Stop trying to mimic meat products, it’s a losing battle and will always be inferior. Stop trying to fit foods into a meat “alternative” product that just sucks in comparison to the original, but you try to justify as being “almost the same”, it’s never even close. It’s easily the main reason so many people won’t even consider vegan options, they’re constantly being lied to and resent that.
Embrace the ingredients and use them in ways that actually make sense. You don’t need to replace meat products for people to try an alternative diet, you just need to have other good options. Many vegan restaurants have absolutely delicious and filling food, it’s never the options that try to replace a burger though. It’s the foods designed from the ground up to be vegan and embracing what the ingredients actually are.
Edit: What a surprise, down voted by the vegan brigade refusing to accept any sort of criticism that their replacements usually suck. Coming to defend poor imitations instead of just acknowledging that some foods don’t need to be replaced, and that attempting to do so just steers people away from alternatives entirely.
I never said that alternatives weren’t good. In fact I said the exact opposite. That the alternatives need to be treated as their own thing, not a replacement for a meat product. But the knee jerk reaction to downvote anything perceives as anti-vegan is just too strong apparently. And you all wonder why people make fun of the vegan culture. It’s almost as bad as Linux fanboys or League of Legends players.
But all it does is remind people how it’s not any of those things. It’s like an uncanny valley for food; the more like meat you make it the more attention you draw to all the ways it’s not. If you make it look like something else people will compare it to that thing instead of judging it on its own merit.
And yet this post is literally trying to replace a hotdog. From the image, not just as a replacement for the role of the meat, but trying to mimic the hotdog in its entirety.
There’s nothing contrarian here. I’m saying a vegan hot dog trying to imitate a regular one will be bad. Make vegan food that’s actually good and embraces what it is made out of instead of trying to replace a regular meat item.
The fact there are responses here literally saying to lie to people about what they’re being fed is insane.
Will a vegan hot dog probably not be as tasty as the real thing? Yeah, but if you’re vegetarian/vegan you occasionally have a hankering for a hot dog, and this can get you at least halfway there, who cares? Don’t be an ass and insult what people want to eat just because it offends your sensibilities, which seems to be the main reason people are down voting you.
Will a vegan hot dog probably not be as tasty as the real thing? Yeah
I actually find the vegan alternatives taste better than the meat based ones (I’m thinking primarily about burgers, the vegan hotdogs/sausages I tried some years ago were borderline inedible).
I was thinking more the smartdogs, or whatever they’re called, not the greatest (texture is fine but the taste is pretty off) rather than sausages. Those do usually satisfy that hankering for a hot dog if you add katsup, mustard, onions and whatever else you want on a dog, even if they aren’t as good as the sausages (which I agree are pretty good).
vegan hot dog trying to imitate a regular one will be bad
But it’s not bad. It’s good. It’s like really good.
It’s good enough to take a picture of and share online. It’s good enough to see online and make your mouth water. It’s good enough that I plan my meals to get some, and I’m looking forward to eating two of my own on Monday (pictured):
If you just don’t like it, that’s fine. That’s your taste, and I’m not going to try and tell you that your taste is wrong because that’s totally subjective.
I don’t like tempeh, but I’m not going to go around saying tempeh sucks and you should stop enjoying it, because that’s just debating a matter of taste.
it’s never the options that try to replace a burger
I generally agree with you, but I actually disagree on this specific example. It’s not fake meat burgers that I think are good, though, it’s black bean burgers. They’re just their own thing and they’re awesome.
Yeah the shape is what causes the confusion maybe. I remember they were but nearly as good back in the day, but now you’ve got all kinds of interesting herbs and spices, because people have figured out that it doesn’t need to taste like meat to be good.
The shape is high tier, though. Perfect for dressing with all kinds of kooky things that would not fit in a sandwich
Vegan sausages and hotdogs are like the only plant based alternatives that taste like the real thing because 90% of the flavor is just the seasonings you use anyway. Use the same seasonings, find the right texture (mushrooms and breading work well), and you’ve got a good plant-based sausage or hotdog.
