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Category: Vegan

  • Formula One Champion Lewis Hamilton Invests in ‘Vet-Formulated’ Vegan Pet Food Startup

    lewis hamilton vegan
    4 Mins Read

    Lewis Hamilton has made a second investment in plant-based pet food startup Bramble to raise awareness about vegan diets’ impact on dog health.

    Formula One legend Lewis Hamilton and his dog Roscoe have partnered with New York-based Bramble, which makes vegan pet food products formulated by vets.

    Hamilton has invested in the brand to promote the “positive and transformative impact” of a whole-food plant-based approach to dog health. Roscoe, meanwhile, has taken up the mantle of ‘chief taste officer’ for the brand.

    “As someone who’s continuously looking to improve my health and find the right food to keep my energy levels up, I think we should look to do the same for our pets, and I want to give Roscoe the best ingredients to keep him healthy and active,” said Hamilton, who is famously vegan. “Bramble ticked all the boxes for me.”

    Bramble declined to comment on the investment sum, its expansion strategy, or future plans.

    Lewis Hamilton’s dog saw health improvements on vegan diet

    Hamilton is known for investing in future-facing food brands, having backed vegan fast-food chain Neat, plant-based food player NotCo, and vertical farming startup Bowery. Before his latest investment in Bramble, he had been part of the pet food brand’s $1.5M Series A round last year, according to Pitchbook.

    “This extends beyond a traditional investment for me, as this is a space I care deeply about and am excited to support,” said the seven-time Formula One world champion. “It’s great to see how far plant-based food has come in the last five years, and I look forward to working with the passionate and dedicated team at Bramble to spread the message about how beneficial a plant-based diet can be for our dogs.”

    Roscoe, a 12-year-old bulldog, was first introduced to a vegan diet in 2020. Since then, he was found to have experienced significant health improvements, including higher energy, a shinier quote, and healthier skin. This led Hamilton to Bramble, whose brand is centred around dog health and longevity, and named after a vegan border collie who lived for 25 years, one of the longest canine lifespans ever recorded.

    bramble pets
    Courtesy: Bramble

    An increasing number of studies are showing the benefits of a plant-based diet for dogs. One paper found that plant-based diets had the “best health outcomes” in dogs, linked to lower medication use, fewer health disorders, and less frequent visits to the vet compared to meat-heavy diets.

    The research came weeks after the British Veterinary Association reversed its long-held position on the health effects of a vegan diet for dogs, recognising that it’s possible to feed them on a fully vegan diet, as long as they’re nutritionally complete.

    “As omnivores, dogs are able to get their nutrients from a plant-based diet if formulated correctly,” noted Amanda Rolat, founder and CEO of Bramble. “I’m looking forward to working with Lewis and Roscoe to raise awareness for Bramble in a genuine, creative, and fun way.”

    Bramble outperformed meat-based kibble in trial

    “I created Bramble because I truly believe that dogs and their caregivers deserve access to complete and balanced food that is nutritionally packed, while also being free from pesticides, antibiotics, growth hormones, carcinogens, and other harmful contaminants,” said Rolat.

    She founded the startup in 2021 after being unable to find a pet food brand that delivered what she was looking for. Bramble offers two meals – The Cowbell and The Roost – and two treats, all targeted at the premium market.

    The Cowbell uses a base of pea protein, sweet potatoes, lentils, carrots, peas, and apples, while the Roost pairs the pea protein with brown rice, potatoes, carrots, peas, and pumpkins. Each product has “more high-quality protein than most commercial dog food”, according to the brand, and exceeds the complete and balanced diet standards set by the Association of American Feed Control Officials (AAFCO).

    In 2023, researchers at the University of Illinois conducted an independent feeding trial with Bramble’s two products and a leading chicken kibble brand, and found that the vegan formulations significantly lowered cholesterol and triglycerides, and promoted a healthier microbiome.

    lewis hamilton dog
    Courtesy: Bramble

    Bramble is among a number of companies innovating in the increasingly popular vegan pet food sector, a $13.6B market. These include Wild Earth, The Pack, Hownd, Noochies!, and Omni, among others. Mars Petcare, meanwhile, is co-leading an initiative in Asia to help human food startups develop sustainable options for pets.

    This is facilitated by growing awareness about the environmental impact of meat consumption. Livestock farming is responsible for twice as many emissions as plant-based foods, and up to 20% of global greenhouse gas emissions – pets alone are thought to consume 20% of all meat produced.

    This has also spurred several cultivated meat brands focused on pet food, including Meatly (which received regulatory approval in the UK in July), Friends & Family Pet Co., Noochies!, and BioCraft Pet Nutrition.

    The post Formula One Champion Lewis Hamilton Invests in ‘Vet-Formulated’ Vegan Pet Food Startup appeared first on Green Queen.

    This post was originally published on Green Queen.

  • Nuggs Maker Simulate Bought By Ahimsa Companies After Period of Uncertainty for the ‘Tesla of Chicken’

    simulate nuggs
    5 Mins Read

    Vegan chicken startup Simulate, famous for its Nuggs, has been acquired by Ahimsa Companies to get the business back on track after months of (dis)quiet.

    Simulate, the plant-based meat brand known for its meme-famous Nuggs, has been taken over by Ahimsa Companies, a recently formed holding company.

    First reported by Axios, the deal is a combination of cash and equity (the amount was undisclosed), and will be used to help the startup return to shelves and consumer’s plates. In recent months, its products have reportedly disappeared from grocery stores, leaving many wondering whether the business was going under.

    Having raised $57M already, Simulate chose to find a buyer rather than try and secure more money in an increasingly difficult funding environment for plant-based meat companies.

    It comes months after Ahimsa Companies, which is affiliated with the Ahimsa Foundation, bought vegan food brand Wicked Kitchen and its subsidiaries Good Catch and Current Foods for an undisclosed sum.

    simulate ahimsa companies
    Courtesy: Simulate/Green Queen

    Simulate’s journey from lockdown-favourite to recent struggles

    Simulate first came on the scene in 2018, with founders Ben Pasternak and Sam Terris banking on the company’s tech-forward software-like approach – which involves constantly improving its formula and publishing its updates – to win customers over.

    The social-media-savvy brand became (in)famous for controversial taglines such as ‘the Tesla of chicken’ and ‘Kill you slower’, leaning it to a silly-yet-serious approach that left a lot of impressions (and memes). The startup’s investors include Reddit co-founder Alex Ohanian, hip-hop legend Jay-Z, and frozen food behemoth McCain Foods.

    The brand blew up during Covid-19, with its frozen chicken nuggets reaching online consumers at a time when most other vegan alternatives were only available in retail stores. By the end of 2021, its annual revenue hit $8M.

    Simulate had also introduced vegan chicken breast, tenders, strips, cutlets, and the now-discontinued discs, and was once valued at $250M. But then, at the end of 2023, Pasternak stepped down as CEO (remaining as chairman), with Terris (who was COO) taking over.

    “This was a decision Ben and I made together over many months, and we ultimately aligned that this would be best for Simulate as we scale up our new technology,” Terris told Forbes at the time.

    In the last few months, things have been muted. The brand’s social media – its best marketing too – had largely gone quiet, with no posts since the end of June. The previous two were related to a new product, Insta-Chicken, that the brand said it would release online (but can’t be seen on its website now).

    This led many fans online to wonder if this was it for Simulate. “Are you still going to make nuggets? The stores near me(in Philly)have stopped carrying them & I read you might be getting rid of them,” wrote one Instagram user. On a Reddit thread titled ‘Has Simulate Nuggs Gone Out of Business?’, customers said the brand’s website was down at one point, and its products could no longer be found on shelves.

    Now, the mystery is out, and it seems Simulate is getting back on its feet. “We’ve spent the last year searching extensively for the right mission-aligned partner to help push Simulate’s technology forward. We found our match in Ahimsa,” Terris wrote on LinkedIn. “Feeling especially grateful today for our team (past and present), the Board, our investors, and NUGGS fans everywhere.”

    Ahimsa Companies looks to amp up M&As

    Ahimsa Companies’s takeover of Simulate is the latest in an increasingly lengthy list of M&A deals in the plant-based sector, and the food tech industry overall. Research has shown that M&A activity in the food business reached an eight-year-high in the first four months of this year. And in Q2, the number of deals was up by a third compared to the same period last year.

    Vegan chicken startup VFC’s evolution into the Vegan Food Group, a holding company that now owns Meatless Farm, Clive’s Purely Plants and Tofutown, is one of the most prominent examples of the importance of consolidation in the plant-based meat sector, which has faced sales and investment declines since the tail-end of the pandemic.

    “There’s been a lot of cash deployed to develop great products, brands and technology, but not under the right economic conditions to thrive,” Ahimsa Companies CEO Matthew Tullman told Axios. “To carry forth the plant-based movement, consolidation is really required.”

    He outlined why driving the industry forward is important. “It is impossible to conceive of a future (in which) we can feed seven-to-10 billion humans on an animal-based diet,” he said, noting that he still has hopes for “a plant-forward future”, but the industry doesn’t work well with the typical venture capital timeline anymore.

    Tullmann confirmed that Ahimsa Companies had no operational overlap with the Ahimsa Foundation, whose head Satish Karandikar is an investor in the holding company, and which led a funding round for alternative protein startup Eat Just last year.

    As part of a roll-up strategy, Ahimsa Companies is now looking at companies in the precision fermentation, cultivated meat, extruded pea protein, non-dairy alternative, and plant-based food segments – it already has two larger deals in the pipeline, according to Axios. Additionally, it has bought a 50,000 sq ft factory in Ohio to produce meat analogues.

    vegan chicken nuggets
    Courtesy: Nectar

    The vegan nugget category is lucrative, but also overcrowded and highly competitive. In the US alone, there are 20 brands of plant-based chicken nuggets, such as Gardein, Quorn, Beyond Meat Impossible, Jack & Annie’s, Alpha Foods, Daring, MorningStar Farms, Yves, Rebellyous, LikeMeat and Boca – and that’s before you get to private-label brands. That has made it hard for companies to stand out, and some, like Nowadays, have exited the space.

    Simulate seemed to have been facing a similar squeeze. But it will be buoyed by the takeover, and the fact that people love vegan nuggets – more so than even the conventional thing. In a recent taste test, more meat-eaters liked plant-based nuggets made by a leading brand (70%) than chicken-based versions (53%), and Simulate was among four other companies identified as the leaders.

    “Generally, breaded and fried plant-based meat categories receive higher ratings than non-breaded and fried categories,” explained Caroline Cotto, director of Nectar, which carried out the research. “These products stood out for their superior flavour, which was most central to overall liking.”

    The post Nuggs Maker Simulate Bought By Ahimsa Companies After Period of Uncertainty for the ‘Tesla of Chicken’ appeared first on Green Queen.

    This post was originally published on Green Queen.

  • The Veggie Burger Debate: EU Court Blocks France’s Attempt to Ban Meaty Names On Plant-Based Food Labels

    france ban plant based meat
    5 Mins Read

    The European Court of Justice has rejected France’s proposed ‘veggie burger’ labelling ban, allowing plant-based food producers to continue using meat-like terms on their packaging. What happens next?

    In a major win for the plant-based sector, the European Court of Justice (ECJ) has ruled that no member state can prohibit companies from using terms like ‘veggie burger’, ‘plant-based sausage’ or ‘vegan bacon’ on product labels.

    The ruling is in direct response to a 2023 decree by the French government, which sought to ban the use of such words on plant-based meat packaging following a request from the livestock farming sector. The legislation was suspended by the top court in France, after receiving a complaint from the European Vegetarian Association (EVU), the Association Végétarienne de France, and industry giant Beyond Meat.

    The Conseil d’Etat referred parts of the case to the ECJ, which has now also rejected the ban and returned the dispute to the French court for a final decision.

    The ECJ’s direction, which makes an exception only if very specific conditions are met, has implications for governments and companies across the bloc, and will save the plant-based industry millions in packaging and marketing redesigns.

    Welcoming the ruling, a spokesperson for Beyond Meat told Green Queen: “We are pleased that common sense has prevailed and that the court has recognised the ability of consumers to make their own informed decisions.”

    Rafael Pinto, EU policy manager at the EVU, called it a “no-nonsense conclusion” that would guarantee accurate information to consumers and discourage member states “from attempting to enforce name bans that are ultimately counterproductive, self-damaging and creating greater consumer confusion”.

    ECJ strikes down attempt to restrict inclusion levels of plant protein

    plant based meat labelling ban
    Courtesy: Ale Rodriguez/Valentyna Smordova/Green Queen

    France has tried to impose a labelling ban on plant-based meat twice. The first time, in June 2022, it issued a decree aiming to ban all meat-like terms except ‘burger’, but after complaints from meat-free companies and associations, the French court suspended the decree, arguing that the timeline was too short and wording too vague.

    The second decree, proposed in September 2023, was nearly identical, co-signed by then Prime Minister Élisabeth, then finance minister Bruno Le Maire, and agriculture minister Marc Fesneau. This order looked to ban 21 terms like ‘steak’, ‘beef’, ‘ham’ and even ‘grilled’. Non-compliance, it stated, would result in a fine of up to €1,500 for individuals and €7,500 for companies.

    But it didn’t stop there. The decree named 120 more phrases – like ‘bacon’, ‘sausage’, ‘cooked fillet’ and ‘nuggets’ – that companies could use, only if the amount of plant protein didn’t exceed a maximum limit ranging from 0.5% to 6%. This, of course, meant that no fully meat-free products could use these terms, since they are usually 100% plant proteins.

    The ECJ addressed this caveat too, ruling that countries can’t adopt national measures that determine inclusion levels of plant proteins below which the use of meat-like terms isn’t allowed.

    The decision notes that such bans can be implemented only if a member state legally defines meat products and descriptive terms first, and even then, such a ban would only apply to products manufactured within that country.

    “On the French case specifically, now it will go back to the French courts, where it will be decided whether the decree that started this also creates definitions of meat and descriptive terms, or just bans their use for plant-based products,” Pinto told Green Queen.

    “Since that was not the scope of the decree, it doesn’t seem like it is detailed enough to create the definitions, but the court might think otherwise.”

    Setting a legal definition would harm the EU single market

    eu plant based meat label ban
    Courtesy: Heura

    The global battle over plant-based labelling has been ongoing for years now, with the major argument being that terms like ‘veggie burger’ confuse consumers. But several studies have shown this isn’t the case, with most consumers knowing the difference between plant- and animal-derived proteins. Plant-based companies like Tofurky, Miyoko’s Creamery, Planted, Oatly and NotCo have all won legal battles over product labelling.

    “As France’s Conseil D’etat reviews the ruling, we will continue to argue for and support consumers’ rights to the genuine choice they demand and deserve,” Beyond Meat’s representative said.

    In a statement sent to Green Queen, Nicolas Schweitzer, co-founder and CEO of Paris-based vegan pork startup La Vie (which just raised €25M), said: “We are so thrilled that, on La Vie’s third anniversary and World Animal Day [October 4], the ECJ has ruled in our favour. We can therefore continue using common names such as plant-based bacon and plant-based ham, which are the clearest for consumers.”

    The ECJ’s verdict acknowledged that existing EU law offers sufficient consumer protection, so additional national regulations contradicting this aren’t allowed. As for the legal definition exception, this is a lengthy and complex process that would risk further spiralling into “EU-level harmonisation issues”, the EVU said.

    To do so, member states would need to legally define what constitutes a burger or a sausage. So far, no country has an established legal definition, according to the EVU. “There are customary definitions and industry recommendations, but not nothing legal,” said Pinto.

    “If this goes forward in several member states, the definitions might not match each other due to cultural and linguistic differences, creating problems for consumers and producers with products on the same market under different names, for both meat and plant-based products,” he added. “It may lead to further fragmentation of the EU single market and hinder competitiveness and consumer information.”

    The ECJ’s decision comes four years after the European Parliament rejected an EU-wide ban on meaty terms for plant-based analogues, although MEPs upheld the court’s 2017 ruling that similarly restricted the use of dairy-related words on vegan products.

    “The case of dairy is different since there are legacy EU regulations establishing definitions of what can be considered dairy, contrary to meat alternatives,” Pinto said when asked about efforts to reverse the alt-dairy labelling ban. “EU law would have to change in order for plant-based dairy alternatives to be able to use the same denominations the rest of the world already uses, such as soy or oat milk.”

    The post The Veggie Burger Debate: EU Court Blocks France’s Attempt to Ban Meaty Names On Plant-Based Food Labels appeared first on Green Queen.

    This post was originally published on Green Queen.

  • McDonald’s France Finally Goes Vegan, Offering Veggie McPlant Nuggets With Beyond Chicken

    mcdonalds vegan nuggets
    4 Mins Read

    McDonald’s France is introducing vegan nuggets made from Beyond Meat, its first plant-based option, offered at the same price as conventional chicken.

    Fast-food giant McDonald’s is finally offering a plant-based option in France, its biggest market outside the US.

    The chain will launch Veggie McPlant Nuggets tomorrow at all its 1,500+ outlets in the country, extending its Europe-wide partnership with US vegan leader Beyond Meat. They will be available in four-, six-, nine- and 20-piece servings and as part of various meal deals, all at the same price as conventional McNuggets.

    Unlike previous veggie launches, the vegan chicken nuggets are a permanent menu addition at McDonald’s France, and are designed to attract vegans as well as flexitarians looking to diversify their protein intake.

    McDonald’s looks to build on France’s changing dietary habits

    mcdonalds france vegan
    Courtesy: McDonald’s France

    The vegan McNuggets are a result of a “close collaboration between Beyond Meat and McDonald’s”. They’re made from a base of pea protein and coated in a blend of wheat and corn flours lightly salted with pepper and celery.

    “We chose to innovate with a first offering based on plant proteins, directly inspired by one of our iconic products,” said McDonald’s France CMO Jean-Guillaume Bertola. “With the Veggie McPlant Nuggets, we are responding to the increasing desire of French consumers to diversify their protein intake while never compromising on taste.”

    The national rollout was based on consumer tests conducted by McDonald’s, which “yielded very satisfactory results, particularly regarding quality and flavour”, according to Bertola.

