually I just eat fish, chicken, tofu or legumes, but its nice for a treat to pretend I’m having some beef or pork :slight_smile:

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