Can't Believe It's Not Meat

Plant-based protein convincing enough to fool carnivores.

- Mischa Moselle

The recent launch of Impossible Burger 2.0 adds to a range of products that increases the options for fitness enthusiasts hoping to drop meat in favour of other protein sources. Beyond Meat were first off the blocks in Hong Kong, coming to the territory in 2018, followed by Impossible Foods. Both are California-based companies producing what can be called artificial, cultured, fake, clean or even in-vitro meat. Other rivals, such as Future Meat Technologies, are based in Israel.

While beef, especially steak, seem to be these companies’ holy grail, there are also new artificial chicken and pork products, such as those from Gardein and Omnipork. Most come in the form of burgers – fast food giant Burger King, who have served a vegetarian burger for decades, is currently trialing an Impossible Burger in a small number of its US outlets.

The incentives for ditching meat in favour of either artificial or plant-based substitutes are many and varied, ranging from dislike of industrial farming to fears around climate change, once elegantly summarised in an Agence France-Presse headline as ‘Cow farts to blame for global warming’.

Teacher and sports enthusiast Kevin Tither is a Hong Kong-based New Zealander with an MSc in Sports Science and Medicine who has been on a plant-based diet for eight years, six as a vegetarian and the last two as vegan.