    “The response was unanimous, there was a real craze from our consumers who found a strong resemblance to the iconic nugget,” he told Le Figaro. “We are rather confident about the success of the product,” he added, noting that the meat-free nuggets have “performed very well” in Germany since their early 2023 launch there.

    McDonald’s holds the largest share of France’s increasingly popular fast-food market. In fact, the country has been labelled as the chain’s biggest market after the US. So the launch of a vegan version of one of its most popular products is a marker of the country’s changing dietary habits, and McDonald’s wish to capitalise on the transition.

    In 2023, an EU-wide survey revealed that nearly six in 10 consumers in France had reduced their meat intake in the preceding year. And federal data shows that French people are eating 6% less meat per capita than they did 20 years ago, though overall consumption has still risen.

    Currently, its citizens eat over 700g of meat per week, more than double what’s recommended in Eat-Lancet’s Planetary Health Diet, and 100g higher than the national dietary guidelines. Health and climate experts have been calling for the national recommendations to cut weekly meat consumption by 25% to 450g in the upcoming update.

    And despite the high amounts of meat the French eat, 57% of them say they’d back government policies that cut back on animal protein for human and planetary health.

    Beyond Meat’s European success with McDonald’s

    mcdonald's mcplant
    Courtesy: McDonald’s

    The launch of the Veggie McPlant Nuggets marks an extension of the successful partnership between McDonald’s and Beyond Meat in Europe. While the McPlant burger – made using Beyond Beef – hasn’t quite worked out in the US, it has thrived across the Atlantic.

    Beyond Meat has suffered a rocky couple of years in terms of sales – for example, it posted an 18% decrease in annual revenue in 2023. Despite that, international sales actually grew by the same percentage, largely thanks to the McDonald’s partnership.

    The vegan meat maker’s CEO, Ethan Brown, told investors that the business had witnessed “continued traction at McDonald’s across countries such as Austria, Germany, Ireland, the Netherlands, UK, Malta, Portugal, Slovenia, and Switzerland”.

    With the vegan McNuggets, Beyond Meat’s link-up with McDonald’s is entering France, joining a Veggie lineup comprising burgers such as the McVeggie, Veggie Curry, and Honey Mustard Veggie, as well as the Caesar Salad Veggie. But none of these existing options are suitable for vegans, so the plant-based nuggets are a first for the fast-food chain’s French operation.

    This comes amid a resurgent plant-based industry in the country. Just last week, the EU’s top court ruled against a ban on the use of meat-related words on plant-based packaging, a piece of legislation originally proposed by the French government (which was suspended by the nation’s highest administrative court).

    This came at the same time France’s most popular plant-based meat export, La Vie, closed a €25M funding round, introduced vegan meatballs, and debuted its first national TV ad. And months earlier, despite all the kerfuffle, plant-based food was all the rage at the 2024 Olympics in Paris.

    The post McDonald’s France Finally Goes Vegan, Offering Veggie McPlant Nuggets With Beyond Chicken appeared first on Green Queen.

    This post was originally published on Green Queen.

  • ‘La Vie est Belle’: French Vegan Meat Maker Doubles Funding Pot with €25M Investment, Rolls Out Meatballs

    la vie funding
    4 Mins Read

    Parisian plant-based meat startup La Vie has raised €25M in investment amid a fourfold hike in sales, and announced the launch of vegan meatballs.

    With growing popularity among retail shoppers and an extended foodservice footprint, French food tech player La Vie has attracted more investors to the tune of €25M.

    The funding round involved Zintinus, Sparkfood, Michel Larroche, Arnaud Bachelier, and a crowdfunding campaign with over 3,000 investors, and takes the vegan pork startup’s total financing to €50M, following an investment of the same amount two years ago.

    The funding has coincided with the announcement of La Vie’s meatball range. The company hinted at this latest product line last week, and it has now confirmed the forthcoming launch of its Italian-style and Spicy Asian meatballs. Packaged in 200g bags for €3.90, the meatballs will be available at Carrefour, Leclerc, Auchan, Intermarché, and Franprix stores from October 28.

    Additionally, the startup has launched its first national TV campaign with ad agency Buzzman. The 40-second spot, titled Duel and released on World Animal Day (October 4), is “designed to ignite a nationwide conversation” about meat consumption.

    Sales of La Vie products up by nearly 200%

    la vie meatballs
    A preview of La Vie’s meatball packaging | Courtesy: La Vie

    The five-year-old startup first became famous for its vegan bacon (and viral, wacky marketing drives), and has since expanded its lineup to include ham and sandwiches too. These products have impressed consumers, foodservice operators, and critics alike, with the brand now present in over 8,200 points of sale across Europe (including Pizza Hut) and winning 24 awards for its flagship bacon.

    The company’s sales have grown by 192% in the last 12 months, and it’s targeting a turnover of €19M for 2024 (up from €7.6M last year).

    “We’re not making any money yet. But in a plant-based substitute market that is growing by 14%, we believe it is more relevant to keep focusing on communication and R&D,” La Vie co-founder and CEO Schweitzer said. “With our sales growing by almost 200%, we’re contributing to the development of the market.”

    La Vie’s pitch – that it presents a healthier, animal-free version of France’s favourite meat – resonates with local consumers. Its sales have increased at a time when French people are eating 6% less meat per capita than two decades ago, with pork consumption reaching its lowest levels in this period.

    The French Nutrition Society and the Climate Action Network penned a report in February calling for the national guidelines to suggest cutting weekly meat consumption by at least 25% – a total of 450g, versus the existing 600g recommendation – in the upcoming update. And a global climate change poll last month found that 57% of French people would back government policies to reduce meat-eating.

    And in 2023, an EU-wide survey revealed that nearly six in 10 consumers in France had reduced their meat intake in the preceding year, with health being the primary reason (chosen by 38% of respondents).

    La Vie targets expansion on the back of new ad and EU ruling

    It has been an uncertain time for plant-based proteins, at least for investors. In Europe, plant-based startups secured €553M in 2023, but only managed to bring in €79M in the first half of this year. In the months since, that number hasn’t increased greatly.

    But La Vie’s €25M raise goes against the tide. “This new round of funding is much more than financial support; it is a recognition of our ability to break through the barriers of plant-based products and shake up the codes of tomorrow’s food industry,” said Schweitzer.

    “With the support of our investors, we will continue our mission and keep innovating, without compromising on taste,” he added. “At La Vie, we have always focused on pleasure, and today we are ready to take the next step by strengthening our presence in our current markets and accelerating the expansion of our product range.”

    The investment will allow La Vie to enhance its existing products and create new ones, while expanding its footprint in France and the UK. This year alone, it has landed on the menus of Pizza Hut France, Parisian bakery Maison Landemaine, and retailer Monoprix’s in-store Picadeli. And it has just introduced its smoked ham SKU at Sainsbury’s stores in the UK.

    The company is now investing in sampling and awareness campaigns to reach a wider audience, an effort that will be aided by the new TV ad. It features a man making a ham sandwich as a pig watches from across the table. The man eats the ham while making eye contact with the pig – with theatrical music amping up the drama – before viewers see the words “Relax, it’s plant-based”.

    The development also came the same week the EU’s top court ruled against a ban on the use of meat-related words on plant-based packaging. It had been proposed by the French government, but suspended by the nation’s highest administrative court, which referred it to the European Court of Justice.

    It means La Vie can continue to call its vegan products ‘bacon’, ‘ham’, and now ‘meatballs’ on its packaging, a major win in a major week for the brand.

    The post ‘La Vie est Belle’: French Vegan Meat Maker Doubles Funding Pot with €25M Investment, Rolls Out Meatballs appeared first on Green Queen.

    This post was originally published on Green Queen.

  • Vegan Dairy Queen Miyoko Schinner Is Teaching A Homemade Plant-Based Cheese Masterclass

    meet the vegans miyoko schinner
    5 Mins Read

    Miyoko Schinner, a pioneer of the plant-based dairy space, is the latest instructor to teach a course at online learning platform Meet The Vegans.

    Months before the launch of her seventh cookbook, Miyoko Schinner is back doing what she best loves: making dairy-free cheese.

    Two years after she left the brand she founded, Miyoko’s Creamery, Schinner has joined forces with online learning platform Meet The Vegans to lead a masterclass on all things plant-based dairy.

    The course is inspired by the forthcoming book The Homemade Vegan Creamery, whose recipes and techniques will form the basis of the digital cooking class, which will feature cheeses, butter, and snacks made from leftover ingredients.

    Schinner has been making and selling plant-based cheese for decades, but the latest cookbook contains “new ways to make cheese, using fermentation and coagulation”, and ingredients she hasn’t publicly explored before.

    “I’ve gotten back into the kitchen over the last year, back on the bench, and I have been working and innovating all these new recipes on making fresh and hard cheeses using a variety of plant milks, whether it’s watermelon seeds or sunflower seeds,” she said.

    Miyoko Schinner looks to promote artisanal vegan cheese

    The course, which will set you back $149 and features over 30 videos, has a range of innovative cheeses devised by Schinner. The Golden Sunshine cream and mascarpone are meant for both sweet and savoury dishes, the Reggie vegan goat’s cheese is a chèvre-style offering, joined by another French favourite, a truffle-infused vegan brie.

    There’s also an Angel’s sharp Cheddar made from potatoes, and a watermelon seed mozzarella. Schinner will also be teaching participants how to make culinary butter with high-fat content for baking, cooking and spreading. And for all the pulp leftover from making the base milks and cheeses, she has devised a recipe for zero-waste crackers.

    “Plant-based cheeses today, commercially, are sometimes… I would have to classify them as ultra-processed foods. A lot of the stuff that’s available today is unfortunately just made out of oil and starch. You know, usually the worst forms of oil,” Schinner told the Meet The Vegans podcast.

    “And so I can’t really recommend them, which is why I really thought that it was important to try to discover a new way to make cheese, embracing whole foods,” she added, outlining how she ended up publishing her 2012 title, Artisan Vegan Cheese.

    She added that vegan cheesemakers around the world are now taking a more whole-food-forward approach. “Collaborating with Meet The Vegans allows me to share my passion for artisanal vegan cheese with a global audience,” she said, outlining her aim to inspire “both new and seasoned chefs” about plant-based cuisine.

    “Miyoko is truly the queen of vegan cheese, and sharing her latest groundbreaking innovations ahead of her cookbook launch means our community gets an exclusive glimpse into her unmatched expertise,” said Meet The Vegans co-founder Laura Belyea. “This course marks a milestone not only for our platform but for plant-based cuisine as a whole.”

    Meet The Vegans was established in January this year, and features courses from a host of plant-based chefs around the world, including Wicked Kitchen co-founder Chad Sarno and former Unity Diner head chef Greg Hanger.

    Moreover, the platform also offers an AI Chef tool to help home cooks decide what to make with the ingredients they have, in a bid to reduce food waste and promote plant-based versions of conventional meat dishes.

    Celebrating plant-based milk for what it is

    miyoko schinner vegan cheese
    Courtesy: Celeste Noche

    Schinner made her name through an all-vegan eatery called Now and Zen, which became popular for its plant-based turkey. After selling the restaurant, she started a namesake natural foods company business, which shut a few years later. At the time, the chef already had three cookbooks to her name, and in the years that followed, she doubled down on the vegan cheese world and created Miyoko’s Creamery (then Miyoko’s Kitchen) in 2014.

    The business rapidly became a leader in the alternative dairy space, selling non-dairy cheeses, butters, and spreads. But in 2022, Schinner was ousted as CEO, following internal disputes with executives. The company sued its founder for alleged breach of contract, a violation of trade secrets, and stealing company IP, but Schinner countersued, saying she was “blindsided” and alleging that sexism led to her dismissal.

    Months later, the two parties came to a resolution, with Miyoko’s Creamery installing former Beyond Meat CMO Stuart Kronauger as CEO, and Schinner going back to the bench as well as building her animal sanctuary, Rancho Compasión, in San Francisco.

    “I’ll be sharing new ideas for many plant dairy foods, including new methods for making cheese and butter (no, the experimentation hasn’t stopped, and I’m at the top of my game again),” she told Green Queen in an interview last year.

    While her masterclass does have analogues like Cheddar, chévre, mozzarella and brie, she posited the idea that plant-based milk should be celebrated for its own flavours. “We have cow’s milk cheese and then we have sheep’s milk and goat’s milk, and they don’t try to imitate each other. Each milk has its own characteristics and they create their different varieties of cheeses,” she said on the platform’s podcast.

    “If we evolve that into the realm of plant milk, we can think about cheese in the same way. Why not let each plant milk express its own unique properties? Let’s create new cheeses. I believe the future of cheese is getting back to plant milks, rather than trying to replicate animal cheeses using oil and starch,” she added.

    “Let’s explore the world of plant milk and find out what flavours and textures can we create from them. It’s an entire evolution that will continue into the future. We’ve got a couple thousand years to get it right.”

    The post Vegan Dairy Queen Miyoko Schinner Is Teaching A Homemade Plant-Based Cheese Masterclass appeared first on Green Queen.

    This post was originally published on Green Queen.

  • Have You Seen This Video of Pus-Filled Animal Flesh? Go Vegan!

    Cysts in meat? What’s next—blood, bones, and cartilage?! A video of someone squeezing pus out of a chunk of animal flesh has apparently shocked and disgusted many Instagram users. News flash: Eating someone’s hacked-up body parts is wrong, with or without the pus.

     
     
     
     
     
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    peta comment on instagram post about cysts in meat

    The Meat, Egg, and Dairy Industries: Oozing With Cruelty

    Can’t stomach the video? Wait until you learn about the disgusting practices of the meat, egg, and dairy industries, which exploit and kill billions of sensitive animals each year. Farms that raise animals for their flesh, eggs, and secretions—including those that use “humane” or “free range” labels—cram animals into filthy sheds or mud-filled pens, sometimes amid their own waste. At slaughterhouses—where workers hang animals upside down and slit their throats—animals’ blood, guts, and feces spill onto the floor.

    Just like humans, other species get abscesses, deadly illnesses, and cancerous tumors—and farmers don’t care as long as they can sell their body parts. Most butchers cut off the visible pus-filled parts, but flesh can be contaminated with dangerous pathogens you can’t see—like Listeria, Salmonella, and E. coli. That’s because when humans exploit animals like commodities, illness, pain, and suffering are rampant. Cows and other animals need you to help.

    And it’s not just meat that can contain pus. Up to 50% of cows exploited for milk suffer from mastitis—a painful udder infection resulting from the grueling, abusive milking routines that dairy farms subject them to. Their infected udders ooze pus, contaminating the milk that ends up on supermarket shelves.

    Call It Quits BEFORE You’re Eating Zits

    Every animal is someone, from protective mother cows who nurture their young to chickens who establish highly complex social hierarchies.

    brown cows in front of very green grass

    These animals don’t want to be exploited and killed for a fleeting taste of flesh. Please, go vegan today:

    Order a FREE Vegan Starter Kit!

    The post Have You Seen This Video of Pus-Filled Animal Flesh? Go Vegan! appeared first on PETA.

    This post was originally published on Animal Rights and Campaign News | PETA.

  • Denver Voters: THESE Initiatives Would Prevent Animals From Being Killed for Their Fur, Flesh

    Two pro-animal measures could raise the Mile High City to even greater heights! Next month, voters in Denver will have the chance to support two exciting initiatives that would prevent countless animals from being slaughtered for their fur and flesh.

    denver, colorado landscape with photos of lamb and fox

    Denver Residents: Vote YES on These Bills to Ban Fur Sales and Slaughterhouses!

    Ordinance 308 would end the sale, manufacture, trade, and display of all new fur products in the city. This ban would spare countless minks, foxes, rabbits, chinchillas, and other animals who would otherwise be held captive in cramped, filthy conditions and ultimately slaughtered via the cheapest possible methods, including suffocation, electrocution, gassing, and poisoning.

    Ordinance 309 would prohibit the operation of existing slaughterhouses and ban the construction of new ones in Denver. There is currently one known slaughterhouse in the city, responsible for killing at least half a million lambs each year. This initiative would spare a vast number of animals annually and allow the city to be a leader in the switch to more ethical food production.

    Here’s What YOU Can Do

    If you live in Denver, please support these lifesaving bills—every vote matters! If you aren’t a registered voter in the city, there are still ways you can help animals suffering on farms and in slaughterhouses. Pledge never to wear fur, leather, feathers, or any other animal-derived material, and go vegan today!

    Take the Feather-Free Pledge
    Order a FREE Vegan Starter Kit

    Note: PETA supports animal rights and opposes all forms of animal exploitation and educates the public on those issues. PETA does not directly or indirectly participate or intervene in any political campaign on behalf of or in opposition to any candidate for public office or any political party.

    The post Denver Voters: THESE Initiatives Would Prevent Animals From Being Killed for Their Fur, Flesh appeared first on PETA.

    This post was originally published on Animal Rights and Campaign News | PETA.

  • OCTO Act Becomes California Law, Banning Octopus Farms

    This week, California Gov. Gavin Newsom signed AB 3162—also known as “the California Oppose Cruelty to Octopuses (OCTO) Act”—into law. PETA endorsed the bill in its early stages, and groups including Social Compassion in Legislation and the Animal Legal Defense Fund worked hard to garner support for it.

    reddish orange octopus swims through blue ocean water

    The OCTO Act will make it illegal for anyone in California to engage in the aquaculture, or farming, of octopuses meant for human consumption.

    It will also ban business owners and operators from knowingly selling octopuses who came from octopus farms.

    Octopuses Are Intelligent, Complex, and Fascinating Animals

    Octopuses feel joy and excitement but also pain and fear.

    They are extremely intelligent and have been known to do the following:

    • Use seashells for protection
    • Steal food from traps set by fishers
    • Escape from aquariums
    • Decorate their homes

    They communicate with one another through complex color changes and flashes that humans still don’t fully understand.

    Keeping octopuses on farms would lead to unnatural aggression, cannibalism, injuries, and death because they would fight and struggle to escape.

    In addition, workers would slaughter octopuses at the end of their miserable lives, inflicting terror and pain by cutting into their brains or clubbing their heads.

    You can help prevent such cruelty by never eating octopuses.

