To have missed all the fuss over plant-based burgers in the last year, you’d pretty much have to have been living between a bun.
Newspapers, magazines and newscasts have been loaded up with stories about these new additions to the market. Beyond Meat, Lightlife and the Impossible Burger have been the toast of the fastfood town, with well-known chain A&W adding the vegan products to its menu. You can also find them in any grocery store. Further testament to their trendiness: Beyond Meat’s stock jumped from its initial public offering price of $45 in May to a high of $239 in July. It’s since fallen to the low $100s — still a tidy profit for early investors.
Memories of meat with good karma
These burgers are designed to mimic the texture and flavour of beef hamburgers (some even “bleed” beet juice to mimic meat juices as they cook) while potentially being better for the planet. And then there’s the fact that animals don’t have to die to produce them. However, a good portion of the media coverage has centred on whether they’re healthier for you than a regular beef burger.
So are they?
“From a nutrition perspective? No,” says Carol Dombrow, a nutrition consultant at the Heart & Stroke Foundation of Canada.
“These newest plant-based burgers, the ones imitating beef, are ultra-processed. While Canada’s food guide is recommending that we consume plant-based foods more often, I don’t think this is what they were talking about.”
Some plant-based burgers have more saturated fat than a beef burger, but the biggest difference is the sodium.
“A lean ground beef burger [has] 80 milligrams [of sodium] and in these burgers, there are between 370 and 390 milligrams. Then you add the bun.” At one fast-food chain, the bun bumps the sodium level up to 1,100 milligrams.
“That’s a huge red flag, especially for seniors,” Dombrow says. “The prevalence of hypertension is huge. They’re not looking to add sodium to their diet. As people get older, their calorie needs start to reduce and their nutrient needs increase, so everything they choose is important.”
That means focusing on whole, unprocessed foods. As a rule, she says the shorter the ingredient list, the better.
“These burgers have 20 ingredients — and most people won’t know what they are,” Dombrow says.
Not knowing what’s between the bun is Carolyn Waddell’s concern.
“It doesn’t look like a spinach or a bean patty. It’s a bunch of unknown stuff as far as I’m concerned,” says the Ottawa woman. “It looks like something entirely [blown apart] by a machine and patted back together.”
Waddell and her husband closely watch their sugar and sodium intake. They don’t eat fast-food burgers often.
Waddell, who responded to Sage’s online Facebook poll on the subject of meatless burgers, has yet to try one of the new plant-based products, but says she isn’t opposed to doing so.
“It’s only fair. How else can I grumble about it if I haven’t at least tried one? I don’t have anything against them, but they’d have to taste very good and I’d have to be convinced that they’re not unhealthy.”
Pamela Fergusson, a plant-based dietitian in Nelson, B.C., thinks people are missing the point by focusing on whether these burgers are healthy.
“These aren’t something I’d describe as a healthy food,” she says. “Unless you’re making your own black bean quinoa burger, then no one is fooling themselves.”
More to the point, she asks: When going out for burgers, does anyone really think that it’s a meal that’s healthy?
“I think people understand they’re a bit of a splurge. Think of these similarly to the night you order pizza or go out for Chinese food. It’s a processed food that’s high in sodium and fat, and does contain some preservatives.”
However, one advantage is fibre, something meat burgers don’t contain.
Fergusson says while people are “obsessed with protein,” despite almost everyone getting enough of it, only five per cent of Canadians meet their daily fibre requirements.
Within six months of introducing the Beyond Burger in Canada, distribution has grown to more than 4,000 stores.
Rather than simply focusing on one food, she stresses the importance of looking at our entire diet. Nutrition is based on what is eaten overall, so if someone wants to have a meatless burger, the bigger picture looks at what else is on their plate and what else they’re eating for the rest of the day.
All told, Fergusson says there’s nothing on the ingredient list of the new plant-based burgers that raises red flags for her.