The problem is those same additives that make a hotdog what it is, are the ones that make it horrible for your health. Let’s not get close enough to hot dog to make it equally bad for us
Eh, since going vegetarian in the past year or so, I’ve found that a lot of the meat substitutes actually are pretty good, depending on how you use them. It’s not usually so perfect that one cannot truly tell, sure, unless it’s a dish where the meat flavor is heavily affected by spices and similar like with chili, but I’ve definitely found types of substitute bacon, or burgers, or ground meat that taste quite good. Though in my experience it’s usually been the cheaper or simpler ones, like black bean burgers or tempeh bacon, that taste best. Not the same, but similar enough to be tasty in broadly similar ways.
A vegan sausage can very much be its own thing, both tofu and seitan have their own distinct flavour profile. While there certainly are fake meat sausages, you cannot just assume it is one because of its shape, the same way a meat sausage isn’t just a fake cucumber.
Sorry but I absolutely hate this take. I stopped eating meat about 15 years ago, but I grew up on meat-based dishes, and I occasionally like to eat stuff from my childhood, just without the meat. It literally doesn’t affect you at all, but you still find the need to tell me that I’m wrong for eating what I enjoy.
I don’t hate them, but I’ve been saying this for years; maybe because I grew up mostly vegetarian, so I find that there are so many interesting flavours other than meat.
Like one local pub here had this great lentil based burger that they stopped making (in-house I’ll add) as soon as Impossible meat came bursting on to the stage.
Now, my partner who was raised eating meat meals all the time loves these fake meats (I like them fine, I mean they are good, compared to what was around 90s definitely!). And I’ve been to the pub with a gaggle of friends and most of the people will get the impossible burger now, which was absolutely not the case before.
So as a gateway for meat eaters to try skipping like one meal of meat and realising they’re fine, I’d say they’re a smashing success.
I know you’re going to be downvoted, but you really underestimate how good hot dogs are at a barbecue.
Serving people salads at a grill outing is a way to lose friends, giving them vegan hot dogs without telling them is a way for them to consider eating less meat. C:
What? Salads at the BBQ are important and kick ass. Salads of fresh, ripe tomato and herbaceous basil with a touch of oil and vinegar, smashed cucumbers with chili powder and black vinegar, watermelon and mint salads, potato salad with a good mustard and dill…
They ain’t the mains at the meal, but they serve a critical function of rounding out the meals and brightening up the plate and palate. Plus they’re packed with vitamins so they help you drink longer in the sun without a nasty hangover the next day.
Point A: never, ever whine about votes. It’s lame as fuck. You take the downs and the ups and whining about the downs, or crowing about the ups is just bullshit.
PointB: I agree with the basics of what you said, but you miss a huge factor. Read on if interested.
I agree wholeheartedly that any commer product throwing vegan in front of a word for another food is bullshit. I even agree that the path to good vegan foods is abandoning the idea that meat needs replacing when there’s entire cuisines that offer amazing food built around non meat, non animal sources.
It is also important to note that not only am I not vegan, I troll vegans occasionally by calling them religious zealots (because the ones that you run into are lol. The nice ones just live their lives and don’t bother anyone.)
However, unless a person is raised without exposure to meat based foods, the truth is that meat is yummy, and a lot of foods that we take for granted and love are either meat based, or contain animal products.
This means that new vegans are trying to figure out how to change their entire life, and need help getting there. And, even as they learn more about plant based diets, they’ll be having people they love that still eat meat, and substitutes become a form of good manners. Having substitutes isn’t a bad thing. Again, I make fun of the jerk vegans, but being able to choose what kind of ingredients go into what I’m eating is a huge plus.
But how is anyone supposed to run searches for recipes without the word vegan being involved? “Non animal product sausages” is going to bring back wildly different hits than “vegan hotdogs”.
The vegans I know (and cook vegan food for) did eventually transition away from a reliance on “replacement” dishes. But it’s a process and it’s one that means they’ll miss some of their old favorites unless they do make these kind of things.
Point C: dude, don’t rub your pet peeves on other people. It’s rude.
Stop trying to mimic meat products, it’s a losing battle and will always be inferior. Stop trying to fit foods into a meat “alternative” product that just sucks in comparison to the original, but you try to justify as being “almost the same”, it’s never even close. It’s easily the main reason so many people won’t even consider vegan options, they’re constantly being lied to and resent that.
Embrace the ingredients and use them in ways that actually make sense. You don’t need to replace meat products for people to try an alternative diet, you just need to have other good options. Many vegan restaurants have absolutely delicious and filling food, it’s never the options that try to replace a burger though. It’s the foods designed from the ground up to be vegan and embracing what the ingredients actually are.