    Lend Octopuses a Helping Hand

    A lifesaving piece of bipartisan legislation, Senate Bill 4810, was recently introduced in Congress. The Opposing the Cultivation and Trade of Octopus Produced through Unethical Strategies (OCTOPUS) Act would ban commercial octopus farming in the U.S. and prohibit the importation of live or dead farmed octopuses (or their meat or derivatives) from outside the country.

    If you’re a U.S. resident, please urge your senator to cosponsor the powerful OCTOPUS Act:

    Take Action Now

    Live elsewhere in the world?

    Help Stop Plans to Build the World’s First Octopus Farm

    Note: PETA supports animal rights and opposes all forms of animal exploitation and educates the public on those issues. PETA does not directly or indirectly participate or intervene in any political campaign on behalf of or in opposition to any candidate for public office or any political party.

    The post OCTO Act Becomes California Law, Banning Octopus Farms appeared first on PETA.

    This post was originally published on Animal Rights and Campaign News | PETA.

  • Future Food Quick Bites: Dairy-Free Mozzarella Sticks, Vegan Wetherspoons & Indian Cultivated Meat

    vegan mozzarella sticks
    6 Mins Read

    In our weekly column, we round up the latest news and developments in the alternative protein and sustainable food industry. This week, Future Food Quick Bites covers Sunday Supper’s plant-based mozzarella sticks, M&S’s new vegan cookies, and a cultivated meat tasting in India.

    New products and launches

    US vegan frozen foods maker Sunday Supper has released Mozza Fritto, a dairy-free mozzarella stick SKU. It’s available at Besties Vegan Paradise in Los Angeles and Orchard Grocer in New York City, and will be at Giant, Bristol Farms, and Good Eggs this month, selling for $9.99 for three servings.

    sunday supper mozza fritto
    Courtesy: Sunday Supper

    As it conducts a regulatory feeding trial for cultivated meat, Further Foods, the portfolio brand of Cult Food Science, is launching a line of vegan Sprinkles toppers for pet food under its Noochies! brand. The 4oz packs will be available in six flavours (three apiece for dogs and cats), and retail for $16.99 in the US and Canada.

    Cultivated meat is now officially banned in Alabama. But before it came into effect, Upside Foods took its Freedom of Food tasting event to the state for locals to try its chicken before it became illegal.

    Italian food giant Barilla is bringing its vegan pesto to the US as part of a flavour expansion, which will be available exclusively at Krogers stores starting this month.

    barilla vegan pesto
    Courtesy: Barilla

    There’s a new almond milk on the block. Sól Date‘s milks are sweetened with dates and come in Original, Chocolate and Vanilla flavours, and can already be found in 400 locations, with another 250 slated for January.

    In more dairy-free news, Canadian vegan cheese brand Daiya has shaken up its frozen pizza range, which has a “lighter, fluffier, and crispier gluten-free crust” and the new Oat Cream cheese.

    In the Netherlands, The Vegetarian Butcher‘s Pulled Beef Strips are now featured on the menu of meal startup Mama’s Maaltijden, part of a poké bowl with sushi rice and pickled cucumbers.

    la vie italian style
    Courtesy: La Vie

    French plant-based meat leader La Vie has teased two new products in Apple’s trademark marketing style, showing the “advantageous curves” of the packaging. They will come out at the end of October in Italian-style and Spicy Asian flavours, and apparently won’t trigger the meat labelling lobby. We think it’s sausages – what’s your guess?

    Meanwhile, La Vie has also rolled out its smoked ham at Sainsbury’s stores across the UK.

    French vegan ingredient company Ingood by Olga has introduced Lengood, a fermented green lentil powder that is designed as a clean-label egg alternative for bakery and pastry products.

    In the UK, pub chain Wetherspoons has added a limited-edition Korean-inspired vegan sticky fried chicken bowl using Quorn‘s mycoprotein meat. It’s served alongside chips and coconut rice.

    UK supermarket M&S has released vegan speculoos and chocolate chip cookies in a light-up tin, as part of its Christmas range. It retails for £7.

    Speaking of British retailers, Slovenian whole-cut plant-based meat producer Juicy Marbles is now selling its vegan steaks at Sainsbury’s, available in two-packs for £7 at 553 stores nationwide.

    vegan seafood uk
    Courtesy: HAPPIEE!

    Singaporean vegan seafood brand HAPPIEE! has expanded its UK presence, with its plant-based shrimp, squid and calamari now available at Sainsbury’s and Morissons (from next week).

    A new vegan sweets brand has been set up by a former Mondelez International executive. Wild Thingz makes bug-shaped fruit gummies in Zesty Pests, Fruity Flyers and Gummy Grubs, which will be available as 25g packs for 90p and 130g bags for £2.99.

    Staying with confectionery for a second, UK vegan oat milk chocolate maker H!P is getting festive with a new £12 advent calendar that features its plain, orange, salted caramel and gingerbread offerings. In addition, it’s launching a Gingerbread Cookie Bar, H!P ‘n’ Mix Festive Pouch, and a Christmas gift box.

    hip chocolate advent calendar
    Courtesy: H!P

    In Thailand, vegan cheese brand Swees has released with what it claims are the world’s first rice-based cheese sticks, with backing from the national government.

    Company and finance updates

    Spain’s Pascual Innoventures has upped its investment in the first three editions of the Mylcubator programme to over $2M, with its latest infusion going to precision fermentation egg startup Onego Bio.

    oshi vegan salmon
    Courtesy: Oshi

    Israeli vegan seafood player Oshi has received two million shekels ($550,000) as part of grant funding by the Israeli Innovation Authority.

    In Sweden, Örebro University’s PAN Sweden research centre has been awarded 40 million kronor ($3.9M) from the state research council Formas for its work on plant proteins. Agrifood company Lantmännen is a key actor in the project.

    Swedish pea milk pioneer Sproud has raised 14.4 Swedish kronor ($1.4M) in a fresh funding round, adding to the $1M it secured back in March.

    sproud pea milk
    Courtesy: Sproud

    UK startup Fermtech has brought in £360,000 in crowdfunding (moving past its £325,000 target) for its ‘zero-carbon’ koji protein, using spent grain from breweries as feedstock.

    Californian firm Triplebar is restructuring to amp up its focus on developing a generative AI genomic language model by 2026 to disrupt the food and medicine industries.

    In Singapore, Temasek-owned sustainable food innovation platform Nurasa has signed an MoU with Food Harbour Hamburg to bring together companies from both regions to develop planet-friendly food solutions.

    3d printed seafood
    Courtesy: Steakholder Foods

    Meanwhile, Israeli food tech startup Steakholder Foods has signed a deal with frozen foods manufacturer Bondor Foods to supply plant-based premises for vegan white fish and salmon patties.

    Indian cultivated meat startup Biokraft Foods is hosting its first public tastings for cultivated chicken after completing an internal validation for the product. The tastings will be held in Mumbai and Pune.

    Elsewhere, cell-based chocolate maker California Cultured has received an investment from Sparkalis, the corporate venture arm of Belgian B2B bakery, patisserie and chocolate leader Puratos Group.

    cell based chocolate
    Courtesy: California Cultured

    Job platform Alt Protein Careers has expanded into Europe, and several startups – from Redefine Meat to Mewery – are already advertising roles there.

    Policy developments

    Over 100 organisations and academics are calling on the UN FAO to retract its Pathways Towards Lower Emissions report from COP28, which downplayed the impact of livestock and climate change. It follows a similar open letter from July, which itself came months after authors whose work the report was based on asked the FAO to retract its report. The latest letter comes after the FAO doubled down on its stance.

    In California, the share of meatless meal options in school lunches increased from 7% in 2019 to 11% in 2023. The number of high schools offering veggie meals also rose from 36% to 56%.

    california school lunches vegan
    Courtesy: Friends of the Earth

    UK charity The Vegan Society and the International Rights Network have helped remove veganism from the National Health Service‘s Prevent training, a counter-terrorism programme designed to identify those at risk of radicalisation. Before the intervention, veganism was being referenced in the training.

    Finally, The Vegan Society is also celebrating a major milestone: it recently crossed 70,000 product certifications with its Vegan Trademark.

    Check out last week’s Future Food Quick Bites.

    The post Future Food Quick Bites: Dairy-Free Mozzarella Sticks, Vegan Wetherspoons & Indian Cultivated Meat appeared first on Green Queen.

    This post was originally published on Green Queen.

  • The Raging Pig Co Attracts Investment to Expand Vegan Pork Products & Launch Mycelium Meat

    raging pig funding
    4 Mins Read

    German meat analogue maker The Raging Pig Company has closed a seed funding round ahead of its move into mycelium protein.

    As it gears up to enter the mycelium market, vegan pork startup The Raging Pig Company has secured an undisclosed sum to accelerate its progress.

    The seed funding round included Sprout & About Ventures, Livian, Solvable Syndicate, and several angel investors, and will allow the startup to develop new products and enlarge its footprint.

    The Hamburg-based startup will use the fresh capital for “further expanding the distribution and sales channels in Germany” across foodservice and retail, positioning itself as the country’s leading plant-based sausage dealer, said CEO Arne Ewerbeck, who co-founded the business with Constantin Klass in 2022.

    “On the product side, we are looking forward to releasing the first mycelium products into the market soon,” Ewerbeck added.

    Raging Pig to roll out mycelium products early next year

    the raging pig company
    Courtesy: Kynda

    Raging Pig’s current lineup includes its flagship bratwurst and bacon, as well as a smoked sausage, mini-bratwurst, and currywurst. The products are made primarily from pea protein, bamboo fibre, and oyster mushrooms.

    The bacon leverages a proprietary fat encapsulation tech and industry sidestreams to deliver its signature look and crunchy mouthfeel, while also reducing emissions by 90% compared to conventional bacon.

    And in March, it announced plans to incorporate mycelium into its product range, teaming up with fellow German startup Kynda to roll out mycelium-based analogues. The latter utilises sidestreams like soy, oat and rice okara to produce a zero-waste mycelium ingredient for plant-based and hybrid proteins.

    “Our focus has always been on taste and sustainability. With Kynda’s nutritious and allergen-free ingredients, we’re able to significantly lower our production costs and are finally able to compete with heavily subsidised meat producers,” Ewerbeck said at the time.

    Raging Pig has been looking to replace the “highly processed” pea protein texturates obtained from high-moisture extrusion in its products. It showcased a burger with the myceliym at the Internorga trade fair in March, swapping 17% of the pea protein with the Kynda-Meat.

    The mycelium-infused meat analogues are set to be released in early 2025, and are currently undergoing the “final steps of production scale-up and distribution”.

    “The first products that we will launch with mycelium will be our plant-based sausage range, starting with our classic: the German bratwurst,” said Ewerback. “There are other products like burger patties in the pipeline and ready to roll out. We will see what makes more sense and how the market reacts as well. Since we are already selling at scale, we can take these steps one at a time and see what works best.”

    Pork industry on the decline as meat analogues gain popularity

    raging pig bratwurst
    Courtesy: The Raging Pig Company

    Germany is the second-largest pork producer in the EU, amounting to the slaughter of 44 million pigs last year, but the industry has been on a declining curve over the last few years, thanks in large part to the outbreak of African swine fever (ASF) in herds in 2022 and consumers shifting dietary habits.

    Last year, pig populations reached their lowest since 1990, just as overall meat production dropped by 4%. In the long term, both the number of pigs slaughtered and the amount of pork eaten in Germany dropped by around 20% between 2015 and 2022.

    Moreover, the post-ASF landscape has led many countries to ban pork imports from Germany, including China, its largest buyer of pork until 2020. At the same time, meat analogues have become increasingly popular, with production doubling since 2019.

    In fact, Germany is the largest market for plant-based food in Europe, with meat consumption dropping by 12% from 2019 to 2023, and 55% of its population identifying as flexitarian. Three in 10 Germans say they want to eat more meat analogues over the next two years, just as the country’s latest nutrition guidelines suggest halving meat intake and eating 75% plant-based.

    Meanwhile, the government set aside €38M in its 2024 federal budget to encourage the manufacturing and consumption of alternative proteins, promote a switch to plant-based agriculture, as well as open a Proteins of the Future centre.

    To solidify its presence, Raging Pig began offering retail products in northern Germany this summer, with products available in select Edeka and Rewe stores (among others) in Hamburg and surrounding areas.

    But its main focus is on the foodservice channel. “We are currently available nationwide in Germany through different foodservice partners,” said Ewerbeck. This includes the canteens at public broadcaster Norddeutscher Rundfunk’s offices in Hamburg, alongside snack bars, festivals, and pubs.

    “Next to Germany, we are currently available in Switzerland and will take a closer look at some other European markets in the upcoming years,” he added.

    The post The Raging Pig Co Attracts Investment to Expand Vegan Pork Products & Launch Mycelium Meat appeared first on Green Queen.

    This post was originally published on Green Queen.

  • Despite Declines, Plant-Based Meat is Selling Better Than It Did Pre-Pandemic

    circana meat alternatives
    5 Mins Read

    Retail sales of plant-based meat have been shrinking, but they’re still higher than pre-pandemic levels. Opportunities lie in price cuts and bundling these analogues with fresh produce.

    In 2023, sales of vegan meat and seafood fell by 12%, on the back of higher manufacturing costs, lower investment levels, and consumer concerns around ultra-processing. This year, it has been more of the same, with Americans spending 19% less on chilled meat analogues and 7% less on frozen products.

    Despite these declines, though, people are still purchasing more plant-based meat products than they were before Covid-19 – last year’s dollar sales ended up at $1.1B, versus $856M in 2019, according to new analysis by market insights firm Circana.

    The Current State of Meat Alternatives report shows that meat analogues have experienced a 2% loss annually over the last four years, compared to a 5% growth for plant-based dairy and a 7% hike for vegan seafood. Since 2019, the market share of meat-free products in the overall meat market has reduced consistently, but still remained largely the same, going from 1.39% in 2020 to 1.07% so far this year.

    Frozen rules, and on-trend products make gains

    plant based meat sales
    Courtesy: Circana

    Plant-based meats sell much better in the freezer, the report found. Sales dropped by 9% in the 52 weeks to July 14, 2024, compared to the same period a year ago. But the decrease was much larger in the refrigerated section, where dollar sales took a 17% dip to reach $309M, than in the frozen aisle (a 6% loss totalling $720M in sales).

    Americans spent twice more on meat analogues in the freezer, and that can be seen via their market share too – these products were bought by 67% of Americans, compared to 37% who bought chilled plant-based meats. Only 29% of people purchased items from both sections.

    plant based meat market leader
    Courtesy: Circana

    Still, some brands are delivering growth. Beyond Meat has increased dollar sales by $10M, driven by its focus on “shifting the ultra-processed perception”, while Meati has seen a $2.7M hike year-to-date, thanks in large part to its all-natural ingredient list for whole-cut steak.

    Circana’s report suggests that the way to consumers’ hearts and wallets are by “delivering quick and easy solutions along with elevated experiences”, with a focus on flavour, form and convenience. Beyond Meat’s ‘heart-healthy’ steak product has been the most successful in the last year, with sales $7.7M higher than the same period last year – this is one of the products that delivers on all three of these metrics.

    Similarly, Impossible Foods’s flagship beef and Beef Lite were up by $3.6M and $3.2M, respectively, while Morningstar Farms’s vegan chicken strips and beef crumbles had sales increases of $3.3M and $3.2M.

    Plugging the price gap

    plant based meat price premium
    Courtesy: Circana

    Plant-based meats continue to be more expensive. SPINS data for the Good Food Institute has shown that there was a 77% price premium on meat analogues last year. This continues to be the case today, with the price gap between conventional and vegan meat exceeding pre-pandemic levels.

    In 2019, meat analogues were $4.16 costlier per lb, but this gap was narrowing in 2022. However, it has been increasing for the last two years, and is now at $4.20 per lb. Given that plant-based products currently make up only 1.07% of the meat market, progress is a tall order for manufacturers as things stand – especially since the per-pound price gap is 31 cents for alt-dairy and $1.27 for vegan seafood.

    That said, chicken and turkey patties have seen prices decrease by 4.5% and 5.5%, respectively, with volume sales also up by 7% and 4% (compared to a flatlining of beer burgers). “This growth is providing value and a ‘better for you’ lean protein option,” the report states.

    Meanwhile, the headwinds of the sector have also resulted in the closure of some companies and withdrawal of certain product lines. Since 2020, the number of alt-meat brands has shrunk by 28%, from 116 to 83.

    One way companies can increase consumer interest is through merchandising. Nearly two in five (38%) people who buy meat analogues also purchase fresh fruit and salad vegetables. “Cross-merchandise with the produce aisle to inspire healthy meals,” Circana suggests.

    Who is the alt-meat shopper?

    us number of vegans
    Courtesy: Circana

    The report shows that the share of vegetarians and vegans in the US has been consistent at around 5-7% for the last 18 years, but the rise of keto and carnivore diets online has led to a 6% increase in meat-eaters since 2022 (making up 80% of the total). The number of flexitarians, meanwhile, is down by 4%.

    When it comes to plant-based meat, the average households tend to be high-income African-American and Asian millennials and urban male Gen Xers. Nationally, plant-based meats are appearing in fewer households, a decrease of 21% between 2022 and 2023, while the number of individual buyers has also narrowed by nearly five million.

    Along the same lines, meat analogues are losing shoppers faster than they’re gaining them, partly due to a 20% decline in “heavy meat alternative buyers”, who make four times more trips to the store and spend twice as much as the average American. This group is responsible for 75% of total spending on these products.

    circana plant based
    Courtesy: Circana

    And worryingly, the share of frequent-purchaser households is declining faster (8%) than one-time buyers (5%). “Retention of frequent buyers is critical to category success,” the report says. “Understand frequent-buyer profiles and identify ways to keep them engaged in the category, such as highlighting trending flavours, pack sizes, and recipes.”

    Companies are also encouraged to “invest in innovation”, with future offerings set to “deliver value through clean, quality products rooted in key consumer trends”. Finally, given the expanding price gap, brands need to define ‘value’ for consumers, including “taste experience, convenience, form, and nutritional profile”.

    The post Despite Declines, Plant-Based Meat is Selling Better Than It Did Pre-Pandemic appeared first on Green Queen.

    This post was originally published on Green Queen.

