Vegan burgers in the nyt editorials

Lou

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Saw this in the NYT today


There Is Nothing More All-American Than the Veggie Burger
By Carol J. Adams
Ms. Adams has been a vegan for 25 years.

I'll post a link to it at the bottom but the article lies behind a "paywall". if you don't normally visit the NYT then you should have no problem reading it. Or if you are a subscriber.

I'll go ahead and paste in a few quotes. Just in case you can't read it and also to give you the gist of it or the motivation to read it.

" Think of the hamburger as a single-portion protein patty and you locate its predecessors not in the ground horse meat of the conquering Tartars but in falafel, nut cutlets, veggie croquettes and millennium-old Indian-fried, protein-rich lentil or bean patties"

"For almost as long as the hamburger has been served, plant-based approximations have been nipping at its heels. Under the pressure of meat rationing during World War II, hamburger makers discovered that years of food experimentation by companies serving the vegetarian Seventh-day Adventist population had resulted in several viable veggie burgers."

https://www.nytimes.com/2018/06/30/...more-all-american-than-the-veggie-burger.html
 
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Reactions: Emma JC
Totally on board with veg options for burgers with a big caveat:

Make them from whole plant foods. Not isolates and garbage manufactured in a lab.

One of the reasons people eat meat in the first place is the nutrition they get from it that they aren't getting eating refined/stripped grains. That's right, nutrition: vitamins, minerals, essential fats and amino acids that come from whole plants that the feed animals eat, then are eaten to get those nutrients by proxy. When thus consumed it comes in a package of cholesterol, saturated animal fat (which differs from plant saturated fat on the human body), poor digestion, lack of fiber, possible parasites, nasty bacteria and even fecal matter, as well as feeding flesh eating bacteria in the colon which all contribute to disease...

But it does provide some nutrition in spite of all this. Nutrition that can be lacking in a vegan diet if that diet is primarily composed of processed and foods stripped of their nutrition and replaced with protein isolates, chemicals, high fructose corn syrup and other garbage. Vegan, but it's still garbage.

One of the reasons I became vegan was because I became convinced I wasn't a natural omnivore. My body is built for plant foods, not animal foods. That being said, those plant foods can be stripped of their nutrient value or made into Franken foods that either provide minimal nutrition or actually cause harm (see Vegan sugar alternatives like Aspartame, Saccharin, or protein alternatives like isolated Soy Protein which is proven to raise IGF-1, hydrogenated or partially hydrogenated oils containing trans fats etc. All from plants, to varying degrees all harmful to you!)

The big issue facing Big Meat from a Vegan World perspective is that they lose their monopoly. Very few people raise their own animals to slaughter and consume, and are dependent on those who do. If I were an unscrupulous monopoly holder, in order to save my monopoly it would be in my interest to make foods with "Cruelty free" and "Vegan" labels that provided sub-nutrition to people so that eventually they go back to eating meat, saying "I got this because I ate vegan food".
 
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Agree with Nekodaiden

The Franken-food thing comes to mind, too. One reason I just don't eat veggie burgers very often is because they're just so processed (unless I make my own from scratch at home, then I know what goes into them.)

Also, I'm good with processed veggie burgers every now and then and tend to go for the ones that aren't designed to taste like meat. There's something that's just "off" to me going meat-free yet searching for something that tastes just like meat.

I suppose I'm not far from that mark when I use black salt and various seasonings to try to get an eggy flavor in tofu scrambles - or that I expect vegan cheese to taste like dairy cheese.

I guess I find the burger designed to taste like beef aspect just more disturbing since it's supposed to imitate the flesh of a corpse.

However, I suppose if it gets more people comfortable with a meat-free lifestyle, then it's doing some good. When I first went vegetarian many years ago, I'm not sure what I would have done without Morningstar products and lots of Amy's frozen entrees. While I try to limit consuming those things now, they were extremely helpful as I transitioned through that initial panic stage of going meat-free.
 
How ironic. I'm going to go make some veggie burgers today at my little sisters.

I totally agree with Nekodaiden on making your own plant-based burgers, as apposed to buying them pre-made, but loaded with garbage. Not only is there a kazillion awesome veggie burger recipes out there, it's way cheaper.

I will say this though, when I go out for a meal, I might make an exception. Honestly, I don't make exceptions often, but depending on the occasion, and what the exception is, I might do it. For example, if it has some kind of oil in the recipe, I can accept that on occasion. It's pretty hard to avoid when dinning out, unless you stick to salads.

If I ever do try an Impossible or Beyond Burger, it will simply be out of curiosity.