"The combination of several plants can produce" meat "with appearance and taste. Don't you want to try it? "

Xiao Chen, who lives in Beijing, is a little excited. As a "post-90s" who loves to hunt for novelty, he likes to search all over the capital in his spare time, and then make short videos of his experience to share with netizens.

On this day, he is going to experience the new "plant meat" recently launched by IKEA. According to IKEA, the main protein source of the "vegetable protein meatball" is yellow peas, in addition to oats, potatoes, onions and apples and other ingredients.

"It's said that I've been curious about the taste and taste of the meatballs before "So as soon as it's on the market at the end of November, I want to come and have a taste of it," Chen said

"Net red" plant meat, delicious?

The reporter followed Chen to the IKEA restaurant in Beijing's Xihongmen shopping mall. In front of the restaurant, the poster of plant meat is particularly eye-catching.

During the peak period of weekend dining, 45 people bought vegetable meat during the 30 minute observation period.

"We came here with a taste of fresh food." In the restaurant, a woman with children told reporters, "seeing the news that this plant meat is on the market, I want to take my baby to have a taste. I think it tastes good. If I don't say it's made of plants, I may not be able to tell it out, but if I taste it carefully, there is still a difference. "

According to the reporter's experience, the appearance of vegetable meatballs is no different from that of ordinary meatballs, and they also have a unique flavor of meat. Although the chewing feeling is slightly different from that of real meat, the overall taste is very close to that of meat.

"I used to love the meatballs here and wanted my father to try them, but he was a vegetarian, so I brought my dad as soon as the plant meat came out." Said a woman at a table next to the reporter.

Asked about the taste experience, the woman's father commented: "it's better than some vegetarian meat."

While satisfying the taste buds, avoiding the overweight, obesity, high blood pressure and other health problems caused by eating a lot of meat - the original intention of the birth of plant meat is to let "no meat, no joy" and "healthy diet" coexist. But now, plant meat seems to be a new "net red", which makes many diners, including non vegetarians, scramble to try.

In supermarkets and food stores, more and more vegetable meat is found. Non animal husbandry "meat" made by molecular technology, adding some colorants and seasoning agents, has become a vegetable protein meat that tastes like animal meat.

Due to the large population base and meat consumption, China's market is a promising potential market for vegetable meat industry. Take IKEA as an example. Krista Boyer, IKEA's U.S. Food and beverage director, once told the media that by the end of fiscal year 2022, IKEA plans to make up 20% of its catering sales from plant-based products.

Plant meat vs animal meat, which is more nutritious?

Compared with animal meat, the "inborn advantage" of plant meat seems obvious. It contains plant dietary fiber and is completely cholesterol free.

Compared with traditional vegetarianism, plant meat is added with more nutrients, such as iron, zinc, niacin, riboflavin, etc.

In this way, plant meat seems to be the common gospel of carnivores and vegetarians who pay attention to healthy diet.

"If you have plant meat, you can be very particular about vegetarianism. You can't do with it at all." A netizen commented, "I want all the texture, flavor, appearance and taste."

However, plant meat is not "full of treasure". Jiang zhuoqin, a professor at the school of public health of Sun Yat sen University, told the media: "in theory, there is no problem to replace vegetable meat with vegetable protein. But if you want to achieve the flavor of beef and mutton, there is a problem with the seasoning added. Natural food diversification is good for health

Compared with real meat, vegetable meat has more additives and belongs to refined food. The sodium content in meat of many plants in the market is too high. According to the inspection of Hong Kong Consumer Council, 60% of vegetarian meat (plant meat) in Hong Kong is high in sodium and fat.

In addition, although the protein content of plant meat is high, its human absorption rate is still lower than that of animal protein. The composition of animal protein is similar to that of human body, and the kinds of amino acids provided by animal protein are also necessary for human body. Therefore, animal protein is superior to plant protein in digestibility and quality.

It is worth mentioning that vegetable meat is not cheap at present. Take IKEA as an example, the price of bagged vegetable meatballs retailed in the food house was 39.9 yuan, higher than the classic meatballs of 32.9 yuan. The price of a 220 gram vegetable patty in China is 66 yuan, and the price of beef pie with the same weight is about 30 yuan.

How environmentally friendly is meat?

Although it is impossible to "completely crush" the real meat in terms of nutrients, the heat of vegetable meat has remained high in recent two years.

Since this year, KFC, Starbucks and other brands have launched plant meat food. Just last month, McDonald's announced that it would launch a new product line of vegetable meat in 2021, including hamburgers, chicken substitutes and breakfast sandwiches.

In China, the local brand of plant meat products are also entering the market. In the supermarket stores of RT mart, Auchan and HEMA Xiansheng, as well as e-commerce platforms such as tmall and meituan, quick-frozen foods such as dumplings, spring rolls and meat cakes made from vegetable meat have been put on the shelves for sale.

China's China Animal trend insight of novel coronavirus pneumonia shows that 86% of consumers will change or consume meat products habits, with 21% of consumers having the idea of gradually replacing other animal meat products with other proteins. 47% of Chinese consumers are willing to choose vegetable meat in Chinese style restaurants, according to the 2020 trend of artificial infection.

Plant meat seems to have become the "new expensive" meat. So, is this kind of food made from plant raw materials environmentally friendly?

According to statistics, animal husbandry is an important source of greenhouse gas and ammonia emissions. According to the data of the food and Agriculture Organization of the United Nations, about 14.5% of the global greenhouse gas emissions come from livestock, especially cattle.

In addition, even without considering carbon emissions during transportation, 67.6 kilograms of carbon dioxide per kilogram of beef is produced by farming and production. However, the carbon dioxide emission per kilogram of soybeans varies from 2kg to 4kg, which is dozens of times larger.

Eating plant meat can really help reduce global greenhouse gas emissions. According to the report released by the United Nations, if human beings want to control greenhouse gas emissions, adjusting the diet structure is also an important part. Reduce meat intake and increase vegetable intake, so as to reduce carbon emissions caused by land resources, forage and fertilizer consumption.

Taking the United States as an example, replacing meat with plant-based food can save about 29 million hectares of arable land, 3 billion kg of nitrogen fertilizer and 280 billion kg of carbon dioxide emissions every year.

It can be seen that even though there are still many problems to be solved in the vegetable meat industry, such as further optimizing the nutrition, reducing the cost and improving the taste, it is undeniable that the birth of plant meat is an innovation and provides a new choice for consumers.

So, are you willing to buy Plant meat for environmental protection?

Source: China Environment News