TODAY puts 'meatless' meat to the test: Does it taste like chicken?

[Calliegirl]

Bill Gates and the founders of Twitter are betting millions that meat lovers will embrace a new plant-based product that mimics the taste of chicken and beef.

Meat substitutes have had a hard time making it to the dinner tables of Americans over the years, but the tech giants believe these newest products will pass the "tastes like chicken" test. Gates has met several times with Ethan Brown, whose product, Beyond Meat, is a mash-up of proteins from peas and plants. Just don't call it "fake" meat.

Ethan Brown, here in his Missouri plant, doesn't like to call his product "fake" meat.
"I sort of bristle at the use of the word 'fake,''' Brown told TODAY's Craig Melvin during a tour of his Columbia, Mo. plant. "I just completely disagree with that. It is an assembly of amino acids, fats and water that is just like what you get out of an animal, so in my view, it is meat."

The TODAY anchors taste-tested Beyond Meat Friday to see if they could tell animal from the plant. They guessed wrong for the chicken and beef, and they are not alone: Gates blogged that he was "impressed" by Beyond Meat's chicken and couldn't tell the difference...

http://www.today.com/food/today-puts-meatless-meat-test-does-it-taste-chicken-1D79579619

 

[Clueless Git]

A poll on this one would be interesting ..

I mean like if it really tastes exactly like beef/chicken/whatevertheycomeupwithnext how many of us here would actualy want to eat it?

 

[Blobbenstein]

well, I would eat it..

I like the present vegan meats, but I don't buy them that often.....if they sold at Tesco, I might get more, rather than having to get them off line, but they are quite calorific, so I don't want to eat to much of it anyway.

 

[KLS52]

I would love to have someone make it for me so I could try it for a third time. I bought it twice and found it to not even be edible. I hate that I had to throw it in the garbage and waste my money. I'm frustrated that I don't like it. I mean, if it's such a good product I shouldn't have to try so hard to make it taste just decent. I just don't get it.

 

[Chryssie]

That was really interesting. I will look for this product.

 

[Calliegirl]

I like that they were willing to try it on the air and give it such a good review. Hopefully, it will encourage some omni's to give it a try.

 

[Calliegirl]

I would love to have someone make it for me so I could try it for a third time. I bought it twice and found it to not even be edible. I hate that I had to throw it in the garbage and waste my money. I'm frustratIed that I don't like it. I mean, if it's such a good product I shouldn't have to try so hard to make it taste just decent. I just don't get it.

I wasn't that thrilled with it either. It tasted really bland, which I hear is what real chicken tastes like. The only way I was able to make it edible was to chop it up and use it for a chicken salad sandwich.

I prefer the Morningstar Farms and Gardien chicken strips.

 

[ledboots]

It's so rubbery. I spiced it up in a stir fry, and the 3 vegans did not like it, the 1 omni did like it. She said it tasted like processed chicken strips like they put in salads.

 

[yakherder]

I've never found a fake meat that actually tastes like meat. But they do all have their own unique tastes and, for the most part, I like them. Plus, even if they don't taste like meat they still work in recipes in place of meat.

Curry with mushroom based mutton substitute is one of my current addictions.

 

[Danielle]

No it doesn't taste exactly like meat, but it still tastes good. That's why I still eat it after almost 6 years of being vegetarian.
I don't remember what animal meat tastes like, anyway. It's not real or fake, it's animal or plant. :/ It just bugs me when people call it fake food (vegan or non), it is real, edible food. It's not plastic.

 

[Blobbenstein]

I quite like the word 'fake' when applied to things like 'fake bacon'.....'fake bacon' doesn't mean fake food, in the same way as 'fake leather' doesn't mean that it's a material like stone, or metal, which would be bad subs for leather.

But that's just my perspective.

I don't eat much in the way of meat subs, but your post made me go and make a V-bites bacon sandwich, this morning. Which was quite nice.

What description do you use, for meat subs, Danielle?

 

[Danielle]

"Fake" really gets under my skin, to say it doesn't would be very fake of me fake = bad, right? If I got a fake ps4, I'd be pretty upset
I just call it vegan meat. Oh and yummy. Meat substitute doesn't bug me as much either.

 

[Blobbenstein]

a non veg*n on a distant board got annoyed at me, years ago, for saying 'vegan cheese'(I think it was); she said it should be 'cheese analogue'......she seemed ****** off at the whole veg*n thing generally.

If veg*ns went around saying 'cheese analogue', most people wouldn't know what they meant, I would think.

 

[Danielle]

Lol sure

 

[Calliegirl]

I just say non-dairy cheese. That seems to get most people's interest, they usually ask what it's made from.

 

[Danielle]

Meatless meats would be better than fake. And non-dairy cheese is good.

 

[Blobbenstein]

I don't like the word 'dairy'., so I wouldn't want to use the word to describe vegan cheese.

 

[Danielle]

Alright then