I will not deny that sometimes I do miss eating meat. The other day at lunch I had the vegetarian version (tofu) of mince chicken lettuce wraps at PF Changs – and was somewhat satisfied. I used to laugh at mock meat options, but now I feel that they will help people – meat eaters – be more open to shifting to a more plant-based diet, especially when they realise the destruction their burger is responsible for. And ESPECIALLY when the burgers look like this (!)

This burger by Beyond Meat is 100% plant-based, made of pea protein, yeast extract and coconut oil. They have beetroot juice that makes it reddish, and “bleed”. Although not their first veg burger, it is the first one to be sold in the same refrigerators as meat in the supermarkets, rather than in the frozen foods section. Released into the market only last week, the stock at Whole Foods sold out in an hour! Unfortunately not available outside the US just yet, but surely it will not be long till they are.

The Company was founded by Columbia graduate Ethan Brown about seven years ago. He sold his house and took his family savings to fund Beyond Meat as he realised how unsustainable meat production is.

Dedicated to improving human health, positively impacting climate change, conserving natural resources and respecting animal welfare, their mission is to create mass-market solutions that perfectly replace animal protein with plant protein. The science behind plant-based protein gives you an idea of how they do this. So far we have only explored 8% of the world’s plant-protein that can serve as meat alternatives!  Sales of plant-protein products grew 8.7% from 2014 to 2015, compared to overall sales of food products that grew 3.7% – clearly the demand is growing.

Beyond Meat has seen investments from the likes of Bill Gates and Biz Stone. A NY Times Food critic couldn’t make out the difference between some of the Beyond Meat plant-based meat solutions and real meat!

Eating meat is destroying our planet. If we can make a difference by replacing our meat by something that tastes just like it, why wouldn’t we?