I have some vegan friends who used those old soy burgers as a transition food, then decided, "why eat fake meat?" and quit.

They are nice folks, and unlike many vegans, they don't preach or don't judge others. They are vegan, I'm keto and we go out to dinner where we can all get what we want. We know we are all just picky eaters.

And when you bite into a juicy, rare cut of beef, you aren't seeing red blood but myoglobin. At least that's what I've read.

But that makes no difference to me:

1. I have the teeth of an omnivore, incisors for tearing flesh, molars for grinding cellulose
2. I have the digestive enzymes of an omnivore, some for plant matter others for fat
3. I have the alimentary canal of an omnivore. Not too short like an obligate carnivore and definitely not like an herbivore. Think about it (1) Ruminants have several stomachs where they can ferment cellulose to get the nutrients out of it (2) horses and their kin have extremely long intestines so that the cellulose stays in the chemical bath much longer in order to get the nutrients out of it (3) rabbits, deer and others eat their own feces to run them through their digestive systems a second time to get the nutrients out of plants.

I don't know about you, but this all tells me that my body is designed to be omnivorous. Therefore I respect my body by feeding it what it is designed to eat.

Omnivore: an animal or person that eats food of both plant and animal origin.

And as far as ethics are concerned, I eat meat that is as humanely raised as is possible. I won't eat those lobsters in the tank with their claws taped up or chicken raised in a cage, etc.

And I know that it if weren't for omnivores and carnivores

1. Those cows in the open pasture would hever have been born, so I'm giving them a peaceful life until the sudden end and for most modern slaughterhouses it's done stress-free. The steer doesn't know what hit it
2. Humans would hever have evolved. Take the case of the Marine Iguana in the Galapagos. Without predators their numbers multiplied without any checks. Long ago it ate all the plants it could digest on it's island so it had to start eating seaweed. The water is cold and the iganas are cold blooded. As they ate all the close to shore seaweed, their numbers are now limited by how long they can hold their breath and survive the dramatic drop in body temperature without succumbing to death. And their numbers are now controlled by iguanas either starving to death or getting so cold that they can't make it back to shore, die, and become crab food.

The Earth is a bigger island than the home of the Marine Iguana, but a closed system none the less. If it weren't for carnivores and omnivores, the herbivores would had eaten every available plant on the planet millions of years ago and life would have literally starved itself out of existence. The earth would have been lifeless long before even the dinosaurs arrived.

Thus, omnivores and carnivores keep the herbivores from eating us out of house and home on a global scale, and I'm happy to be of service in keeping their numbers in check.

Bob

People become vegetarians and vegans for either health reasons or ethical reasons (or both). I think it's perfectly reasonable and understandable that they would want to try and recreate the foods they've eaten all their lives.




No, but there are a whole lot of low carb and keto dieters trying really hard to make almonds and cheese taste like bread, lol (fathead dough, anyone?).

What concerns me most about this issue is that it's the vegans' first relatively successful step towards their goal of discouraging meat production in the future...

If they can get even half the population eating this stuff, farmers and ranchers will find it difficult to continue raising stock.

I think that depends a lot on whether they're craving something similar what they've given up... or if the similar flavor and texture to what they've given up causes them to crave the real thing. If it causes them to crave the real thing, that would be counter productive to their cause.



But it can certainly be a transitional food too, as Bob's friends started out with, and then decided "why eat fake meat?" (For whatever reason - were they eating it because of the lab-created taste because of the taste and texture similar to meat satisfied a craving? Did they give it up because of the irony of going meatless, while intentionally seeking out something that was made specifically to look and taste similar to meat?)



I"m sure this is true for a lot of LC/Keto people.



For me, I was never looking for the taste of bread. For me, it's a matter of trying to recreate the convenience of bread, because bread tastes like cardboard to me these days. But I do like the convenience of being able to eat a burger or chicken salad without a fork - I like being able to put it in between two oopsies, and pick it up with my hands to eat it.