  • Future Food Quick Bites: Slutty Vegas, Impossible Chicken Salads & A Vegan Cream Liqueur

    vegan documentaries
    6 Mins Read

    In our weekly column, we round up the latest news and developments in the alternative protein and sustainable food industry. This week, Future Food Quick Bites covers Upside Foods’ tasting event at a taqueria, Japan Airlines’ sweet protein partnership, and a UK state investment into climate-resilient legumes.

    New products and launches

    Cultivated meat leader Upside Foods showcased its chicken at Chicago taqueria Antique Taco, weeks before a judge will consider its preliminary injunction as part of a lawsuit against Florida’s cultivated meat ban.

    upside foods chicken
    Courtesy: Jessica Halper/LinkedIn

    You can now eat sweet proteins on the fly, literally. Japan Airlines has partnered with Californian food tech startup Oobli to offer its chocolates on the Tokyo-San Francisco route. They’re made from Oubli Sweet Protein, a sugar alternative that has no impact on blood glucose.

    Frozen meat-free brand Amy’s Kitchen has expanded its plant-based footprint, replacing eggs with tofu in its breakfast wraps and scrambles.

    Next year, New York City will be host to the first Plant Powered Kids Festival, a fully vegan event that will include family-friendly activities like workshops, cooking classes and yoga sessions, alongside food from plant-based vendors. It will be held at Industry City in Brooklyn on February 2.

    just salad impossible chicken
    Courtesy: Just Salad

    US fast-casual chain Just Salad has made Impossible Foods‘s vegan chicken a permanent menu item with its fall menu launch. The plant-based Unbreaded Chicken Filet is part of a Southwest Crunch salad and a Vegan Chipotle Wrap, and also available as a protein option in Build-Your-Own orders.

    Speaking of chains, Slutty Vegan is part of the Pepsi Dig In Restaurant Royalty Residency in Las Vegas. Founder Pinky Cole will be serving up its signature Fussy Hussy burger at Mandalay Bay’s Libertine Social and Luxor’s Public House for four weeks through October 18.

    slutty vegan vegas
    Courtesy: Slutty Vegan

    British vegan food producer Marigold Health Foods – maker of Engevita nutritional yeast, vegan boullion cubes, and canned meat analogues – has teamed up with packaging specialist Sonoco to launch fully recyclable packaging for a range of its products. The latter’s EnviroCan is designed with a paper bottom and can be recycled by consumers kerbside.

    Also in the UK, The Tofoo Co – recently acquired by Comitis Capital – has introduced a Tofoo Katsu SKU in its added value line, which will be available at Sainsbury’s for £3 per 240g pack.

    Shortly after its Swiss launch, artisan vegan cheese brand Julienne Bruno has entered the Republic of Ireland via 65 stores, offering its plant-based Burrella, Crematta and Superstraccia SKUs from €5.29-5.95.

    julienne bruno cheese
    Courtesy: Julienne Bruno

    Parisian meat analogue maker La Vie‘s bacon will be on the menu at Picadeli at French retailer Monoprix and in Sweden for the next two months.

    German beverage manufacturer Waldemar Behn is making its vodka-based Dooley’s Creamy Liqueur brand entirely vegan. It will relaunch the range in 700ml bottles next month, swapping out the dairy with coconut and soy milk instead.

    And ahead of Oktoberfest, German food tech innovator Planteneers is offering manufacturers its fiildMeat S 141501 modular system to make plant-based meats for street food classics, such as bratwrusts as well as hot dog sauces.

    Company and financial news

    The UK’s Department for Environment, Rural and Social Affairs (Defra) has pumped in £3M towards four research organisations to develop climate-resilient legume crops.

    Hollywood star Gal Gadot‘s mac and cheese brand Goodles, which has a vegan SKU, has hired a new CFO in Chris Hall after sales tripled in 2023.

    vegan smoked garlic butter
    Courtesy: Flora/Warren Goldswain/Getty Images

    Dutch alt-dairy leader Upfield has renamed itself to Flora Food Group to reflect its flagship butter range, and acquired a manufacturing facility located in Hugoton, Kansas to produce creams and cream cheeses for the North American market.

    Speaking of factories, Thai plant-based cheese company Swees has opened a fully vegan-certified facility for co-manufacturing.

    Croatian plant protein producer Nutris has been acquired by Swedish investment firm Summa Equity for an undisclosed sum.

    nutris fava bean
    Courtesy: Nutris

    Scottish startup MiAlgae has secured $18.5M to produce omega-3 fatty acids via microalgae fermentation. It will use the capital to build an industrial-scale facility in the country.

    As it awaits regulatory approval in Singapore, Dutch cultivated meat producer Meatable has received €7.6M ($8.5M) in state funding, under the Netherlands Enterprise Agency‘s Innovation Credit programme.

    At Wageningen University, the Bioprocess Engineering Chair Group’s cellular agriculture team has obtained a €1.5M investment from Korean biotech firm Whoniz to work on cultivated meat and seafood.

    odd burger
    Courtesy: Odd Burger

    Canadian vegan fast-food chain Odd Burger has announced the private placement of $4M of convertible debt after reporting its highest quarterly revenues since going public.

    Israel’s MNDL Bio has raised $2M to expand its AI-powered gene optimisation platform, which is said to accelerate R&D, lower costs, and bolter success rates in synthetic biology.

    Impact investor Earth First Food Ventures has kickstarted a $10M Series A round to expand its financing portfolio in the alt-dairy segment and introduce a $50M precision fermentation fund.

    Policy and research developments

    The EU’s regulation requiring manufacturers to produce caps that stay tethered to the plastic bottles has been in place for a couple of months now, and has annoyed many drinkers. But with the EU set to double down on its plastic waste strategy, the caps are here to stay.

    Cultivated meat startups Meatable and Umami Bioworks have joined the APAC Society for Cellular Agriculture, expanding its membership to 12.

    precision fermentation egg
    Courtesy: The Every Company

    Precision fermentation egg maker The Every Company has secured a foundational patent in the US for its animal-free ovalbumin protein.

    Food advocacy organisation ProVeg International has taken over the Portuguese Vegetarian Association to open an office in Portugal, joining 12 other locations globally.

    Cellular Agriculture Australia has released a report calling for clearer, more verifiable impact claims and metrics from companies in the cultivated meat and cellular ag space.

    eric adams vegan
    Courtesy: NYC Health + Hospitals

    Across the Pacific, New York University hosted the 2024 Plant-Based Food Festival, where it announced that it has signed on to the city’s Plant-Powered Carbon Challenge.

    Scientists at the National University of Singapore have found a way to fortify soy whey with Bifidobacteria strain and propionic acid bacteria to increase vitamin B12 levels in plant-based products.

    In an advancement for vegan seafood, researchers in China have created plant-based simulated yellow croaker meat tissues by dual-nozzle 3D printing.

    Finally, a new docuseries goes behind the scenes of the plant-based culinary scene in Portland, Oregon. The V Word will be released tomorrow, September 26 on streaming network WaterBear, and explores the lifestyle through a cultural lens via the city’s vegan restaurants.

    Check out last week’s Future Food Quick Bites.

    The post Future Food Quick Bites: Slutty Vegas, Impossible Chicken Salads & A Vegan Cream Liqueur appeared first on Green Queen.

    This post was originally published on Green Queen.

  • DIY Dairy: 7 Brands Making Oat Milk Powders for At-Home Use

    oat milk powder
    6 Mins Read

    A host of brands are innovating with oat milk powders in multiple flavours to cut packaging waste and offer personalisation – here are seven of the best.

    Oat milk has quickly become the darling of the plant-based milk space, which is by far the biggest money maker in the global vegan food market.

    Ever since Oatly took over coffee shops in the 2010s, oat milk has been on a stellar rise. Now, virtually every plant-based milk company has an oat product, since the ingredient has taken over as the bestselling base for alt-dairy in certain markets, and is aiming for almond milk’s throne in the US.

    At nearly $3B, milk alone makes up over a third (36%) of the US plant-based market. Within this, almond milk accounts for 56% of the alt-milk market, but its dollar share has fallen by 61% since 2021. Much of this has been captured by oat milk, which accounted for 24% of the segment’s sales last year.

    Estimates suggest that oat milk will be a $5.6B market in 2033, with the number of brands and options proliferating all across the world. This has also necessitated diversity in offerings – consumers want cleaner-label, cheaper and versatile products, and brands are coming up with new ways to deliver these attributes.

    Liquid oat milk is great, but most of this comes in Tetra Paks and requires a lot of packaging, which in turn amps up the financial and environmental cost of transportation. And since most of the world’s waste doesn’t really get recycled, the post-use cycle leaves a lot to be desired.

    Enter oat milk powders. Several companies are making blitzed-up, dehydrated versions of oat milk that you can just add water to, reducing the amount of packaging and shelf space needed, while providing greater customisability. You want an oat cream? Add less water. Do you want a thinner milk that resembles skimmed? Add more.

    It also solves a key pain point. Oat milk is one of the toughest plant-based milks to make at home, since the slimy texture puts many consumers off. While there are ways to remove the slime and make a milk that has the desired mouthfeel and flavour, it takes a lot more time and effort, and specialty ingredients that aren’t exactly pantry staples.

    While it’s a nascent market and more research is needed to determine the true value of these products, you only have to look at the success of brands that have made oat milk powders their primary offerings, and the fact that traditional oat milk makers have also begun innovating with powdered versions, to know that the demand is there.

    Here are seven of the best companies making oat milk powders.

    Overherd

    Headquarters: London, UK
    Founders/parent company: Sandy Eyre
    Total funding: Undisclosed

    overherd oat milk
    Courtesy: Overherd

    Launched in 2023, Overherd is among the youngest companies in the space, and makes only one thing: powdered oat milk. The product is made up of 68% gluten-free oats, coconut MCT powder, and chicory root fibre, and fortified with calcium carbonate and vitamin B12. It can be shaken, stirred or blended, used as a barista milk, and has fewer calories, fat and sugar than market leaders like Oatly and Alpro. Plus, Overherd uses 90% less packaging and is 10 times lighter.

    Mighty

    Headquarters: Leeds, UK
    Founders/parent company: Tom and Nick Watkins
    Total funding: £8M

    mighty oat milk powder
    Courtesy: Mighty

    Mighty originally began as a pea milk company, before expanding into oat and other milks. In early 2023, it brought out a powdered oat milk made up of 90% oats, coconut oil powder, and salt. The company says each pouch makes up to four litres of oat milk, and lasts two years on the shelf. It can be stirred straight into hot tea and coffee, used in baking as you would conventional milk powder, and blended to make liquid oat milk.

    JOI

    Headquarters: Miami, US
    Founders/parent company: Dave Korstad, Isabelle Shu and Tony Jimenez
    Total funding: $2M

    joi oat milk powder
    Courtesy: JOI

    One of the original new-format alt-milk brands, JOI is well-known for its nut milk pastes. But it recently unveiled an oat milk powder (to great reviews), and true to its name, this contains Just One Ingredient: oats. The JOI powder can be stirred straight into tea and coffee, or blended to make milk (a teaspoon per cup of water is the recommended amount). Each pack can make 8 quarts (7.5 litres) of milk, which lasts up to seven days in the fridge. For the baristas, it has launched a powdered oat milk creamer too.

    Nimbus

    Headquarters: Sydney, Australia
    Founders/parent company: Alexandra Mills
    Total funding: Undisclosed

    nimbus oat milk
    Courtesy: Nimbus

    Another 2023-launched company, Nimbus makes two oat milk powders in original and mocha flavours. The plain version contains 93% oats, and is complemented with avocado oil powder, salt, xantham gum and calcium carbonate. The mocha version additionally contains coffee and cocoa powders, and coconut sugar. Once blended, it can be used as a barista milk for frothy drinks, and each pouch makes five litres of milk. The recycled packaging weighs ten times less than cartons too.

    Blue Farm

    blue farm oat milk
    Courtesy: Blue Farm

    Headquarters: Berlin, Germany
    Founders/parent company: Philip von Have and Katia Pott
    Total funding: €3M

    Blue Farm is a company all about oat milk powders, and has an extensive range to show for it. The core lineup comprises a Pure Oat Base, which contains 100% fermented oats, a calcium-fortified version with red algae, a barista edition with oat beta-glucan and sodium carbonate, as well as cocoa and vanilla flavours. These can be used in a variety of applications – all you need to do is mix two spoons of powder with 200ml of water. Additionally, Blue Farm has various functional lattes like pumpkin, matcha, turmeric, Supreme Greens, and Chagaccino, among others.

    EcoMil

    Headquarters: Murcia, Spain
    Founders/parent company: Nutriops
    Total funding: Undisclosed

    ecomil oat milk powder
    Courtesy: EcoMil

    The oldest brand on this list, EcoMil pioneered this alt-milk format with its almond milk powder in 1991. Now, it’s one of Europe’s leading manufacturers of plant-based milks. Its powdered oat milk contains 56% oats, corn maltodextrin, dehydrated sunflower oil, and vanilla. It comes in 400g tins that can make five litres of milk, and can be used in hot drinks as well as cooking applications.

    Oatbedient

    Headquarters: Singapore
    Founders/parent company: Elaine and Darren Teo
    Total funding: Undisclosed

    oatbedient oat milk powder
    Courtesy: Oatbedient

    Founded in 2022, Singapore-based Oatbedient began as an oat milk powder company, but has since diversified into liquid milks too. But it’s an outlier in that these ready-to-mix milks are meant to be drunk on their own, since they’re really an alternative to malted milk powders. Its core range includes a plain version (with oat milk powder, maltodextrin and sugar), a Lite unsweetened version, one with chia seeds, and a chocolate flavour. It has since also introduced latte, mocha and matcha versions. Each pack contains 12 sachets, which need to be mixed with 180ml of hot water.

    The post DIY Dairy: 7 Brands Making Oat Milk Powders for At-Home Use appeared first on Green Queen.

    This post was originally published on Green Queen.

  • 90% of Patients Satisfied with NYC’s Plant-Based Hospital Meals Scheme

    new york city hospitals vegan
    5 Mins Read

    New York City’s Health + Hospitals scheme for plant-based meals has received overwhelming support from patients and led to reduced food costs and emissions.

    Half of all patients in New York City’s public hospitals chose to eat vegan meals since Mayor Eric Adams’s ‘plant-based by default’ scheme was launched in 2022, and almost all of them were satisfied with the food.

    Based on research proving the efficacy of plant-based diets and treating, preventing, and even reversing chronic diseases, the programme has served over 1.2 million vegan meals, from black bean burgers and orange cauliflower to sloppy does and Sicilian pizzas with non-dairy mozzarella.

    Carried out in partnership with catering giant Sodexo, the scheme has received overwhelming support, with 90% of patients satisfied with their choice of eating plant-based, and just 5% requesting an alternative meal, according to a study published in the American Journal of Lifestyle Medicine.

    “We put patient health first by putting plant-based meals first,” says co-author Samantha Morgenstern, a dietitian with Sodexo who worked on the scheme’s implementation. “We proved that when given the choice, patients opt for and prefer nutritious and delicious plant-based meals.”

    How New York City’s hospitals promote plant-based meals

    nyc hospitals plant based
    Courtesy: NYC Health + Hospitals

    NYC Health + Hospitals began the development of the plant-based default programme for lunches in 2021, with the aim of making vegan food the preexisting option at all its 11 hospitals. Patients and their families are provided with nutrition information aimed at encouraging them to make healthier dietary choices both in the hospital and after discharge.

    The programme now includes meals at dinners as well. And in addition to the 11 hospitals, vegan entrées have been rolled out in all five post-acute care facilities.

    Building on the research the programme is based on, hospital staff are educated about the health benefits of vegan diets and nutrition, while all stakeholders – like administrators, nursing staff and patients – are kept engaged to ensure a common understanding of the scheme’s goals.

    Meanwhile, the culinary team was trained in “fundamental techniques” of plant-based cooking and recipe design. Today, the menu comprises over 20 plant-based dishes from a variety of cuisines, and those have evolved over time.

    For example, the Garden Bolognese was first made with soy crumbles, but the team has since replaced it with mushrooms as the high-protein ingredient to “reduce reliance on processed foods”.

    Regardless of a patient’s therapeutic diet order, plant-based items are available and adjusted as needed. Foodservice associates visit the patient rooms and announce the featured meals every day, placing the meal orders on an iPad.

    The first meal offered is the chef’s recommendation, and is always plant-based. If this isn’t accepted, patients are presented with an alternative vegan option. If that is also rejected, many other dishes are available to patients. “While the goal is to offer the most healthful meal first, patients are not restricted in their options,” the study notes.

    Plant-based saves costs, both for the wallet and the planet

    eric adams vegan
    Courtesy: NYC Health + Hospitals

    Last year alone, New York City’s public hospitals served over 780,000 vegan meals to patients. To nudge them towards choosing plant-based, NYC Health + Hospitals is employing several on-site promotion activities.

    At admission, patients receive branded educational material with information about the meals, which contains a QR code for recipes and an FAQ section. On all hospital computers and TVs, screensavers include an appealing image of vegan food with text highlighting its health benefits.

    Moreover, tray carts pushed through hospital halls are wrapped in imagery that promotes plant-based meals, and foodservice staffers wear pins that read: “Ask me about plant-based menus.” When being discharged, patients also receive a vegan recipe book collected from hospital staff submissions.

    A resolution signed by 1,400 US mayors last year promoted a shift to plant-based diets across the country, taking inspiration from Adams’ hospital campaign (the New York City mayor himself follows a plant-forward diet). “Patients have experienced significant improvement in their cardiometabolic health, including weight loss, improved blood sugar, and reduction of other risk factors,” the document said of the city’s plant-based by default programme.

    Apart from health, gains were also made in terms of finances and sustainability. The scheme led to a 36% reduction in carbon emissions from all meals served, with plant-based entrées nearly 60 cents cheaper on average. For instance, meat-based chili costs roughly $1.38 per serving, while a vegan version is priced at around 47 cents.

    These cost savings come from the fact that the programme focuses on whole foods over meat analogues, which are 38% more expensive in the foodservice channel. Overall, the programme reduced food costs by $318,000 in 2023, and these savings are expected to improve.

