No, it's not the President, for once.
Whole Foods CEO (and bright green more-or-less libertarian) John Mackey professes skepticism about the various recent non-meat "meat" products, pointing out they're highly-processed foods. He's also of the opinion that you can retrain your palate to enjoy more traditionally-vegetarian (and far less processed) foods.
He's right about the latter; when I was younger, the various sorts of vegetarians I encountered, from hippies to blue-eyed Buddhists, generally served up flavorful (if unfamiliar) foods that were what they were, without trying to pretend to be anything else.
This world is full of good food, from raw fruits and vegetables both familiar and uncommon to tasty dishes you and I have never heard of. While the various "Beyond Impossible" fake meats are said to be palatable copies of the meats they resemble, that's faint praise; as the comedian said of exotic game meats, "If it 'tastes just like chicken,' why not just eat chicken?" Your palate deserves better. If a burger that bleeds beet juice keeps you from trying delicious dhal, it's not doing you any favors.
Roberta:
ReplyDeleteThe Babylon Bee had an amusing article on an innovative process that infallibly turns vegetables into tasty food:
https://babylonbee.com/news/innovative-new-process-converts-vegetables-into-meat-by-feeding-them-to-cows
I've had (and made) many vegetarian meals that were tasty, and even more that used non-vegetarian items like cheese (eggplant parmesan comes to mind) to supplement the flavors. But human beings evolved to be omnivores and ever since we tamed fire to be able to use it to cook, meat has been a staple part of most people's diet.
Not to mention the fact that it just tastes good.
You correctly point out that only vegetarians try to concoct mock meat. People who enjoy meat don't try to turn meat into pretend vegetables, unless you count leftovers put in the refrigerator and forgotten. Vegetarianism is a neuroses.
ReplyDeleteOh, I wouldn't say that, Monty. Vegetarianism, or veganism, is just a choice. Trying to force it on others is a neurosis.
ReplyDeleteI'm bemused by the efforts to take perfectly good vegetables and try to turn them into fake meat. It's one thing if the stuff is kind of close naturally -- "pulled jackfruit" isn't exactly shredded barebcued meat, but it's pretty good -- but quite another to run the stuff through a lab, tweaking and prodding, when the ingredients are perfectly good on their own.
Yeah, I've been thinking I should have qualified that since I clicked 'Post'. I hereby take a step back from the neurosis thing. I'll go with what you say.
ReplyDeleteVegans, for the most part, are making a moral choice, whether you agree with it or not. That doesn't mean they don't miss the taste of meat; as others have said, we've evolved as omnivores, and we react to the aroma of cooked flesh. So many vegans still crave it. I've tried the various Beyond Meat products, and they're pretty good. Especially the sausage links; I would have a hard time telling the difference between them and regular,supermarket sausages (and you can't really argue they're more processed than pork sausages).
ReplyDeleteI don't know of anyone, except the manufacturers, who are arguing for this to become a dietary staple. They're a treat, in much the same way as a fast food burger is supposed to be.
I just realized that I now think of "burger" as a shape, not meat product. Having had a lot of good vegetarian food, a good "veggie burger" is one that is tasty, even if not necessarily meatlike. I can have something that's obviously a patty of black beans or falafal or portobello mushroom on a bun and consider it good.
ReplyDeleteI certainly won't turn down a good beefburger, but I'd rather have good vegetables than mediocre meat or meatlike products. It's all about the taste....