Beyond Meat gets name-checked in the article, but I want to emphasize that their burgers are pretty good: https://jakeseliger.com/2017/08/23/beyond-meat-burgers-are-p... and in my view underappreciated right now. If you've not tried them yet, you ought to.
I love how highly, highly processed foods are suddenly A-OK to many people here once it's a fake meat product. Whatever happened to the concept of, "Eat real food?"
I shouldn't even have to post about "Textured Wheat Protein" but it's essentially another denatured protein, one that is completely doused in glyphosate right before harvest. That's the main ingredient of these "burgers."
>But high-temperature processing has the unfortunate side effect of so denaturing the other proteins in soy that they are rendered largely ineffective.23 That's why animals on soy feed need lysine supplements for normal growth.
>Nitrites, which are potent carcinogens, are formed during spray-drying, and a toxin called lysinoalanine is formed during alkaline processing.24 Numerous artificial flavorings, particularly MSG, are added to soy protein isolate and textured vegetable protein products to mask their strong "beany" taste and to impart the flavor of meat.25
>In feeding experiments, the use of SPI increased requirements for vitamins E, K, D, and B12 and created deficiency symptoms of calcium, magnesium, manganese, molybdenum, copper, iron, and zinc.26 Phytic acid remaining in these soy products greatly inhibits zinc and iron absorption; test animals fed SPI develop enlarged organs, particularly the pancreas and thyroid gland, and increased deposition of fatty acids in the liver.27
> That's why animals on soy feed need lysine supplements for normal growth.
No wonder eating a mono diet requires supplements. How can we expect protein isolates from a legume to be a super-powerful all in one food?
>Nitrites, which are potent carcinogens, are formed during spray-drying.
Cool thing to leave out that nitrites are used as preservatives and colorings in meat and consuming them without the added phytonutrients (available only in plants) removes the blocking effect and cancerous nitrosamines form.
Just check out google scholar for nitrosamines and meat. It's all over the place, hundreds of studies.
So, Stephanie Seneff is just scaremongering without sufficient evidence. Just like any food/ingredient demonization.
> Phytic acid remaining in these soy products greatly inhibits zinc and iron absorption
"phytic acid cancer" on google scholar, good thing it blocks heme iron absorption, wouldn't like to over-absorb it and get cancer.
> test animals fed SPI develop enlarged organs, particularly the pancreas and thyroid gland, and increased deposition of fatty acids in the liver.
Just like feeding mice 20% calories from casein protein (in milk) gets them cancer, and you can turn it off and on by lowering/increasing the casein amount. should we now scaremonger and tell that milk should be avoided, maybe whey protein also because it's filled with casein?
Yeah, I'm pretty sure there are crazy people out there willing to eat just whey powder and soy protein isolate all day long. For the sane folks, it's probably safe.
You can list out all the negatives, leaving positives out and make a demonizing picture out of any food/ingredient.
If fake meats had come first and animal meats were just now coming to market, people would make similar arguments about health effects... and they'd be warranted. With animal meat, one has to worry about salmonella, e. coli, staph, and other pathogens. These food-borne pathogens kill about 5,000 Americans a year and make millions sick.[1] Also, cooking meat creates carcinogens.[2]
If fake meats were as dangerous as the real thing, they'd be illegal to sell. Concerns about the safety of these new foods are pure status-quo bias.
I think it's foolish to assume that some novel and highly processed food item is going to be safer than something which we've been eating for thousands of generations. Basing the conclusion of safety based on a piecemeal analysis of the components hand-waves away the entire complexity of digestion and metabolization.
> I think it's foolish to assume that some novel and highly processed food item is going to be safer than something which we've been eating for thousands of generations.
It's not that processed foods are particularly safe, but that meat is unsafe in a way we're accustomed to. Again: every year, meat-borne pathogens kill 5,000 Americans and cause illnesses in 1% of the population. Fake meats simply don't cause those rates of illness or death. If they did, the FDA would not allow them to be sold.
And coal plants kill far more people than nuclear ones. It's just not as obvious that they're the cause to those who are sick.
Who is to say that eating an equivalent amount of this fake meat product wouldn't cause a far greater number of deaths and reduction in quality adjusted years? It will be much harder to tell, because the problems aren't as obvious/acute, and there are always a huge number of confounding variables when it comes to nutrition.
Unless the problems it causes are acute, the FDA isn't going to have a very good way of comparing the safety of these with normal meat.
We don't know what properties this meat will have; we do know what causes regular meat to be harmful, and fake meat does not share several of those particular factors.
I think you are crazily optimistic about both the FDA and the ability to see any significant health effects from fake meat. Even my vegan friends have only been eating it for about a decade, and that doesn't strike me as enough time for e.g. discerning whether it is carcinogenic.
Among other things, sodium nitrate (included in the above description of fake meat) is, by itself, known to be more carcinogenic than red meat itself. But you don't see the FDA ensuring new foods don't use it.
Slaughterhouses and packaged meat are a pretty recent invention, certainly not one we’ve evolved with over thousands of generations. Is it really more natural to open a cellophane package of ground meat that comes from who knows how many animals?
What makes you think slaughter houses were needed? That just made things more "efficient". Humans and our ancestors have been eating meat since we have been a species.
Some of the things done in order to achieve efficiency has tangible consequences on the healthiness of the food. For instance cramming many animals in a very small space (e.g. in poultry farming) increases chances of contagious diseases developing. Industry is trying to compensate using antibiotics, but that has issues also.