    “The proven success of New York City Health + Hospitals’ plant-based meals programs should inspire hospitals across the country to implement similar programs,” said co-author Anna Herby. “Hospitals that offer patients plant-based meals provide a teachable moment on how to prevent or reverse obesity, heart disease, type 2 diabetes, and other diet-related conditions that are so often the cause of hospitalisation.”

    NYC Health + Hospitals is now also considering expanding the programme to patients not included in the initial rollout (like behavioural health patients). This would help cut emissions even further – food makes up a fifth of the city’s, which is why the local government is working to reduce emissions by a third by 2030.

    Adams also launched the Plant-Powered Carbon Challenge earlier this year, with non-profit Greener by Default helping partners track emissions and share best practices on designing plant-forward menus. It has been taken up by Columbia University, The Rockefeller Foundation, catering giant Aramark, and the US Open, among others.

    The post 90% of Patients Satisfied with NYC’s Plant-Based Hospital Meals Scheme appeared first on Green Queen.

    This post was originally published on Green Queen.

  • Australia’s vEEF Rolls Out Plant-Based Beef Mince and Sausages Cheaper Than Meat

    veef plant based meat
    5 Mins Read

    In Australia, vEEF has introduced a new range of meat analogues that are priced lower than animal-derived meat, keying into consumer trends.

    Nearly a year after its merger with Love Buds, vEEF is rolling out a new range of meat analogues that tackle a key consumer pain point: cost.

    Available at Woolworths, the new beef mince and sausages are on par with conventional meat, at AU$4.50 per 300g pack. This is much lower than Woolworths’ own-brand lean beef and beef sausages (ranging from AU$16-22 per kg, versus AU$15 for vEEF).

    They are housed in renewed packaging that uses 50% less plastic than previous vEEF products and features a Carbon Neutral label, a reference to the brand’s carbon neutral certification by the eCarbon reductio Institute last year.

    “We recognise that high costs have historically deterred many conscious consumers from embracing plant-based alternatives. In these challenging times, we’re committed to striving towards making delicious, nourishing plant-based foods accessible to all Australians,” said co-founder and CEO Alejandro Cancino, who received a Michelin star during his time in Tokyo, as well as three chef’s hats, Australia’s equivalent to the Michelin star.

    “By offering vEEF at a fair price, we’re empowering more people to make choices that align with their values and dietary preferences. It’s about making plant-based eating an accessible option for everyone, not just a select few,” he added.

    vEEF cuts profit margins to offer cheaper plant-based meats

    veef sausages
    Courtesy: vEEF

    Cancino founded the company as part of Fenn Foods in 2018 with his wife, Paolo Moro, with a range that now includes nuggets, bacon bits, roast chicken, steaks and burgers across chilled and frozen formats.

    Last year, vEEF merged with All G Foods’ Love Buds brand to form the Aussie Plant-Based Co. “This union combines our strengths, enabling significant growth in both retail (vEEF) and foodservice (Love BUDS) sectors,” said Cancino.

    “Our consolidated resources and shared expertise have positioned us for continued expansion. We remain committed to delivering top-quality plant-based products across both channels, leveraging our enhanced capabilities to meet growing consumer demand,” he added. “This strategic alliance strengthens our market presence, allowing us to better serve our customers and drive innovation in the plant-based food industry.”

    The latest soy-protein-based products are vEEF’s first new launches since the merger. They include a beef mince for use in tacos, pasta sauces, and more, as well as three sausages. The classic sausages are ideal for stir-fries and barbecues, the Smokey ones can be added to soups and casseroles, while you can top up pizzas and breakfast scrambles with the Chorizo version (which is much cheaper than conventional branded Chorizo sausages, which range from AU$26-50).

    The company has managed to bring down the prices and overcome challenges like high raw material costs and supply chain instability through a multi-faceted approach. Its manufacturing hub streamlines production and reduces reliance on external suppliers to cut intermediary costs, while it has been working on addressing efficiencies in the supply chain.

    vEEF has also continued to refine its manufacturing process, allowing it to increase output while maintaining its quality, and the economies of scaling up this way also bring down prices. Notably, it is accepting a lower profit margin to offer competitive pricing, with a long-term focus on market share and consumer accessibility.

    Just earlier this month, a survey of 2,000 Australians found that price is the second largest barrier to the consumption of plant-based meat, with 37% deterred from choosing these products due to their high markups. That said, budgetary concerns were also the second most important reason for reducing the amount of meat Australians eat, a factor cited by 54% of respondents.

    The price problem for plant-based meat

    plant based meat survey
    Courtesy: Food Frontier

    The aforementioned poll, commissioned by Sydney-based think tank Food Frontier, suggested that nearly a fifth of Australians (21%) identify as meat reducers, while another 7% are flexitarian. Meanwhile, 15% are vegan or vegetarian – meaning more than two in five consumers are either cutting back on meat, or don’t eat it at all.

    This is on the back of a 47% hike in plant-based meats sales in Australia from 2020 to 2023 (across both retail and foodservice). With another 12% of citizens hoping to reduce meat this year, and four in five going meat-free at least once a week, the market for plant-based analogues seems ripe.

    But the latter category suffers from a major price premium, carrying a 33% higher markup than animal-derived meat. That said, this gap has narrowed from 49% in 2020, and Australian-made plant-based mince is only 8% more expensive than its cattle-based counterpart. Vegan sausages, on the other hand, have become 27% costlier in this time.

    plant based meat price parity
    Courtesy: Food Frontier

    Food Frontier found that manufacturers are prioritising health and nutrition in plant-based meat, followed by price. “Some Australian manufacturers said they absorbed price hikes whenever feasible to shield consumers from bearing the brunt, recognising the role of pricing in consumer decision-making,” the think tank’s CEO, Simon Eassom, told Green Queen in May.

    “And some companies improved efficiencies in their supply chain, while others pursued vertical integration to reduce overall expenses. Another contributor to the narrowing of the price gap is the departure of several imported plant-based meats, which were more expensive per kilo than locally produced products.”

    With continued manufacturing efficiencies, expansion in local production capacity, as well as some support from retailers, costs could be driven down even further, added Eassom: “If overseas trends are anything to go by, we think the Australian market, when it can, will see even closer price parity.”

    The post Australia’s vEEF Rolls Out Plant-Based Beef Mince and Sausages Cheaper Than Meat appeared first on Green Queen.

    This post was originally published on Green Queen.

  • Forma Foods Unveils ‘Chaotic’ 3D Printing Tech for Michelin-Starred Vegan Beef

    forma foods
    5 Mins Read

    Mexico’s Forma Foods is making whole-cut plant-based meat using a 3D printing technique that has impressed Michelin-starred chefs.

    What started as a bioprinting firm in 2017 has turned into a full-fledged food tech startup, leveraging its chaotic printing technology to address consumer pain points about the texture of meat analogues.

    For 75% of people around the world, the texture of plant-based meat is as important as its animal-derived counterparts – but only about 60% are actually satisfied with it.

    In Mexico City, Forma Foods is hoping to give consumers the mouthfeel they want from these products based on a technology that doesn’t just replicate animal muscle fibres, but also adipose and connective tissues, resulting in a well-rounded textural experience for the consumer.

    The startup’s beef analogues have impressed investors as well as chefs alike, landing on the menu of Rodrigo Rivera-Rio’s Koli, a recent recipient of a Michelin star. “It’s a protein, obviously, made with all the most cutting-edge technology in a laboratory,” the chef told TecScience in June. “It’s from Monterrey, it’s regia cuisine.”

    koli cocina de origen
    Courtesy: Forma Foods

    How Forma Foods developed its chaotic printing technology

    Forma Foods was founded on the back of years of research by Grissel Trujillo de Santiago and Mario Moises Alvarez during their time at Tecnologico de Monterrey. With biotech engineer Li Lu Lam Aguilar joining as co-founder and CEO, the tissue engineering experts initially explored cultivated meat, but pivoted to plant proteins due to the much higher costs involved.

    Its chaotic printing technology produces microstructures that mirror the architecture of animal tissues via the use of plant-based pastes: pea protein helps simulate muscle tissue, coconut oil mimics fat tissue, and prebiotic fibre from an Oriental root replicates connective tissue.

    “The term ‘chaotic’ might seem counterintuitive, as it’s often associated with disorder,” admits Alvarez, the firm’s CTO. “But in mathematics and physics, chaotic flows are known for their ability to create intricate, highly ordered microstructures efficiently.”

    The development of a now-patented specialised printhead in 2019 allowed the company to overcome the challenge of adapting 3D printing to produce meat analogues. “We use static mixers within our printheads to generate chaotic flows, enabling us to produce detailed microarchitecture within each filament. This innovative method allows us to recreate the complex texture of meat in a cost-effective and scalable way,” Alvarez explains.

    “Our printing technology replicates the architecture and texture of real meat by precisely organising different components – protein fibres, fat, and connective tissue – at a microscopic scale,” he adds. “In real meat, these elements are not mixed randomly – they are aligned and structured, which gives the meat its distinctive texture. Similarly, we print multi-material filaments that emulate these components.

    “While other plant-based meat producers typically create ‘ground meat’ products where all the ingredients are mixed and lack the fibrous structure of real meat, our approach coextrudes three different materials through the same nozzle, achieving a microstructure that mimics the natural alignment of meat at the micron level.”

    3d printed meat
    Courtesy: Forma Foods

    Forma Foods outpaces a cow by a factor of 100

    Forma Foods has created plant-based versions of arrachera (skirt steak) and carne al pastor (grilled pork) to appeal to local palates. After all, more than half (54%) of Mexicans are swapping meat for plant-based analogues.

    In 2022, a study suggested that 9% of the country’s population was vegan, another 19% vegetarian, and 15% identified as flexitarian – making it the largest plant-forward market in Latin America. Even Taylor Swift recognised this, offering Propel Foods’s vegan Bistec steak, Chorizo and Pastor tacos to Eras Tour visitors at the Foro Sol stadium in the capital last year.

    As proof of its product potential, Forma Foods has raised over $1M in funding from Tec Ventures and Saya Bio. “We are seeking additional funding to accelerate the development and scaling of our technology,” says Alvarez.

    Each of the company’s printers can currently produce 1.8kg of its beef per hour, a rate around 100 times speedier than the time it takes to raise a cow. “Our overall annual production is still limited, as we only have a small number of printers in operation (we design and build our own 3D printers),” he reveals.

    “However, our technology is easily scalable by simply adding more printers, which will significantly increase our production capacity to tonnes per month by mid-2025,” notes Alvarez. Another milestone would be reducing the costs of the final product. “Our current market price is above that of traditional beef, but we aim to achieve price parity by 2026,” he adds.

    plant based meat mexico
    Courtesy: Forma Foods

    The startup has outlined a three-pronged strategy as part of its development plan: gain consumer trust, establish strategic partnerships in the market, and offer products that are unique and innovative. On that note, it’s been in talks with some foodservice customers, and currently supplies three cuts of its 3D-printed meat for special events at Tecnológico de Monterrey.

    At Koli, Rivera-Rio served its beef as part of a conceptual dish. The story goes: as one beet watched cows eating other beets, it felt lonely and decided to become beef itself. To visualise this, he requested Forma Foods to shape its meat analogue in the form of a beetroot, pairing it with a beet sauce.

    “I think it would be very interesting to keep this as an ongoing dish in the menu: the vegetable that wanted to be meat,” the chef said, hinting at an ongoing collaboration with the startup. “This season it would be beet, next it could be a carrot. It can be a thousand things.”

    “Looking ahead, we plan to expand into retail stores across Mexico, particularly those specialising in vegan and health-conscious products,” says Alvarez. “We expect this rollout to happen at the beginning of 2025.”

    The post Forma Foods Unveils ‘Chaotic’ 3D Printing Tech for Michelin-Starred Vegan Beef appeared first on Green Queen.

    This post was originally published on Green Queen.

  • Treets Taps ChoViva’s Cocoa-Free Chocolate for New Vegan Peanut Dragées

    treets peanuts vegan
    4 Mins Read

    Planet A Foods has partnered with Katjes International to launch a cocoa-free, plant-based version of the famous Treets peanut dragées.

    Katjes International is bringing out a cocoa- and dairy-free version of Treets Peanuts, thanks to a partnership with German alt-chocolate producer Planet A Foods.

    The new dragées – which feature Planet A Foods’s ChoViva chocolate alternative and vegan pastel shades – will be available in German supermarkets from the end of the month, accompanied by a large marketing campaign by Treets.

    “I am particularly proud to launch a joint product with such a strong and well-known brand. Treets’ strong sense of sustainability and naturalness aligns perfectly with our values at ChoViva,” said Planet A Foods co-founder and CEO Maximilian Marquart.

    “I am excited to offer consumers a new and delicious cocoa-free alternative with the Treets Peanuts Vegan,” he added.

    Treets Peanuts goes cocoa-free

    treets peanuts choviva
    Courtesy: Planet A Foods

    First introduced by Mars in the 1960s, Treets originally consisted of chocolate-coated peanuts with a hard outer shell, in the style of a dragée. They were discontinued in 1988, replaced by Galaxy Minstrels and peanut M&Ms.

    In 2009, Mars reintroduced Treets, but by 2017, it let the property rights expire. Katjes acquired the brand a year later and permanently reestablished Treets in the European market. The range has since expanded to include peanut butter cups and spreads too.

    While the dragées have had a vegan pastel coating since Katje relaunched them, now, the whole product is plant-based. To amp up its sustainability credentials, it’s also free of cocoa, opting for an alternative made from sunflower seed and grape flours.

    The vegan Treets Peanuts will roll out at locations of all major supermarkets in Germany this month, including Kaufland, Globus, Famila, Tegut, Edeka and Rewe.

    Aside from the aforementioned seed flours, they comprise sugar, peanuts, palm and shea fats, rice starch, emulsifiers, maltodextrin, glucose syrup, carnauba wax, and natural food colouring. Per 100g, the dragées contain 30g of fat (10g saturated), 48g of sugar, and 12g of protein.

    This is the latest in a growing list of partnerships Planet A Foods has established for ChoViva. The alt-chocolate has been part of over 20 products launches since entering the market 12 months ago, including with Lindt, Griesson-de Beukelaer, Peter Kölln, Lufthansa, and Deutsche Bahn. It has also been part of private-label offerings from retailers such as Rewe and its subsidiary Penny, Edeka, Lidl, and Aldi.

    Planet A Foods to launch semi-sweet ChoViva and enter UK in 2025

    cocoa free chocolate
    Courtesy: Planet A Foods

    Planet A Foods uses a proprietary fermentation process to turn its ingredients into chocolate-like products with a “melt-in-the-mouth texture” and “full-bodied chocolate flavour”. With 30% less sugar, they can be used as both a 1:1 replacement of conventional chocolate or in hybrid formulations.

    One of the key challenges it is addressing is climate change. Dark chocolate is more polluting than pork, chicken and farmed fish combined, releasing more greenhouse gases into the atmosphere than every other food except beef. Cocoa itself is linked to mass deforestation, which is why it is part of anti-deforestation bans coming to the EU and the UK.

    Meanwhile, climate change itself is decimating cocoa production: extreme weather events have destroyed yields, leading to all-time highs in cocoa futures. Longer term, a third of cocoa trees could die out by 2050. As per an independent life-cycle assessment, ChoViva’s cocoa-free offering has a carbon footprint of 1.3kg of CO2e per kg, representing 83% fewer greenhouse gas emissions than vegan chocolate.

    But Planet A Foods is also working on alternatives to palm oil, aiming to create a fermented ChoViva Butter by converting single-cell oils, agricultural sidestreams and local feedstocks like beet sugar into a fat resembling cocoa butter. Pending regulatory approval, the company aims to bring this to market by 2026.

    In the short term, it plans to launch more products in Germany, including a semi-sweet version of ChoViva. Speaking to Green Queen after raising $15.4M in a Series A round earlier this year, Planet A Foods revealed it was making a play for the UK market.

    This is on track, with a UK product expected in 2025, followed by rollouts in several other European countries. Additionally, it is also exploring the US and Asian markets.

    Planet A Foods is among a number of companies working on climate-friendly chocolate and alternatives, including Italy’s Foreverland, London-based Win-Win, US startup Voyage Foods, and Israel’s Kokomodo.

    The post Treets Taps ChoViva’s Cocoa-Free Chocolate for New Vegan Peanut Dragées appeared first on Green Queen.

    This post was originally published on Green Queen.

  • After 136 Years, Italy’s Gruppo Tonazzo is Ditching Meat for Plant-Based

    gruppo tonazzo plant based
    5 Mins Read

    Italian legacy meat producer Gruppo Tonazzo is shuttering its meat business to solely focus on plant-based proteins via its Kioene brand.

    Driven by its impact on the environment and people’s health, one of Italy’s oldest meat manufacturers is going vegan.

    Padua-based Gruppo Tonazzo, which began as a butcher shop in 1888, has announced that by the end of the year, it will divest its meat business. The company will switch its entire focus on plant proteins through its long-running Kioene brand, which itself has been around since 1988 and is an established leader in the country’s vegan market.

    “We are embarking on the third revolution in our company’s history, and – we hope – in the sector as well,” said CEO Stefano Tonazzo, calling it “a gesture of great responsibility towards the environment and the nutritional wellbeing of future generations”.

    This was echoed by his brother Albino, who is CEO of Kioene: “This is a choice that we have carefully considered within the family and shared with our collaborators, a decision through which we want to make our contribution to safeguarding the planet and promoting an increasingly conscious diet.”

    Francesca Gallelli, public affairs consultant at alternative protein think tank the Good Food Institute (GFI) Europe, told Green Queen: “This decision demonstrates that alternative proteins are not a threat, but rather a chance for the conventional meat sector to diversify, innovate, and enhance its offerings to meet consumers’ demand – especially when backed by deep expertise and the strength of the ‘Made in Italy’ brand.”

    Embracing vegetables for people and the planet

    kioene plant based
    Courtesy: Kioene/Gruppo Tonazzo

    The makings of the decision can be traced back to the establishment of Kioene all those years ago, the idea for which came about during a trip the Tonazzo brothers took to São Paulo. “We woke up very early and left with one of our suppliers to visit the slaughterhouses outside the city,” Albino recalled in an interview with Nord Est Economia last year.