That hasn’t stopped some consumer groups from fear-mongering, however. The Center for Consumer Freedom, a U.S.-based PR firm financially supported in part by meat producers, has been running a campaign that includes full-page ads in newspapers such as the New York Times to stoke fears about plant-based burgers. Many of them ask: “What’s hiding in your plant-based meat?”
“They’re really trying to scare people with a list of ingredients in plant-based foods,” Fergusson says. “They try to make those ingredients sound as scary as possible, and find ways to twist ingredients to make it sound dangerous. But the reality is they’re common in all processed foods, including those that contain meat.”
Beyond Meat says its products are made with “simple, plant-based ingredients and without any GMOs (genetically modified organisms), soy, gluten or artificially produced ingredients.” Those ingredients include purified pea protein, coconut and canola oils, rice protein, potato starch and beet juice extract for colour.
Further, the company says its products are free of other elements in animal protein that have faced criticism, including heme iron, inflammatory stimulants, cooking-induced carcinogenic compounds, hormones, antibiotics, as well as what the USDA refers to as “residual” contaminants from the production process that can appear in some commercial meats. Meanwhile, Beyond Meat’s production method involves heating, cooling and pressure — “the same three steps used to make pasta.”
Sometimes, you just don’t want the meat
Association member Colleen Milton Hasiak transitioned to a whole food, plant-based diet years ago, as she has kidney disease that benefits from a low-protein diet. She doesn’t label herself as vegan, as she still occasionally has mayo on her asparagus sandwiches and doesn’t refuse the odd piece of birthday cake made with eggs.
“When I go home to the East Coast and my 93-year-old uncle is cooking lobster, I also don’t want to have to explain why I don’t eat animal products,” says the Windsor, Ont., woman.
As she phased out meat, she also did away with processed foods. But she’s not opposed to an occasional plant-based burger.
“I love to cook and prefer to cook at home, but if I’m out with friends, I will eat a burger that’s been commercially prepared and contains things I normally wouldn’t consume. Just because we’re not meat eaters doesn’t mean we don’t like burgers. We just don’t want the meat.”
Hasiak has heard people ask — as they often did in our Federal Retirees Facebook poll results — why vegans would want to eat burgers? She says when people are uninformed, that is often their immediate reaction.
“I think it’s the name ‘burgers’ people have difficulty with. I think they would be happy if those of us who weren’t eating meat would find a new word.”
That’s probably not going to happen, nor are these plant-based products going away any time soon. Quite the contrary, it would appear. “The generations coming up behind us are definitely more interested in whole foods and plant-based diets,” Hasiak says. “And it’s not just for the health benefits, but for the environment. There is more of a move to eliminate animals as a source of food for ethical reasons — the good of the planet and the animals. I see that in our kids.”
Fergusson says plant-based burgers require a lot less water and don’t produce greenhouse gases — unlike cows, which release large amounts of methane. And from a welfare perspective, removing animals from the equation is a plus for many people.
“There is a shift afoot,” she says. “These companies are going to continue to improve their products. The technology will improve, they’ll be able to make them cheaper, with better ingredients and they will more closely resemble meat.”
Beyond Meat is committed to “a rigorous cycle of rapid and relentless innovation to make our products even better when it comes to taste, nutrition and price,” but demand has already been strong.
“Within six months of introducing the Beyond Burger in Canada, distribution has grown to more than 4,000 stores,” the company said in a statement.
Fergusson points to plant-based milk as an example of the potential for growth. A decade ago, the alternatives to cow’s milk were soy and rice milk. Now stores have rows of options.
“Even people who eat animal products still buy plant-based milk. That’s what’s happening with meat alternatives,” she says. “They’re widely purchased by omnivores [who] want to have a plant-based meal a few times a week.”
She encourages people to try the products and have fun with them.
“But if you’re looking for real healthy benefits, enjoy them with whole foods — fruits, vegetables, nuts, seeds, beans and lentils.”
After all, the plants that will give you the biggest nutritional bang for your buck don’t come in a package.