Beyond Meat Burger Review

This product is hotter than Hansel right now so I thought I’d give it a review.

Overview:

It’s made out of PEOPLE! Just kidding. It’s mostly peas.

Since the dawn of veggie burgers, vegans can attend barbecues without feeling left-out. And I’m all for that. I like hosting and encouraging my guests to enforce their nutrition boundaries. Be ye vegan, an abstainer from booze, nut-free, or an eater of oysters (gross); you are welcome in my home….which may smell like charred flesh at any given moment.

Ultimately this product exists b/c it sells (for now). Vegan products are a billion-dollar industry. They are also highly-profitable I might add. it costs but a shillings to make a veggie burger.

What’s in “Beyond Meat”?

Well, a bunch of peas, industrial fibres, and some fats. From their website: “Water, Pea Protein Isolate*, Expeller-Pressed Canola Oil, Refined Coconut Oil, Rice Protein, Natural Flavors, Mung Bean Protein, Methylcellulose, Potato Starch, Apple Extract, Salt, Potassium Chloride, Vinegar, Lemon Juice Concentrate, Sunflower Lecithin, Beet Juice Extract (for color), Pomegranate Fruit Powder, Lycopene Color (from Tomato)”

How cow. Water is the first ingredient? Otherwise, not too shabby. Nothing harmful.

Macros:

Good for you Beyond Meat! 20 grams of protein is a decent amount!

But the problem here is buns. Not my buns of course, they are my best feature. I mean a bun having about 25-40 grams of carbohydrate. So if you ate two Beyond Meat patties and two buns, you’re up at 100 grams of carb, (400 calories) so this is “beyond” a healthy carb portion (for most adults) which is about 25-50 grams per meal.

Ok, so you only get one bun I guess. But then you’re only getting 20 grams of protein. Ideally we get about 30 grams of protein at a meal.

So….. two patties and one bun? Ya, that’s the ticket! Oddly enough, that’s the same strategy I employ when I eat beef burgers. If I’m trying to lose weight, it’s no buns.

Remember – two patties, one bun. 

With beef patties it is a bit easier to control your protein and carbs. But they have saturated fat and that’s not good.

That all being said, most people who set out to eat burgers aren’t thinking:

“Ok, sweet, after these burgers, my abs are going to be shredded, and I’m going to live forever.”

So from a binary perspective, Beyond Meat patties are healthier than beef burgers because they have less saturated fat and less calories. They are a balanced food item

Taste

This is personal so I’m not getting into it. Google the amazon reviews however if you’d like to see a split audience. The smell isn’t particularly good apparently.

I eat beef but I buy it mostly from small farms so I hope the cows eat better so the meat is healthier. I also hope they are treated well, but at some point, ya, they are killed. I also hope that my high vegetable intake, fish oil, and activity level will prevent me from getting heart disease, despite some days I surpass the recommendations for saturated fat.

Lastly I want to mention that I want people to keep an open mind about food. It’s ok to be partly vegan, or to change how you eat (going from Paleo to Vegan or visa versa). We should be agnostic about our nutrition as my colleagues say. Support your friends in their nutrition journeys. And do not cite Netflix documentaries in arguments about food.

Try new things and try to eat healthy. If you want to eat super-healthy, come see me.

Thanks!

Kb