    “On the way, we saw an endless line of trucks stopped on the road. We asked what it was. It was soy, destined for animal feed,” he said. “It was shortly after, during dinner, that my life changed: they explained to me that the energy needed to produce one unit of animal protein was the same as that needed to produce 12 units of plant protein. An absurd ratio.”

    It sparked a research effort that ended in Albino and his team creating some of the first soy burgers on Italian supermarket shelves. That lineup has since expanded to include a whole-food focus, using vegetables like aubergines, broccoli, kale and spinach as the base, and these propelled the brand’s market success.

    Apart from the veggie burgers, its current portfolio also includes falafels, cutlets, and chicken fillets (though these contain eggs and aren’t vegan) in both fresh and frozen options. Its entire lineup has over 100 SKUs – including alt-dairy offerings – and has penetrated 2.3 million households in Italy (around 10% of the total).

    In the last decade, Kioene has become a major money maker for Tonazzo, so much so that the plant-based burgers alone made up €50M of its €80M turnover in 2023 (a 63% share).

    “While our family has been involved in the meat industry for five generations, nearly 40 years ago, we began a shift by introducing plant-based protein alternatives,” said Stefano. “With the same spirit of innovation and foresight, we are now closing all meat-related operations to focus entirely on plant-based proteins and our Kioene brand.”

    Tonazzo leans into Italy’s fast-growing plant-based market

    gruppo tonazzo vegetali
    Courtesy: Kioene/Gruppo Tonazzo

    Tonazzo’s factory in Villanova di Camposampiero will continue to produce plant-based products, and employees in the meat business will be offered new roles within the company to ensure a just transition, which is earmarked for December 31.

    “As pioneers and key players in this market, we feel a deep responsibility towards future generations, and we want to help protect the Earth from progressive environmental degradation. We are aware of the need to help people take care of their wellbeing, starting with food,” Albino said.

    “This is how we aim to contribute to change and collective awareness, and we are convinced that the market and consumers will follow us once again.”

    Italians are actively eating less meat. A pan-European survey in 2023 found that the country had the joint-highest share of consumers (59%) looking to cut back on guanciale, vitello, pancetta and the like. This was primarily driven by concerns around health (54%), antibiotic use (17%), and the environment (16%), in line with the reasons Tonazzo is saying arrivederci to meat.

    It does seem that the company is following consumer trends: among the Italians reducing meat, most want to replace it with legumes (57%) or legume-based proteins (43%), with the desire for plant-based meat lower at 39%. Kioene’s portfolio plays straight into this trend.

    That said, it also comes at a time when meat analogues are the second-fastest-growing segment in Italy’s vegan sector, behind only plant-based cheese. In 2023, retail sales of meatless products in Italy swelled by 13%, nearly reaching €200M – only milk alternatives had higher sales, according to GFI Europe.

    This isn’t a one-off. Plant-based meat sales are actually up by 24% from two years ago, and in the first four months of 2024, sales are 10% higher than the corresponding period last year.

    “As more Italians incorporate plant-based meat into their diets, it’s inspiring to see a historic meat company embracing the potential of alternative proteins,” said Gallelli.

    The post After 136 Years, Italy’s Gruppo Tonazzo is Ditching Meat for Plant-Based appeared first on Green Queen.

    This post was originally published on Green Queen.

  • 86% of Spaniards Would Eat More Plant-Based Meat If They Deliver on Taste, Health & Environmental Benefits

    plant based meat spain
    4 Mins Read

    A majority of consumers in Spain are open to eating more meat analogues if they offer nutritional and taste parity alongside a lower environmental impact.

    In Spain, over half of consumers (56%) have eaten plant-based meat in the last six months, and another 8% are considering trying them. But an even higher share of people would consume these products if they presented key benefits, according to a new survey.

    Conducted by Spanish meat analogue leader Heura, the 1,000-person poll sought to examine the perspectives of the country’s residents on the nutritional, taste and environmental credentials of plant-based meat.

    It found that consumption of these products skews higher in men, those aged 25-34, and people in the northeast. There was also a significant difference in socioeconomic acceptability, with medium- to high-earners more likely to eat plant-based meat.

    But of those who haven’t consumed these products in the last six months, it’s people in the northwest of Spain and the age bracket of 35-54 who are most interested in trying plant-based meat in the short term.

    To sway these consumers and take plant-based meat intake to an even higher level, companies need to meet their taste and health requirements while convincing them of the environmental benefits.

    UPFs not a barrier, but consumers still unsure about nutrition

    spain vegan survey
    Courtesy: Heura

    Spain is among Europe’s largest meat consumers and has one of the highest per-capita meat consumption rates globally. Based on data from the UN FAO, the country’s average meat intake per person is five times higher than what’s recommended by the WHO.

    But Heura’s survey shows that Spaniards are open to plant-based meats, provided they meet their needs. It underscored the importance of taste and texture when it comes to meat analogues – 85% of consumers say they’d eat these products if they delivered the same sensory experience as their conventional counterparts.

    This is particularly important to the 8% of people considering eating more plant-based meat in the near term – of these, 98% of people would be convinced to try vegan analogues if they matched animal proteins on taste. And this would persuade even those currently disinterested in these products, 65% of whom would be open to giving them a shot.

    Heura, which saw sales jump by 22% last year (reaching €38.3M), says it has the highest repetition rate on the market, and claims that neurophysiological studies have found that its vegan burgers perform on par or better than conventional beef.

    Another major concern surrounding plant-based meats is the health aspect. Red meat has been associated with increased risk of heart disease, cancer, type 2 diabetes, and other conditions, but the (often misleading) narrative around ultra-processing has left many questioning the nutritional value of plant-based meats.

    However, only 8% of Spaniards believe that the ultra-processed nature of vegan burgers means they’re not healthier than animal-derived meat. Nearly three-quarters (71%) feel plant-based burgers are better for human health, but the poll also uncovered consumer uncertainty in this regard – only 26% of people strongly agreed with this statement.

    Unawareness about plant-based meat’s planetary benefits

    spain plant based meat survey
    Courtesy: Heura

    People in Spain remain largely unaware of the environmental potential of plant-based meat. Asked to rank four measures based on their positive planetary impacts, a majority (64%) ranked replacing meat with plant proteins as the least effective action, behind recycling, using renewable energy at home, and reducing water consumption.

    Two-thirds (66%) of Spaniards found recycling to be the most effective action to combat climate change, despite the fact that the country’s recycling rates are lower than the EU average. In contrast, only 19% of respondents placed plant-based meat consumption in their top two climate actions.

    However, recycling has been found to reduce an average of 5-9% of greenhouse gas emissions, much lower than the 75-90% reduction a plant-based diet can bring, according to the FAO. Independent research has also shown that vegan diets can reduce emissions and water pollution by 75%, while replacing 50% of animal proteins with plant-based analogues can cut agricultural emissions by 31%.

    Heura – which closed a €40M Series B funding round earlier this year –  says it has also reduced its own climate footprint by 23% per kg of product between 2021 and 2023, while its vegan beef emits 94% fewer greenhouse gases than conventional beef.

    But when presented with a plant-based meat option that tastes the same, has a better nutritional value, and has a lower environmental impact, 86% of consumers would be willing to consume it. This is actually twice as high as the willingness to try a vegan burger with such attributes, suggesting that expanding the category is no longer limited to burgers.

    “We are solving these challenges in a way that goes beyond what the industry is doing. With cutting-edge technology and new scientific approaches, we create foods that have the same textures and flavours as meat, but are better for your health and the planet,” said Heura co-founder and CEO Marc Coloma.

    “We want to satisfy those who are looking for complete and sustainable options, while contributing to the wellbeing of everyone, from society and the planet to animals,” he added. “We don’t make alternatives, we make successors.”

    The post 86% of Spaniards Would Eat More Plant-Based Meat If They Deliver on Taste, Health & Environmental Benefits appeared first on Green Queen.

    This post was originally published on Green Queen.

  • Future Food Quick Bites: Vegan Uggs, Plant-Based Stroopwafels & Beer from Pasta Waste

    vegan uggs
    5 Mins Read

    In our weekly column, we round up the latest news and developments in the alternative protein and sustainable food industry. This week, Future Food Quick Bites covers Alpro’s new flavoured barista milk, vegan footwear wins, and Violife’s latest marketing campaign.

    New products and launches

    South Korean vegan cheesemaker Armored Fresh has announced that it will release a vegan grated parmesan made from oat milk in the US this fall.

    alpro barista caramel
    Courtesy: Alpro/Green Queen

    Alpro has released a 750ml caramel-flavoured barista milk made from soy and oats in the UK, which is available at Sainsbury’s for £1.75.

    Another flavoured milk comes from Mighty, which has announced a Gingerbread Oat Barista milk as part of the UK’s annual tradition of releasing Christmas-themed products from September.

    In more alt-dairy news, Cathedral City has added a Plant-Based Smokey cheese block to its lineup, which will be available at Tesco soon.

    beyond belief brewing co
    Courtesy: Beyond Belief Brewing Co

    Also in the UK, Beyond Belief Brewing Co, a subsidiary of pasta supplier Ugo Foods, is launching a line of beers made using waste pasta in grocery, including a Pale Ale, IPA and Vienna Lager, which will be available at Ocado for £8.50-£8.75 this month.

    Barefoot shoe maker Vivobarefoot has introduced the Gobi Sneaker Premium Canvas, a Vegan Society-certified sneaker made from 98% natural materials. Instead of plastic, the brand is using a bio-based alt-leather from Natural Fiber Welding called Mirum.

    In more footwear news, sheepskin boot manufacturer Ugg has announced a vegan version of its signature shoe, partnering with New York label Collina Strada. The vegan Uggs are made from recycled polyester microfibre and corn leather, and are available in the UK on both brands’ websites.

    vegan stroopwafels
    Courtesy: Stroop Club

    Texas-based startup Stroop Club has rolled out its vegan stroopwafels in Europe. Using sunflower oil and cacao fats, the products are available as two- or eight-packs at Ankorstore.com and Faire.com, and on its website.

    Speaking of Dutch delights, plant-based giant Vivera has launched Protein Bites in the Netherlands, described as “plant-based meal enrichers” made from vegetables, grains and legumes. The whole-food product line is available in TexMex, Thai and Green flavours, and can be found at Albert Heijn, Jumbo and Plus stores.

    vivera protein bites
    Courtesy: Vivera

    In the US, TiNDLE Foods‘ chicken tenders are now available on the menu of AI-driven meal kit and grocery solutions platform Hungryroot.

    Meanwhile, Rich Products Corporation‘s F’real has debuted the first non-dairy edition of its DIY shakes, an oat-milk-based Choco Choco Chip flavour.

    Plant protein company Havredals has expanded its fava bean meats on the US east cost through a distribution partnership with Performance Food Group.

    faba bean burger
    Courtesy: Havredals

    And Slovenia’s Juicy Marbles is also hoping to ‘steak’ a claim in the US with a 2025 supermarket launch for its whole-cut meat analogues. It’s working on a more accessible product line to widen its customer reach.

    Finance and company updates

    Plant-Ex Ingredients, a British supplier of plant-derived flavours, colours and extracts has raised £9M in funding from BGF to expand internationally, with the US a key focus market.

    Canadian vegan meal replacement beverage maker Sperri has attracted new funding to spur its US expansion efforts. It has just entered the D2C channel via Amazon.

    Swedish investor Kale United has announced a new €50M Kale Growth Fund for alternative protein startups.

    mellody honey
    Courtesy: MeliBio

    Vegan honey maker MeliBio has been granted a utility patent in Germany, which it hopes will fuel its expansion in Europe.

    Meanwhile, Copenhagen-based Meat Tomorrow, which is developing pluripotent stem cell lines for cultivated meat, has raised 4.1 million kroner ($610,000) to expand R&D efforts and establish partnerships.

    As election season rages on in the US, vegan cheese giant Violife has debuted a new marketing campaign dubbed America Has Voted, after its product was voted the best dairy-free cream cheese. The company will take over bagel shops on election day (November 5) and offer samples in grocery store parking lots in Austin and Miami.

    violife cream cheese
    Courtesy: Violife

    Givaudan‘s food innovation platform MISTA has chosen biomass fermentation as the central theme for the 2024 Growth Hack event.

    Research and policy developments

    As US lawmakers continue to find ways to try and ban cultivated meat, a federal judge in Florida has set a date for a hearing about the state’s ban on cultivated meat. In its lawsuit, Californian startup Upside Foods asked the court for a preliminary injunction, which Chief US District Judge Mark Walker will hear arguments for on October 7.

    florida lab grown meat lawsuit
    Courtesy: Kevin Martin Galante/Upside Foods

    In a new research partnership, Indian cultivated meat startup ClearMeat will join forces with Melbourne’s La Trobe University under the Indo-Australian research corridor. It was announced as ClearMeat unveiled ClearX9, an FBS-free powdered growth medium.

    Also in India, the Good Food Institute India and the state-owned CSIR-Institute of Himalayan Bioresource Technology have signed a research agreement to advance the country’s alternative protein sector. The latter will provide scientific support and access to state-of-the-art labs and instrumentation facilities for GFI India’s research fellows.

    If it manages to meet the taste and nutrition requirements, plant-based dairy could be 10% cheaper than cow’s milk by 2030, a new report shows.

    national trust vegan
    Courtesy: William Shaw/National Trust

    Finally, in the UK, conservation agency the National Trust is looking to make half of its food in cafes meatless as part of its net-zero pledge for 2030, with its 2.6 million members set to vote on the proposal. Around 40% of its current catering is plant-based.

    Check out last week’s Future Food Quick Bites.

    The post Future Food Quick Bites: Vegan Uggs, Plant-Based Stroopwafels & Beer from Pasta Waste appeared first on Green Queen.

    This post was originally published on Green Queen.

  • Deliciously Ella: Plant-Based Snacking Brand Acquired by Hero Group in Multimillion-Pound Deal

    deliciously ella hero group
    5 Mins Read

    Swiss food manufacturer Hero Group has taken over vegan healthy eating brand Deliciously Ella, with owners Ella and Matthew Mills remaining at the company.

    Deliciously Ella, the UK-based pioneer of vegan snacking, has been acquired by Hero Group, a Swiss food company that also owns British children’s snack brand Organix.

    While the terms of the deal were undisclosed, it is expected to make millions of pounds for founder Ella Mills and her husband Matthew, who are both majority shareholders and will remain in the business under the new ownership.

    The takeover will allow Hero to expand its presence in the UK, and enable Deliciously Ella to “reach millions more customers around the world” – the brand is set to enter the US with its oat bars through Whole Foods Market.

    The deal comprises the Deliciously Ella recipe app, its branded products, and its factory near Milton Keynes, but does not include the recently launched Plants brand (which sells pantry staples like pasta and sauces, as well as kombucha and soups) or the Plants by DE restaurant in London – the latter two remain under the Millses’ ownership.

    It means that seven Deliciously Ella employees will move across to work for the Plants brand, and the remaining 70 will join Hero. “This is a transformational moment in bringing our natural, plant-based ranges to more people, both in the UK and abroad,” Ella and Matthew said in a joint statement.

    “As a family-owned business, with a long-term view that aligns with our thinking, Hero Group are the right fit for us,” they added.

    Deliciously Ella had ‘numerous approaches’ to sell

    plants by deliciously ella
    Courtesy: Deliciously Ella

    Deliciously Ella began as a food blog in 2012 that Ella used to chronicle her recovery from an autoimmune disease by following a whole-food plant-based diet.

    She tapped into her roots as a descendant of the Sainsbury family with her retail brand, which grew to a portfolio of over 100 products present in all major UK supermarkets. She has also authored eight cookbooks – her 2015 title Deliciously Ella became the fastest-selling debut cookbook in the UK at the time, while 2018’s Deliciously Ella: The Plant-Based Cookbook broke records as the fastest-selling vegan cookbook ever.

    Ella has shifted more than 1.5 million copies of her recipe books, while her retail company has sold nearly 88 million units and is present in more than 10,000 stores across the UK and the EU – that equates to one Deliciously Ella product being purchased every second.

    With her husband and business partner, she also opened three restaurants in London (two of which closed pre-pandemic). Plants by DE, in London’s Mayfair, initially struggled but has since been thriving.

    The company generated around £24M ($31.7M) in revenue in its latest financial year, with a pre-tax profit of £1.8M ($2.4M). And to make things more efficient, it brought production in-house by buying a factory in Milton Keynes, which is now under Hero’s ownership.

    “What started as a small recipe website and a cookbook has become something bigger than either of us could have imagined,” said the Mills couple. “We have had numerous approaches to sell or partner with other food companies over the years, but only this one felt right.”

    They added: “Hero has brands all over the world and a proven track record in helping brands reach much greater scale.”

    A major win for Ella Mills

    deliciously ella
    Courtesy: Deliciously Ella

    “Our multi-year strategy has focused on bringing brands that fit within our core categories with the aim of fulfilling our mission to bring natural, healthy food to consumers,” said Hero CEO Rob Versloot. “Deliciously Ella is a perfect fit for us, and we are particularly happy to have them on board.”

    The company owns a number of brands across the world, such as healthy snacking labels Corny and Hero B’tween, jam makers Queensberry, Schwartau and Vitrac, and baby food players Semper, Beech-Nut, Baby Gourmet, and Organix.

    The deal marks a feather in the cap for Ella Mills, who for years faced turbulent struggles with online trolls and the challenges that come with owning a multichannel business while raising a young family. She has faced bullying over motherhood and eating disorders, which worsened her mental health. All this while two of her restaurants closed before the turbulence of Covid-19 and its lockdowns.

    Deliciously Ella’s products are now in Switzerland, Ireland, Austria and Germany, with the move to the US impending. “We’re completely reliant on the business for our income,” Matthew told the Times. “We’ve had a personal guarantee on our house for eight years.”

    He added: “We started talking in December of last year. Ella and I dated for about two months before we got married whereas we dated these guys for ten months before getting married. That’s a long time for us.”

    Hero’s purchase of Deliciously Ella comes amid a flurry of M&A activity in the vegan sector, following a 24% dip in investments last year and a flatlining of sales globally. Wicked Kitchen was snapped up by the newly formed Ahimsa Companies in June, while VFC evolved into the Vegan Food Group to become a holding company that now includes Meatless Farm, Clive’s Purely Plants and Tofutown.