Edit: What a surprise, down voted by the vegan brigade refusing to accept any sort of criticism that their replacements usually suck. Coming to defend poor imitations instead of just acknowledging that some foods don’t need to be replaced, and that attempting to do so just steers people away from alternatives entirely.
I never said that alternatives weren’t good. In fact I said the exact opposite. That the alternatives need to be treated as their own thing, not a replacement for a meat product. But the knee jerk reaction to downvote anything perceives as anti-vegan is just too strong apparently. And you all wonder why people make fun of the vegan culture. It’s almost as bad as Linux fanboys or League of Legends players.
the point isn’t to fool people into thinking it’s meat the point is to fill the same role as meat in a dish in terms of texture, protein, etc
But all it does is remind people how it’s not any of those things. It’s like an uncanny valley for food; the more like meat you make it the more attention you draw to all the ways it’s not. If you make it look like something else people will compare it to that thing instead of judging it on its own merit.
sounds like you shouldn’t be buying and eating it, on the other hand I enjoy them and enjoy that they’re not real meat
And yet this post is literally trying to replace a hotdog. From the image, not just as a replacement for the role of the meat, but trying to mimic the hotdog in its entirety.
dude you’re letting “being contrarian” define your whole identity. reconsider your life
There’s nothing contrarian here. I’m saying a vegan hot dog trying to imitate a regular one will be bad. Make vegan food that’s actually good and embraces what it is made out of instead of trying to replace a regular meat item.
The fact there are responses here literally saying to lie to people about what they’re being fed is insane.
Will a vegan hot dog probably not be as tasty as the real thing? Yeah, but if you’re vegetarian/vegan you occasionally have a hankering for a hot dog, and this can get you at least halfway there, who cares? Don’t be an ass and insult what people want to eat just because it offends your sensibilities, which seems to be the main reason people are down voting you.
I actually find the vegan alternatives taste better than the meat based ones (I’m thinking primarily about burgers, the vegan hotdogs/sausages I tried some years ago were borderline inedible).
I was thinking more the smartdogs, or whatever they’re called, not the greatest (texture is fine but the taste is pretty off) rather than sausages. Those do usually satisfy that hankering for a hot dog if you add katsup, mustard, onions and whatever else you want on a dog, even if they aren’t as good as the sausages (which I agree are pretty good).
But it’s not bad. It’s good. It’s like really good.
It’s good enough to take a picture of and share online. It’s good enough to see online and make your mouth water. It’s good enough that I plan my meals to get some, and I’m looking forward to eating two of my own on Monday (pictured):
If you just don’t like it, that’s fine. That’s your taste, and I’m not going to try and tell you that your taste is wrong because that’s totally subjective.
I don’t like tempeh, but I’m not going to go around saying tempeh sucks and you should stop enjoying it, because that’s just debating a matter of taste.
The Glizzy is a form factor for the masses.
I generally agree with you, but I actually disagree on this specific example. It’s not fake meat burgers that I think are good, though, it’s black bean burgers. They’re just their own thing and they’re awesome.
Same with these vegan hotdogs, they have an autentic flavor. In my opinion, they are “a thing” on their own not pretending to replace anything.
Yeah the shape is what causes the confusion maybe. I remember they were but nearly as good back in the day, but now you’ve got all kinds of interesting herbs and spices, because people have figured out that it doesn’t need to taste like meat to be good.
The shape is high tier, though. Perfect for dressing with all kinds of kooky things that would not fit in a sandwich
I agree about black bean burgers. I’m an omnivore but will choose the black bean patty often because they’re just so good.
Yeah, I never liked veggie burgers, but black bean patties are awesome!
…. Although I do like beyond/impossible
Vegan sausages and hotdogs are like the only plant based alternatives that taste like the real thing because 90% of the flavor is just the seasonings you use anyway. Use the same seasonings, find the right texture (mushrooms and breading work well), and you’ve got a good plant-based sausage or hotdog.
I’m not even vegan, btw!
The problem is those same additives that make a hotdog what it is, are the ones that make it horrible for your health. Let’s not get close enough to hot dog to make it equally bad for us
I said seasonings. I mean, sure, too much salt is bad; so just don’t use a fuckton of it.
Isn’t the main health concern due to the nitrite from the curing salts? If there’s no meat to cure, there’s no need for curing salts.