Especially considering the fact that we will live up to three times as long as the average hunter-gatherer. Time matters when considering carcinogens and other long-term effects. National and international bodies providing food guidelines tend to advocate a reduction in red meat, sausage, etc. for good reasons.
With animal meat, one has to worry about salmonella, e. coli...
You have to worry about that with vegetables as well. Certainly here in Sweden the nr 1 source of food borne salmonella is spinach, arugula and similar leafy greens.
Cooking food can create carcinogens. A couple of years ago there was much fuss about a Swedish study about carcinogens in crisps (potato chips) – that's potato fried in vegetable oils, no meat involved.[1] (The fuss was mostly caused by not understanding the quantities involved.)
You can keep all of that aforementioned "meat" afaic.
This is just one part pseudoscience, one part nonsequitor. There's zero accepted nutritional scientific evidence that plant protein cannot completely adequately replace meat sources. Yes, of course someone who literally just eats soy burgers will experience some nutrient deficiency, but so would someone who just ate real burgers (plus the extra cholesterol and fats!). Millions of people completely replace meat with processed plant protein, with no evidence for any ill-effect. There is nothing inherently wrong with processing a food source, and to suggest such is nothing more than marketing quackery.
It is extremely frustrating gow you spread confusion and conflate concepts that have nothing to do with each other, with the end result being that all you accomplish is to spread propaganda about efforts that will literally save the planet from environmentally destructive, excessive meat production.
Is MSG considered an artificial flavoring? I was under the impression that it is both naturally occurring in biology and that its health problems are greatly over-exaggerated.
The funny thing is that the real health issue of MSG is rarely mentioned - it makes unhealthy food taste better. It is not surprising that we have evolved to appreciate the taste of protein. However when we add something that imparts a strong taste of protein while actually containing very little protein to food high in fat and carbohydrates then people may end up eating more of those.
> "
I shouldn't even have to post about "Textured Wheat Protein" but it's essentially another denatured protein, one that is completely doused in glyphosate right before harvest. That's the main ingredient of these "burgers.""
How are you certain about 'doused in glyphosate'?
It should be noted that making meat substitutes out of wheat protein is nothing new, and it's accessible to the home cook, not something that has to be done in a lab. If you don't believe me, look up recipes for homemade seitan.
> I love how highly, highly processed foods are suddenly A-OK to many people here once it's a fake meat product. Whatever happened to the concept of, "Eat real food?"
People do usually eat 'real food' when they eat meat products. That's the problem.
No, they are not, they are part of one evaluation. You only make one decision: to eat or not eat. When deciding whether it is 'A-OK' to choose the eat decision, both the moral and nutritional aspects are relevant. Either can justify it.
Danihan's criticism is wrong and projecting onto an imaginary strawman because he pretends that the only reason anyone could ever care about vat meat or fake meat is for the possible health benefits and accuses them of hypocrisy for endorsing processed foods in one case but not in hypothetical others - which is bizarre because that reason is literally not even in the laundry list of reasons in OP or other coverage (suggesting he didn't even read OP). Read through the article again, health is never mentioned, all the reasons are moral, environmental, or economic. I am perfectly willing to say that maybe vat meat or fake meat are not exactly as healthy as eating some tomatoes or something, but you know what, I really don't give a shit about minor issues or cherrypicked chemistry as I am far more concerned about whether it will soon be possible for me to continue eating tasty meat (possibly even for less cost) without killing hundreds of animals a year.
It's a bunch of normally inedible ingredients made to taste edible with fake flavoring and MSG. The last thing I need in my diet is even more misdirection in flavor profile telling my body what nutrients I need.
I'm sure it tastes just fine, but at something like $16/lb for a hamburger substitute that puts it on the same price level as prime grade ribeye or tenderloin.
It's really unfortunate all the meat "alternatives" take the organic/healthy but huge premium approach as this makes it very inaccessible to your standard consumer. Maybe for 6+ figure earning HNers it's not an issue but for the majority of the country it is.
I don't really understand this concern; this is a common strategy for introducing new products. When smartphones came out they were a premium product. Over time they became more accessible as the market grew beyond just the first adopters. They're arguably commoditized now, if we're thinking about super cheap Android phones.
Tesla is another example.
And economics should force price down, if the costs of manufactured protein decrease substantially.
It's not a fair analogy. Smartphones are still a premium product ($800 new). They were heavily subsidized by the mobile carriers which made them accessible. However, we are slowly seeing that subsidization eroding (fortunately now everyone is addicted).
I don't mean to be petty but it's not "economics" that drives prices down but rather competition. The thing about smartphones is while they all had dramatically different surface behavior, underneath they all shared very similar technological cores (Qualcomm processors, iOS/Android/Windows OS, etc...) and were able to utilize those same innovations.
Artificial meat on the other hand doesn't seem to be like that. Every product is unique and requires significant investment in R&D to make a reality.
They have been selling it for a long time now, it's not like this stuff is brand new. My only point was that we have not seen the effects you are describing happening yet which is worrisome. It feels like they are happy with product positioning at the moment.
The cat food smell when you cook them is for real. I noticed it independently, and it turns out plenty of people had already observed this. I wonder if this will hinder mass adoption -- it really did make my apartment smell strange! They tasted great though.