    In the US, Superlatus agreed to buy plant-based dairy and egg startup Spero, months after it signed a deal to purchase precision fermentation dairy leader Perfect Day’s consumer arm The Urgent Company. And in Australia, All G Foods spun off its meat analogue brand Love Buds, which merged with Fenn Foods’ vEEF to form The Aussie Plant-Based Co.

    The post Deliciously Ella: Plant-Based Snacking Brand Acquired by Hero Group in Multimillion-Pound Deal appeared first on Green Queen.

    This post was originally published on Green Queen.

  • Hart House: Kevin Hart’s Vegan Fast-Food Chain Closes All Locations Overnight

    kevin hart vegan restaurant
    4 Mins Read

    American comedian Kevin Hart’s plant-based restaurant chain Hart House suddenly closed all its locations last week.

    Hart House, the Californian vegan fast-food eatery by comedian Kevin Hart, unexpectedly shut the doors of all its four locations on September 10.

    “To our team, guests, and community, who helped make the change we all craved,” the chain wrote on Instagram. “A Hartfelt goodbye for now as we start a new chapter.”

    CEO Andy Hooper confirmed the news to Eater Los Angeles, but the reason for the closure of the two-year-old chain is still unclear.

    Hart established the venture in 2022, two years after publicly announcing that he was following a plant-forward diet, cutting out red meat, fish and seafood after a serious accident. “I founded Hart House to create a good experience that combines the joy of coming together over food with the power of purpose,” he wrote on the restaurant’s website, which still remains up with no reference to the closure.

    Hart House’s competitive prices and in-house plant-based meats

    Hart House opened its first location in Westchester in August 2022, followed by a second store in Monrovia in November. The chain’s flagship store was opened in May 2023 on the corner of Hollywood Boulevard and Highland Avenue, while a fourth outlet was opened in University Park South a month later.

    “If I can give people a place to have the option that’s placed smack dab in the middle of where your McDonald’s, Chick-fil-A, and Burger King [are], people may see a Hart House and say: ‘I’m going to go plant-based today,’” Hart told The Hollywood Reporter in 2022.

    To set up the business, Hart teamed up with investor Michael Rubin and chef Mike Salem, who helped launch the Impossible Whopper during his time at Burger King.

    Known for its competitive pricing, the chain sold chicken sandwiches, burgers, and nuggets for under $8, with combo meals costing less than $15. Meanwhile, fries, salads and tater tots were available for less than $3, and milkshakes for under $6.

    Despite Hart being an investor in Beyond Meat, appearing in marketing campaigns at the time, he and his team decided against using branded plant-based meats, instead developing its own range of proprietary analogues in-house.

    But the fast-food chain – which outlined its ambition to be the future of quick-service restaurants – has now closed. Why that happened, and what happens to it next, is unclear.

    In a statement sent to Eater Los Angeles, Hooper said: “The response to the product has been incredible, and we thank our committed team, our customers, and our community partners for helping make the change we all craved, and for their unwavering support of Hart House.”

    hart house closed
    Courtesy: Hart House

    High costs and low sales key challenges for vegan restaurants

    Hart House’s closure comes amid a turbulent time for plant-based restaurants in South California, and in the US as a whole.

    Within Los Angeles, Vegan Drip Burger, Shojin, Nic’s on Beverly, Flore Vegan, Jewel, and Matthew Kenney’s VEG’D and Plant Food & Wine are among the plant-forward restaurants that have shut down this year alone. Even Shake Shack closed five stores in the LA area earlier this month.

    This is part of a wider trend – according to the Los Angeles Times, at least 65 well-known restaurants closed in 2023. High inflation rates have squeezed consumer wallets, prompting them to spend less on dining out. A recent survey showed that American families spend 10% less of their food budget on restaurants than they did in 2022.

    At the same time, restaurants themselves are facing thin margins, and high labour and ingredient costs. In 2023, pound sales of meat analogues dipped by 8% in the US foodservice sector, versus a 4% drop for conventional meat, according to Circana data cited by the Good Food Institute.

    Plant proteins also suffer from a major price gap, which has been accentuated by the cost-of-living crisis – despite the cost of meat climbing faster than plant-based alternatives, the latter are still 38% more expensive. This has also pushed some formerly meatless restaurants to add meat to their menus, like Sage, Hot Tongue Pizza, Elf Cafe, Burgerlords, and Margo’s in Los Angeles.

    That said, in California, the number of fast-food jobs has reached an all-time high, despite the mandated minimum wage increasing from $15.50 to $20 in April.

    But as Hart’s restaurant closes, another celebrity-backed eatery is about to open its doors this winter, with siblings Billie Eilish and Finneal O’Connell partnering with restauranteur Nic Adler to set up Italian diner Argento in LA’s Silver Lake area.

    The post Hart House: Kevin Hart’s Vegan Fast-Food Chain Closes All Locations Overnight appeared first on Green Queen.

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  • Beyond ‘Chimp Crazy’: The PETA Foundation’s Precedent-Setting Legal Battles

    In four nail-biting episodes, HBO’s Chimp Crazy zeroes in on the PETA Foundation’s high-stakes legal battle with notorious animal broker Tonia Haddix—the self-proclaimed “Dolly Parton of chimps.” Six chimpanzees were rescued from the now-defunct Missouri Primate Foundation, we launched a nationwide search for Tonka—who was found and recovered from Haddix’s basement—and now, we’re aiming to collect the nearly $225,000 Haddix owes us in attorneys’ fees and costs.

     
     
     
     
     
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    A post shared by PETA (@peta)

    That’s what happens when seedy exhibitors, cruel experimenters, and deceptive companies try to go to bat with PETA and the PETA Foundation’s lawyers. If they don’t lose in a court of law, they eventually lose in the court of public opinion.

    From dethroning major Tiger King villains to spotlighting SeaWorld’s cruelty, the PETA Foundation’s crack legal team has paved the way for dozens of historic victories for animals.

    Here are some of the PETA Foundation’s sensational and unforgettable legal showdowns beyond Chimp Crazy:

    PETA Decimates the Cruel Big-Cat Cub-Petting Industry

    Remember “Joe Exotic,” “Doc” Antle, Jeff Lowe, and Tim Stark? These infamous Tiger King villains are either behind bars, out of business, facing federal charges, and/or in mountains of debt after losing to PETA. The work of PETA Foundation lawyers contributed to the closure of Lowe’s and Stark’s facilities by government prosecutors; the rescue of more than two dozen big cats from Stark and the transfer of all his other captive animals; and the seizure of 69 big cats from Lowe’s now-defunct facility.

    We also saved 39 tigers, three bears, two baboons, and two chimpanzees from Joseph Maldonado, aka “Joe Exotic,” before he was arrested and imprisoned on murder-for-hire and wildlife-trafficking crimes.

    By the time the Big Cat Public Safety Act was passed in December 2022, the big-cat cub-petting industry was already crumbling, thanks to PETA. With proper enforcement, this law—which prohibits private ownership of big cats and bans public contact with them—will serve as the final nail in the industry’s coffin.

    PETA Strikes Down ‘Ag-Gag’ Laws

    The meat, egg, dairy, and fishing industries all have a common enemy: the truth. That’s why they relentlessly lobby for “ag-gag” laws, which are designed to silence anyone investigating and exposing the horrors that occur on farms and in slaughterhouses.

    When the meat industry introduced laws to try to make it imprisonable and suable to document flagrant cruelty on farms and in slaughterhouses, PETA’s legal maneuvering stopped these “ag-gag” bills cold in 19 states, and versions of these laws were declared unconstitutional in five other states—including Idaho, Iowa, North Carolina, Utah, and Wyoming.

    PETA Takes Down Secretive Experimenters

    Laboratories that use and kill animals in painful, useless experiments often do so on the taxpayers’ dime—which is why they go to great lengths to conceal their operations from the public.

    When the National Institutes of Health (NIH) quietly attempted to censor criticism of its horrific tests on animals, PETA and others slapped the agency with a lawsuit—and we won. A court ruled that NIH’s blocking of keywords—including “monkey(s),” “cats,” “mouse,” “experiment,” “testing,” “PETA,” “torture,” and “revolting”—on its social media pages violated the First Amendment.

    And when a major international research conglomerate sued to prevent PETA from showing footage of laboratory workers violently thrusting petrified monkeys into containers and shoving plastic tubes up their noses, we gained the right to secretly film and publicize our video.

    PETA Invokes the Anti-Slavery Amendment Against SeaWorld

    PETA’s famous Tilikum v. SeaWorld case was the first-ever filing seeking to apply the 13th Amendment to animals other than humans. Our lawsuit urged a federal court to declare that five wild-caught orcas forced to perform at SeaWorld were being held as slaves.

    The court ruled against the orcas, but the lawsuit sparked a wave of awareness for orcas and other animals suffering at the abusement park. The release of Blackfish two years later—combined with PETA’s ongoing campaign against the company—further tanked SeaWorld’s reputation. Most travel companies have cut ties with SeaWorld, and hundreds of thousands of families now steer clear of the parks.

    PETA Foundation Lawyers Put a Target on the Back of Humane-Washing Egg Sellers

    Humane washing is what happens when companies that exploit and kill animals for their flesh, eggs, or secretions want to market their products to conscious consumers. Using labels like “free-range,” “pasture raised,” “humane,” and “ethical,” these companies mislead well-meaning buyers into thinking that animal-derived products can ever be “humane.”

    For example, PETA eyewitness video footage of a Nellie’s Free Range Eggs supplier showed approximately 20,000 hens confined to a single extremely crowded shed with severely restricted access to the outdoors, which they could reach only by fighting their way to hatchways that were only occasionally open.

    free-range hens

    PETA Foundation lawyers filed a lawsuit against Nellie’s and subsequently helped file a class action lawsuit against another humane-washing egg brand as well as a global milk seller. In three historic decisions, federal courts held that these lawsuits raised valid legal arguments. These wins set a precedent for future action against other deceptive companies.

    PETA’s Unprecedented Lawsuit Saved a Chimpanzee Held in Solitary Confinement

    Following a lawsuit from PETA and a concerned member of the public, Joe the chimpanzee—who was suffering in solitary confinement at an Alabama roadside zoo—was rescued and transferred to a true sanctuary. Joe, who is also Chimp Crazy star Tonka’s brother, was the first chimpanzee to be rescued as a result of an Endangered Species Act (ESA) lawsuit. He even met chimpanzee expert Dr. Jane Goodall during his rescue! Now he’s enjoying life at an accredited sanctuary, where he has ample space, expert care, the opportunity to socialize with other chimpanzees, and freedom from exploitation.

    chimpanzee at a sanctuary with grass and a tire
    More of PETA Foundation’s Precedent-Setting Cases

    Stream Chimp Crazy to Follow Our Pivotal Case Against a Notorious Primate Broker

    How does the PETA Foundation’s legal team do it? See for yourself by streaming Chimp Crazy on Max! Then take action to support a critical bill that would protect chimpanzees and other primates.

    U.S. Residents: Support the Captive Primate Safety Act

    The post Beyond ‘Chimp Crazy’: The PETA Foundation’s Precedent-Setting Legal Battles appeared first on PETA.

    This post was originally published on Animal Rights and Campaign News | PETA.

  • NewTexture: Schouten Creates ‘Replacement for Textured Proteins’ with Novel Fibre Technology

    schouten newtexture schnitzel
    4 Mins Read

    To address concerns about plant-based meat textures, Dutch company Schouten has introduced a chicken schnitzel made from its NewTexture fibre technology.

    When it comes to plant-based meat, one of the biggest pain points for consumers is the texture. For years, many meat analogues have been described as dry, crumbly, mushy, or just unappealing in terms of mouthfeel.

    It’s why companies are racing to come up with ways to produce meat analogues with whole-muscle structures that better resemble their conventional counterparts. It’s also why this effort is called the “holy grail” of plant-based meat.

    Globally, the texture of vegan meat products is as important as their animal-derived versions for 75% of consumers – but only about 60% are actually satisfied with it.

    Similarly, a 1,500-person survey this year found that 42% of Americans are deterred from choosing a meat analogue dish at a restaurant because they don’t think they’ll like the texture. And in Germany, 26% of people say they’d pay more for a plant-based product if it has the same taste and texture as the food it’s hoping to replace.

    Responding to these needs, Dutch alternative protein pioneer Schouten has come up with a “self-developed” fibre technology, promising enhanced textures in meat analogues. It’s starting with a chicken schnitzel, which is now available for its foodservice customers.

    Fibre technology aims to improve texture and reduce emissions

    schouten newtexture
    Courtesy: Schouten

    Schouten explains that a lot of meat analogues require high amounts of energy and what some feel is “unnecessary processing”.

    This is why it has developed a novel fibre technology, dubbed NewTexture, which it describes as a “replacement for textured proteins”. The innovation is aimed at providing a better texture for meat analogues, and it results in lower emissions than existing technologies.

    “This new subline within our Classics range is the result of years of research and development,” says Niek-Jan Schouten, CEO of Schouten Europe. “We are confident that Schouten’s NewTextures will be a game changer for both our business partners and end consumers.”

    Schouten is showcasing the technology in its new chicken schnitzel, made from soy and wheat proteins. This is said to have a uicy texture and white hue characteristic of conventional chicken. In addition to the visual and textural attributes, the schnitzel also has strong nutritional credentials, clocking in 12g of protein per 100g, nearly 5g of fibre, and only 1.2g of saturated fat.

    “Meat substitutes are sometimes prepared incorrectly, which can make them a bit dry. These products retain their juiciness, making them even more appealing,” explains Schouten. “The overall package is spot on, and we are very proud of this launch, which will help elevate the product category to a new level.”

    Others innovating with fibres to advance meat analogues include Germany’s Project Eaden and US startup Tender Foods, both of which are using fibre-spinning technologies.

    It’s all about product diversity

    schouten
    Courtesy: Schouten

    Schouten, a family-owned company, has been making meat analogues since 1990 – one of the earliest movers in the market. It has an extensive product range geared towards customers in over 50 countries, from supermarket private-labels to branded manufacturers and quick-service restaurant chains.

    It forayed into seafood analogues for the first time in early 2021 with a vegan tuna product, before releasing new lines of plant-based chicken and beef a few months later.

    Outside its Classics line of meat analogues, the company also has a range called Variations, which involves products that aren’t meant to resemble meat. “Ultimately, we believe that meat substitutes don’t always need to mimic meat,” Schouten said. “With legumes and vegetables, we can develop excellent protein-rich products that don’t have a meat equivalent.”

    He added: “However, to convince true meat lovers to buy meat substitutes more often, the classics are still essential. It’s important that we continue to improve the quality of these products. That’s why we keep investing in our Classics.”

    It was with this line of thinking that the company announced a portfolio of mycoprotein products, through which it also aims to “market products with a lower footprint and less processing”.

    These moves have legs, and are being replicated elsewhere too. Beyond Meat, one of the world’s largest plant-based meat companies, recently brought out Sun Sausages in response to consumer demands for whole foods – these links aren’t meant to resemble meat, and are instead made from vegetables and legumes. And just last week, the company said it would soon launch a mycelium-based steak as a clean-label option.

    The post NewTexture: Schouten Creates ‘Replacement for Textured Proteins’ with Novel Fibre Technology appeared first on Green Queen.

    This post was originally published on Green Queen.

  • You Can Host the Ultimate Canadian ‘ThanksVegan’ Celebration—Here’s How

    A decadent feast complete with loads of stuffing, piles of fluffy mashed potatoes and gravy, and even a savory roast for the centerpiece—all without cruelty? It’s not a dream—it’s ThanksVegan! PETA is inviting kind Canadians (and everyone else, too) to join in on this animal-friendly celebration, which falls on October 14 this year.

    How to Have a Canadian ThanksVegan Menu

    Whether you like to get creative in the kitchen or prefer to keep things simple, PETA has you covered with mouthwatering recipes for ThanksVegan classics, new favorites, and all the sides in between. So what are you waiting for? Let’s give thanks (for vegan food!) and dig in.

    The Best Vegan Meatloaf Recipe

    Savory Vegan Gravy

    Maple-Sriracha Roasted Brussels Sprouts with Cranberry Wild Rice

    Three-Step Vegan Pumpkin Pie

    Vegan Pumpkin Pie
    Vegan Pumpkin Pie
    Browse Even More Free Vegan Recipes

    Stores Offering Vegan Options Across Canada

    Want to make your “ThanksVegan” dinner as simple as possible? It’s easy to find all the essentials you’ll need to make a delicious feast at many Canadian grocery chains. Here are some that stock meatless roasts, vegan butter, nondairy milks, and so much more:

    • Atlantic Superstore
    • Bloor Street Market
    • Buy-Low Foods
    • Dominion
    • Fortinos
    • IGA
    • Independent City Market
    • Loblaws
    • Loblaws CityMarket
    • Nesters Market
    • No Frills
    • Real Canadian Superstore
    • Safeway
    • Save-On-Foods
    • Sobeys
    • Urban Fare
    • Valu-mart
    • Your Independent Grocer
    • Zehrs

    Buy-Low Foods ad

    To help you with grocery shopping, we’ve put together a list of vegan products you can find in Canadian stores.

    Get Inspired for ThanksVegan With These Vegan Canadian Influencers

    Gravy and potatoes are great, but why not think outside the boxed stuffing? These vegan Canadian influencers offer simple ways to max out flavor and fun this ThanksVegan:

    Rose of Cheap Lazy Vegan specializes in inexpensive vegan recipes for people who don’t know how to cook. Check out her traditional Korean dishes and other simple, flavorful meals.

    Afia Amoako’s blog is full of colorful and healthy vegan recipes. Brighten up your ThanksVegan menu with any of her comforting vegan stews, soups, bowls, or other dishes.

    Bodybuilder Derek of Simnett Nutrition offers a variety of tasty, whole-food vegan recipes. Elevate your ThanksVegan spread with his easy Thanksgiving sides.

    Lauren Toyota of Hot for Food specializes in restaurant-quality vegan comfort food. Impress your friends and family this ThanksVegan with one of her many holiday recipes, like this vegan Thanksgiving roast.

