As a vegetarian, I understand why meat substitutes (substances that attempt to approximate the experience of eating meat — in taste, texture, and visual appearance) aren’t for everyone.
Some people question why an individual who doesn’t eat meat would even want to eat something that attempts to replicate meat. Others are more concerned with the highly processed nature of many of them, and understandably so: Most meat substitutes probably shouldn’t be a part of every meal (just like meat!). They’re filled with firming agents, stabilizers, additives, and ingredients you can barely read aloud, much less identify.
Of course, there are a number of different reasons why people choose not to eat meat at all (or eat less meat) and, correspondingly, a number of reasons why people might be looking for ingredients with meat-like characteristics.
(To make sure we’re on the same page: I wouldn’t relegate tofu to the role of meat substitute. It might have been introduced to audiences in the United States as such, but tofu was never intended to be a replacement for meat where it originated, in Asia — and let’s be honest, tofu is good [it is!], but saying ... Read more