Why not? The seasonings are what makes it taste like a hotdog and I’m not eating a hotdog because it’s healthy. Let people enjoy things.
It tastes good tho.
I like it when the food tastes good.
Eh, since going vegetarian in the past year or so, I’ve found that a lot of the meat substitutes actually are pretty good, depending on how you use them. It’s not usually so perfect that one cannot truly tell, sure, unless it’s a dish where the meat flavor is heavily affected by spices and similar like with chili, but I’ve definitely found types of substitute bacon, or burgers, or ground meat that taste quite good. Though in my experience it’s usually been the cheaper or simpler ones, like black bean burgers or tempeh bacon, that taste best. Not the same, but similar enough to be tasty in broadly similar ways.
A vegan sausage can very much be its own thing, both tofu and seitan have their own distinct flavour profile. While there certainly are fake meat sausages, you cannot just assume it is one because of its shape, the same way a meat sausage isn’t just a fake cucumber.
Sorry but I absolutely hate this take. I stopped eating meat about 15 years ago, but I grew up on meat-based dishes, and I occasionally like to eat stuff from my childhood, just without the meat. It literally doesn’t affect you at all, but you still find the need to tell me that I’m wrong for eating what I enjoy.
I don’t hate them, but I’ve been saying this for years; maybe because I grew up mostly vegetarian, so I find that there are so many interesting flavours other than meat. Like one local pub here had this great lentil based burger that they stopped making (in-house I’ll add) as soon as Impossible meat came bursting on to the stage.
Now, my partner who was raised eating meat meals all the time loves these fake meats (I like them fine, I mean they are good, compared to what was around 90s definitely!). And I’ve been to the pub with a gaggle of friends and most of the people will get the impossible burger now, which was absolutely not the case before.
So as a gateway for meat eaters to try skipping like one meal of meat and realising they’re fine, I’d say they’re a smashing success.
OK dad
I know you’re going to be downvoted, but you really underestimate how good hot dogs are at a barbecue.
Serving people salads at a grill outing is a way to lose friends, giving them vegan hot dogs without telling them is a way for them to consider eating less meat. C:
What? Salads at the BBQ are important and kick ass. Salads of fresh, ripe tomato and herbaceous basil with a touch of oil and vinegar, smashed cucumbers with chili powder and black vinegar, watermelon and mint salads, potato salad with a good mustard and dill…
They ain’t the mains at the meal, but they serve a critical function of rounding out the meals and brightening up the plate and palate. Plus they’re packed with vitamins so they help you drink longer in the sun without a nasty hangover the next day.
It’s always some form of deception.
Just be fucking real.
I’ve had excellent vegan food and no one ever tried to trick me into it.
That’s a good way to lose friends.
Deception is definitely the best way to do things. Don’t want to actually let people know what they’re eating of course.
Never ask what the hot dog is made of :>
Point A: never, ever whine about votes. It’s lame as fuck. You take the downs and the ups and whining about the downs, or crowing about the ups is just bullshit.
PointB: I agree with the basics of what you said, but you miss a huge factor. Read on if interested.
I agree wholeheartedly that any commer product throwing vegan in front of a word for another food is bullshit. I even agree that the path to good vegan foods is abandoning the idea that meat needs replacing when there’s entire cuisines that offer amazing food built around non meat, non animal sources.
It is also important to note that not only am I not vegan, I troll vegans occasionally by calling them religious zealots (because the ones that you run into are lol. The nice ones just live their lives and don’t bother anyone.)
However, unless a person is raised without exposure to meat based foods, the truth is that meat is yummy, and a lot of foods that we take for granted and love are either meat based, or contain animal products.
This means that new vegans are trying to figure out how to change their entire life, and need help getting there. And, even as they learn more about plant based diets, they’ll be having people they love that still eat meat, and substitutes become a form of good manners. Having substitutes isn’t a bad thing. Again, I make fun of the jerk vegans, but being able to choose what kind of ingredients go into what I’m eating is a huge plus.
But how is anyone supposed to run searches for recipes without the word vegan being involved? “Non animal product sausages” is going to bring back wildly different hits than “vegan hotdogs”.
The vegans I know (and cook vegan food for) did eventually transition away from a reliance on “replacement” dishes. But it’s a process and it’s one that means they’ll miss some of their old favorites unless they do make these kind of things.
Point C: dude, don’t rub your pet peeves on other people. It’s rude.