    Going vegan is easier now than ever—and PETA is making it even easier. Request a vegan starter kit to go vegan just in time for the ThanksVegan holiday. For the sake of us all, share this blog post with a friend to help them go vegan today!

    The post You Can Host the Ultimate Canadian ‘ThanksVegan’ Celebration—Here’s How appeared first on PETA.

    This post was originally published on Animal Rights and Campaign News | PETA.

  • In Yet More Evidence for Dogs, A Vegan Diet Outperforms Meat on Health Outcomes

    dogs vegan diet study
    4 Mins Read

    New research presents the latest evidence of plant-based food’s benefits for dogs, with vegan diets presenting the best health outcomes for canines.

    For dogs, vegan diets are linked with lower medication use, fewer health disorders, and less frequent visits to the vet compared to meat-heavy diets.

    That’s the consensus of a new study, which found that overall, “vegan diets had the best health outcomes” for dogs. It’s the latest in a growing list of evidence that has tied plant-based canine diets to be nutritionally on par or better than meat-eating.

    The researchers surveyed owners of 2,536 dogs, 54% of whom were fed conventional meat diets, 33% raw meat, and 13% vegan. “Dogs fed vegan diets clearly had the best health outcomes in this very large-scale study, and these results are consistent with prior studies in this field,” said lead author Andrew Knight, who has led a number of studies exploring veganism, pet health, and climate change.

    He did caution that “care should always be taken to ensure diets are nutritionally sound, by checking package labelling and purchasing from reputable pet food companies”.

    Vegan dog food better for several illness indicators

    vegan dog food health
    Courtesy: Heliyon

    The study builds on 2022 research conducted on the same dogs, which found that among the 22 most common health disorders found in canines, 11 were most prevalent in those eating conventional meat, right in those consuming raw meat, and three in those on vegan diets. Overall, 49% and 43% of dogs fed conventional and raw meat were unwell, respectively, as opposed to 36% of those fed a plant-based diet.

    But in that research, the differences in ages were large – vegan dogs were older than conventional meat-eating ones, and lower ages can improve health outcomes. This latest study added controls for age, sex, neutering status, breed size, and unusually high exercise levels, and measured them against seven illness indicators (as well as the 22 specific disorders).

    “This trend was clear and consistent, with lowered odds of illness indicators usually both substantial and statistically significant, for dogs fed vegan diets,” the study notes.

    dogs vegan diet
    Courtesy: Andrew Knight/Heliyon

    The results indicated that by switching from a conventional meat diet to veganism, dogs will see a reduction of 21% in vet visits, 34% in medication use, 48% in a progression to a therapeutic diet, and 14% in the number of health disorders. Plant-based dogs are also 33% and 39% less likely to be assessed as unwell or severely ill by vets, respectively, with their guardians also 51% less likely to report severe illnesses.

    Meanwhile, when compared to raw meat diets, vegan diets represent reductions of 10% in medicine use, 8% in health disorders, as well as 34% and 29% in vet and guardian reports of severe illnesses. Raw meat diets do result in 24% fewer vet visits than vegan diets, as well as a fraction of a chance of progressing onto a therapeutic diet.

    That said, the study references numerous studies that have “demonstrated nutritional deficiencies or imbalances, and pathogen hazards, associated with raw meat diets” for dogs.

    Alternative pet food on the rise

    vegan dog food healthy
    Courtesy: Damedeeso

    “For six specific disorders, vegan diets were associated with statistically significant risk reductions of 50-61% compared to dogs fed conventional meat,” the authors write.

    “After pooling our results with related studies published to date, vegan dog food was consistently associated with lowered risks of multiple specific health disorders. No health disorder was consistently more prevalent in dogs fed vegan diets.”

    According to Knight, this is the 11th scientific study that demonstrates good health outcomes in dogs fed vegan or vegetarian diets. It comes weeks after the British Veterinary Association (BVA) reversed its position on the health effects of a vegan diet for dogs, recognising that it’s possible to feed canines on a fully plant-based diet, as long as they’re nutritionally complete.

    It followed a survey by the association, which revealed that 42% of pet owners feed their furry friends meat-free diets. Commending the BVA’s decision, Knight said at the time: “It is now up to international veterinary associations to follow suit.”

    Vegan dog food is already a $13.6B market, and with awareness about the environmental impact of meat consumption increasing, this sector is poised for further growth. Pets are thought to consume 20% of all meat produced globally. In the UK, they eat more meat than the entire under-18 population.

    “Nutritionally sound vegan diets offer extremely large environmental benefits, so this is very good news for dog owners who want to protect the environment whilst also maximising their dogs’ health,” Knight says of the latest study.

    Alternative protein for pets is an exploding space – the UK has approved cultivated chicken for pets, companies in the US are hoping to get the greenlight by early 2025, while vegan dog food makers continue to roll out new products. And in Asia, Mars Petcare is co-leading an initiative to help human food startups develop sustainable options for pets.

    The post In Yet More Evidence for Dogs, A Vegan Diet Outperforms Meat on Health Outcomes appeared first on Green Queen.

    This post was originally published on Green Queen.

  • For Its New Factory, Planted Zeroes in On Germany’s Leading Plant-Based Market

    planted meat
    4 Mins Read

    Swiss meat analogue maker Planted will open its second manufacturing facility in Germany, Europe’s leading market for vegan food.

    Planted, the Switzerland-based producer of meat analogues, has announced plans to open a new factory in Germany, its main market for exports.

    The company, which recently unveiled a fermentation-derived whole-cut steak, already has a plant at its headquarters in Kemptthal, Switzerland. For the second site, it is reviving an old brewery in Memmingen, Bavaria to create a modern production hub for vegan meat.

    The new facility is expected to begin production by the first quarter of 2025. At full capacity, it would be able to produce 20 tonnes of meat analogues every day, and around 5,000 tonnes annually. The facility in Germany – which accounts for 75% of Planted’s exports from Kemptthal – is set to create over 50 obs, adding to its 200-strong staff.

    “Our international expansion follows the strategic decision to bolster our biotechnological expertise and locations abroad, closer to our consumers,” said Planted co-founder Lukas Böni.

    Planted powered by a new whole-muscle platform

    planted factory
    Courtesy: Planted

    In April, Planted released its whole-cut steak, which has since made its way into restaurants and retailers in various countries, including Switzerland and Germany.

    This is the first product resulting from its whole-muscle innovation platform, where it uses proprietary microbial fermentation processes to grow what it calls “biostructured proteins”. The startup says it’s “convinced that biostructured proteins will surpass animal meat in the future, in terms of flavour, sustainability, health, productivity and price”.

    Planted began the strategic expansion of its production capacity at Kemptthal this spring via a state-of-the-art fermentation plant, and this effort will now continue at the new site in Germany.

    For the Memmingen factory, Planted has partnered with green infrastructure firm Alois Müller Group. It will be entirely free of fossil fuels and “almost completely” carbon-neutral, making use of a well cooling system, regionally generated district heating from wood burning, and photovoltaics to ensure all energy at the plant comes from renewable sources.

    “We are proud to be one of the few innovators of plant-based meat who covers as many steps as possible in the value chain – from research and development to industrial production,” said Böni.

    “This depth of value creation allows us to develop our vision of ‘better proteins’ even more strongly and will be implemented at the new plant in Memmingen, for example, when it comes to green technology and sustainable production.”

    The company noted that the Kemptthal facility will continue to “maintain its production and importance”, particularly for local consumers in Switzerland, where it is the market leader.

    Planted bets on Germany’s growing appetite for plant-based meat

    plant based meat germany
    Courtesy: Planted

    Planted’s whole-muscle steak is made from soy protein, rapeseed oil, bean and rice flours, and a blend of microbial cultures, and leverages a solid-state fermentation process that lasts 30 to 40 hours. It’s a departure from the high-moisture extrusion it uses to make its plant-based meat products like chicken, kebabs, duck and pulled pork.

    The development of the steak was facilitated by a $2.3M injection by state-backed innovation agency Innosuisse, as part of the Swiss Accelerator Program. The company has secured $131M in total funding to date, helping it breach over 8,000 foodservice and 8,700 retail locations across Europe.

    “Our goal is to quickly bring innovative products from our fermentation platform to the market – in particular the Planted steak, which currently uses our most advanced and disruptive fermentation technology in terms of scalability, flavour and product quality,” said Böni.

    “The investment in the additional production site enables us to meet the rapidly growing market demand and produce even closer to our German consumers,” Böni added. In Germany, the company is one of the top 10 best-selling meat analogue makers.

    The production of each Planted steak produces 97% fewer emissions and requires 81% less water per kg than conventional beef. At the new factory in Memmingen, this will bring savings equivalent to the annual emissions of half the city’s residents.

    Germany is Europe’s leading vegan market in terms of sales, with the sector growing in value by 42% since 2022. In 2023, production of plant-based meat expanded by 17% from the year before amid increasing consumer demand for these analogues. A survey earlier this year revealed that 30% of Germans want to eat more plant-based meat in the next couple of years, just as meat consumption fell to record lows in 2023.

    In March, Germany updated its dietary guidelines to recommend slashing meat consumption by half and making 75% of diets plant-based. Only two months later, the German Nutrition Society doubled down on this by acknowledging that veganism is a “health-promoting diet” with proper supplementation.

    Moreover, Germany’s government allocated €38M in its 2024 budget to promote alternative protein consumption and a switch to plant-based farming, as well as open a Proteins of the Future centre.

    The post For Its New Factory, Planted Zeroes in On Germany’s Leading Plant-Based Market appeared first on Green Queen.

    This post was originally published on Green Queen.

  • Future Food Quick Bites: Vegan Domino’s, Plant-Based Dairylea & A KitKat Copycat

    fry's formable meat
    4 Mins Read

    In our weekly column, we round up the latest news and developments in the alternative protein and sustainable food industry. This week, Future Food Quick Bites covers Fry’s Family Foods’ formable mince, Domino’s vegan cheese collaboration in Australia, and upcycled food startup Reduced’s Series A fundraise.

    New products and launches

    Fry’s Family Foods has launched what it says is the UK plant-based industry’s first ‘formable’ mince. The Shape and Sizzle SKU can be made into meatballs, koftas, burgers and sausages, and is available at Tesco for £2.50 per 300g.

    Mondelēz International has released a plant-based version of its Dairylea cheese Dunkers in Morrisons in the UK, with the garlic- and onion-flavoured crunchy tubes now accompanied by a coconut- and oat-based cheese dip.

    Mycoprotein giant Quorn has rolled out a new foodservice menu solutions department called QuornPro, launching through a partnership with Good It’s Gluten Free to include gluten-free meals in foodservice.

    Also in the UK, vegan chocolate brand Buttermilk has introduced the Choccy Wafer Bar, a dairy- and gluten-free replica of KitKat Chunky made from rice. It’s available online and at Sainsbury’s for £1.70.

    vegan kitkat chunky
    Courtesy: Buttermilk

    Speaking of replicating famous chocolates, fellow British brand NOMO has released a vegan coconut-chocolate bar in the style of Mars’ popular Bounty offering.

    Canada’s Else Nutrition has rolled out vegan Ready-to-Drink Kids Shakes in chocolate and vanilla flavours at 19 Bristol Farms locations in Southern California. Suitable for ages two to 13, they’re made from a base of almond butter and buckwheat flour.

    Icelandic brand Good Good has launched a vegan lemon curd with no added sugar in the US, which is available on its website and on Amazon for $9.99 per 330g jar.

    domino's vegan
    Courtesy: Made With Plants/Domino’

    And in Australia, Domino’s has partnered with local startup Made With Plants to introduce vegan and gluten-free mozzarella cheese for its plant-based pizzas.

    Finance and company developments

    Swedish precision fermentation startup Melt&Marble has achieved a manufacturing milestone, completing a demo-scale production of 10,000 litres of fermentation for its animal-free fat.

    Swedish agrifood company Lantmännen has poured in 1.2 billion Swedish kronor ($116M) towards a new plant protein factory in Lidköping, which will be able to produce 7,000 tonnes of concentrated protein from peas and fava beans annually.

    future food quick bites
    Courtesy: Martin Kaufmann/Reduced

    Also in the Nordics, Copenhagen-based food waste startup Reduced, which creates upcycled food ingredients, has announced the second closing of its Series A funding round, which now totals €8M ($8.8M).

    The Climate Bonds Standard, a certification scheme for green debt instruments, has added alternative proteins to its criteria to help drive investment into the sector.

    Artisanal vegan cheesemaker Climax Foods has secured bridge funding from existing investors to extend its runway for the rest of the year, after a challenging few months that has seen a majority of employees furloughed, given unpaid leave, or take voluntary salary cuts.

    climax blue cheese
    Courtesy: Climax Foods

    In England, the Stroud Farmers’ Market has closed its monthly vegan market, citing a lack of footfall and decreasing stalls each month.

    Policy, research and awards

    South Korea’s TissenBioFarm has received the Cultured Meat Product of the Year honour at the 2024 AgTech Breakthrough Awards for its marbled cultivated steak.

    cultivated meat regulatory approval
    Courtesy: TissenBioFarm

    In India, 69% of consumers find plant-based proteins to be as effective as meat, according to a survey by Wonderful Pistachios.

    The Newcastle City Council in the UK has introduced a trial to generate renewable energy and fertilisers from food waste. Households will receive two new containers and caddy bags for food waste, which will then be recycled.

    Another local government in the UK, the Nottingham City Council, has announced it will only serve vegan food and drinks at internal meetings from the end of September.

    oshi vegan salmon
    Courtesy: Oshi

    Finally, Israeli alt-seafood player Oshi has received its trademark in the US, weeks after partnering with Lewis Hamilton-backed vegan chain Neat. It recently relocated production to California, spotting a bigger market for its plant-based fish in the US.

    Check out last week’s Future Food Quick Bites.

    The post Future Food Quick Bites: Vegan Domino’s, Plant-Based Dairylea & A KitKat Copycat appeared first on Green Queen.

    This post was originally published on Green Queen.

  • Thai Startup Creates Plant-Based Pork from Local Coconut Water

    coconut water meat
    4 Mins Read

    Backed by the Thai government, Sangtuptim Inter Co., a manufacturer of coconut-based products, has developed a plant-based pork analogue from coconut water.

    A Thai company known for its coconut vermicelli has created plant-based meat using coconut water, as part of a government-led programme to promote the industrial economy.

    Sangtuptim Inter Co. has developed the meat analogue under the Department of Industrial Promotion’s (Diprom) Reshape the Future policy. The product has won an award in the UK, and is said to represent a prototype for using innovation to increase the value of local food products.

    Thailand is the 10th largest producer of coconuts globally, and has a burgeoning alternative protein sector marked by consumer enthusiasm for healthier products. According to Orasa Sangtuptim, managing director of Sangtuptim Inter Co., plant-based food has become popular in the country, with food safety, sourcing, and environmental impact being key considerations.

    Treading international (coconut) waters

    coconut water noodles
    Courtesy: Sangtubtim Inter Co.

    Diprom announced its Reshape the Future policy in January, with a view to keeping up with the changing economy, reshaping the country’s economic corridors, and increasing access to opportunities through investment. For 2024, the goal is to help over 18,000 entrepreneurs and create over ฿10B ($293.5M) in added economic value.

    When it comes to the agriculture sector, the government agency plans to do so by promoting access to production technology, boosting value-added processing, and helping develop products that meet consumer needs – especially health-promoting plant-based foods.

    Specialising in coconut products, Sangtuptim Inter Co. joined the Industrial Promotion Center, Region 8 scheme that looks to develop small and medium-sized enterprises, beginning with a coconut jelly and further innovating with fresh non-fat, sugar-free noodles made from coconut water, which can be served cold and hot.

    The plant-based pork, meanwhile, is a mix of coconut water and king oyster mushrooms, and has recently been patented. As part of its international recognition, the product has received vegan certification in Italy, alongside the gold award at the International Invention and Trade Expo 2022 in London.

    These products capitalise on the strength of local farmers in the Samut Songkhram Province, and elevate an agricultural raw material to a higher-value product through tech innovation. Currently, Sangtuptim Inter Co.’s products are sold locally, as well as in the US, Germany, New Zealand, Canada, and Norway.

    Plant-based demand strong in Thailand

    thailand plant based meat
    Courtesy: Sangtubtim Inter Co.

    “Throughout our participation in the DIPROM programme, we have gained practical knowledge that can be effectively applied,” said Sangtuptim. “We received in-depth advice from experts that has been beneficial to our business, resulting in an annual revenue increase of over ฿2M ($59,000).”

    While the Thai plant-based sector has grown by 61% in the last five years – expected to reach 45B in 2024 – it still faces its challenges. In June, the country’s Food and Drug Administration (FDA) published draft regulations suggesting a ban on meat- and dairy-related terms (such as ‘almond milk’, ‘plant-based chicken nuggets’, ‘Angus’ and even ‘clean meat’) on plant-based analogues.

    But this comes amid increased willingness to shift to alternative proteins in Thailand. According to a 1,500-person survey published in January by Madre Brava, two-thirds of Thai consumers plan to stop eating meat in the next two years, and only 9% say they wouldn’t consume alternative proteins in that period.

    Health and nutrition concerns are both the main consumption drivers and barriers – 57% find alternative proteins healthier than meat, but 47% say they’d rather eat whole foods given the amount of processing meat analogues go through.

    Price is another major concern, with 47% also finding plant-based alternatives too expensive. That said, two in five Thai consumers are willing to swap half their meat intake with alternative proteins, while 51% would swap half their meat consumption with traditional plant proteins.

    thailand vegan survey
    Courtesy: Madre Brava

    Meanwhile, Thai citizens want government action to support farmer transitions with new jobs (72%) and eco-friendly practices (69%). “If the government has a policy to seriously support the production of plant-based protein and alternative protein, both for domestic consumption and export, it would be able to correspond with the direction of both the domestic and export markets,” said Jacques-Chai Chomthongdi, Southeast Asia director at Madre Brava.

    A product like Sangtuptim Inter Co.’s vegan pork – which uses locally farmed coconuts, offers health benefits, and promotes food security in a country where 10.5% of people face severe hunger every day – fits the bill.

    The post Thai Startup Creates Plant-Based Pork from Local Coconut Water appeared first on Green Queen.

    This post was originally published on Green Queen.