In other cases, I like having a substitute for a traditional food, but not necessarily because the LC part of the substitute itself gives me a a copycat flavor. For instance, I'll make oopsie stuffing, because the chopped up oopsies provide a similar texture and volume to the cubed bread used in stuffing, but it's the flavor of the savory seasonings, chopped onion, and celery (sauteed in butter) that I add to the stuffing mixture which creates the actual flavor I want. Mashed cauli doesn't serve as a substitute for mashed potatoes in any way other than to provide a similarly textured substance (because mashed cauli sure doesn't taste like potatoes!) which is a perfect vehicle for some xanthan thickened gravy Admittedly, the xanthan thickened gravy does taste very similar to flour thickened gravy, but that's primarily due to the flavor of the meat drippings/meat broth.



I do have a few other LC substitute recipes that I use from time to time - usually only at a traditional time of year for that particular food, for a lot of the same reasons mentioned above. The LC versions are also much more satisfying that the foods they replace, because they don't have the carbs of the original, with more protein and fat than the original, which makes them much more satiating than the original.



But it's the same as for a vegan eating fake meat - if a LC substitute just causes cravings for the real thing, that's going to be counterproductive to your goal.

Fake carb = Pollock + binders

Good observation, and that's exactly my point in my first post on this thread. Start the transition even if it's manufactured carbage.

You just haven't eaten the right ones! Dairy Queen (about 25 years ago) had a veggie burger that I really liked. I've also made patties out of beans & carrots for vegetarian friends - they're good, too. The reason I don't eat these anymore is because of the carbs. One of my favorite cookbooks was Laurel's Kitchen - great tasting vegetarian recipes. I still miss lentils.

There is a third reason and it's mental illness.

I had a heck of a time giving up bread - I was a baker, after all! At first I tried all sorts of lc "bread" recipes. They were either too much work or didn't taste or feel like bread. The occasional recipe that reminded me a lot of bread would trigger a craving for the real thing & I would eat too much of it.

The few that I really like I save for special occasions.

I think most veggie burgers depend on the onions and other spices to recreate the burger experience. I haven't been even slightly interested in them in decades so that might have changed.

To do it right, you would have to recreate a plain burger on a bun with no onions, ketchup, mustard, or anything else.

Like Calianna I chose to eat some 'fake bread'. It's still plant sourced so it's not meat masquerading as vegetable so I don't think that counts. I use the fake bread for 2 things

(1) convenience - hand holding a cheeseburger

(2) a vehicle for fat. Most commercial breads are rather tasteless, but saturate peanut butter, dairy butter, olive oil, bacon grease, coconut oil, and other fats/oils on them and they are transformed into something delicious.

I get zero carb bagels and saturate them with Kerry Gold butter, and it's a delightful experience I can't enjoy by eating the melted butter alone.

Bob

Do mentally ill people ever get to do something because they want to? Where does the mental illness let off, and the person begin? I tend to be delusional, when I am, about things I feel strongly about. My last big, florid, manic episode involved the ins and outs of metabolism, especially metabolism pertaining to low carb/ high fat metabolism. That doesn't really tie my interest in this stuff to the mental illness.

On a philosophical level, I'm never comfortable with "it's not him, that's the mental illness speaking." When I'm depressed, it's depressed me speaking, when I'm manic, it's manic me. I never cease to exist when I get all crazy.

And then there's the fact that other folks tend to look at you as if you're totally nuts if they see you pop a pat or two of pure butter into your mouth. But, slather a couple of pats of that same butter onto half a low-carb bagel and eat it and nobody bats an eye.

When people have an aversion to meat and find it repulsive for no apparent reason, then the ones in Europe become radical and actually burn down the meat markets, that's what I was talking about....

I don't think we can tie an ideology down to mental illness, even when it leads to what seems irrational behaviour.

Also no apparent reason--at the very least, some of them have a lot of empathy for the fluffy bunnies. I wouldn't call it no reason, I'd certainly call it inadequate reason for such extreme behaviours. Basically, they've allowed animals into their "Us" and stuck human carnivores into their "Them." I think it's a fairly normal human tendency that leads to all sorts of trouble. It's not just the mentally ill humans who have trouble getting along with other groups of people.

Basically I'm saying, as a member of the mentally ill community, I don't want those guys in my club any more than you want them in yours. Or any more than I think most more reasonable vegans want them in theirs.