Do not serve this man – Taste Scene

I ate my first plant-based burger last week and well, all things considered, it may well have been the last.

It was lunch-time on Friday and, as a friend of mine would say, the hunger was upon me.

I needed food and I needed it yesterday and the problem with that kind of hectic hunger is, anything will do.

Now, I enjoy a burger as much as the next man (unless they’re an American) but as is the way with many fast food joints, said burgers are usually lacking and so habitually, if something new and gimmicky arrives on the menu, I’m always a sucker for gimmicks.

On Friday past, the joint in question was McDonald’s and as I hurried along the windswept January street willing my rumbling guts to be quiet, I noticed a big sign outside of of Mickey D’s advertising the new ‘McPlant’.

“Sure, why not?” I says to meself. “I’ll give it a whirl.”

The McPlant, ‘A vegan burger made with a juicy plant-based patty co-developed with Beyond Meat featuring vegan sandwich sauce, ketchup, mustard, onion, pickles, lettuce, tomato, and a vegan alternative to cheese in a sesame seed bun. Vegan certified,’ is the latest addition to the McMenu and the latest (supposed) nod to healthy vegetarianism.

I also wondered, seeing as how the McPlant was the newest newcomer to McD’s, if I’d be the first McSucker to give this McGimmick a McWhirl. Of course, I didn’t think to ask the automated ordering screen if that might be the case and so I made my choice of the McPlant (alongside fries and a Coke), and I took my seat and awaited its arrival.

“They should have got Robert Plant to do an advert for this new burger,” I told my phone, as I scrolled through my usual social media sewage. But my phone didn’t answer, obviously because I hadn’t preambled the statement with a, “Hey Google…”

At last my own Robert McPlant arrived and like a man fresh off the north face of the Eiger, I laid into the burger with no small amount of relish.

The hoover was set to maximum revs and with hunger providing the metaphorical sauce, the burger and fries disappeared faster than you could say, “What’s this McPlant thing made of anyway?”

That question had to wait for my return to a computer whereupon I was stunned by the answer.

Honestly, I don’t know what I expected the McPlant to be made of (plants, presumably) but the ingredient list sent my eyebrows away into my hairline (no mean task seeing as how said hairline is quickly receding).

According to their website www.mcdonalds.com, the new McPlant patty (excluding the bun, sauces and assorted garnishes) is… “Water, Pea Protein (16%), Rapeseed Oil, Coconut Oil, Flavouring, Rice Protein, Stabiliser (Methyl Cellulose), Potato Starch, Apple Extract, Salt, Pomegranate Extract, Potassium Chloride, Concentrated Lemon Juice, Maize Vinegar, Yeast Extract, Carrot Powder, Emulsifier (Sunflower Lecithin), Colour (Beetroot Red), Maltodextrin.”

So how is it, Dear Ronald McDonald, that a patty whose first five ingredients (and therefore largest) includes water and two types of oil can be referred to as a McPlant? Wouldn’t McProcessed be a more apt moniker?

Admittedly (I’m being honest here), the McPlant was tasty enough in terms of a fast food sandwich and as I’ve said, I hoovered it up without hesitation. But was it better than a beef equivalent? Sadly no – but it wasn’t lagging too far behind.

The crux with the McPlant – and I think this applies to all kinds of semi-synthetic plant alternatives – is that it’s an attempt to attract a different clientele to fast and processed food.

However, if you’re a discerning vegan or vegetarian and you’re eating what you’re eating because of health benefits rather than a penchant for convenience, you’re not going to be fooled by the McPlant.

Would I eat another McPlant? Never say never but when I compare the processed nature of the McPlant patty to a more traditional McDonald’s beef burger, it would be difficult to make the veggie case.

According to www.mcdonalds.com again, the beef burger is made from… beef (plus salt and pepper).

The McPlant isn’t tastier, it isn’t cheaper, it doesn’t have fewer calories and it’s not exactly better for your health (arguably it’s worse for your health because it’s more highly processed than the beef)… so why would you choose the McPlant over say, a Big Mac? It doesn’t make sense, at least not for us omnivores.

I understand of course that part of this thrust towards plant-based meat alternatives has arrived because of climate change (as the bovine community is farting us all into extinction) and whilst that is all well and good, it probably shouldn’t happen to the detriment of our own healths.

I read an interesting article last week entitled, ‘100 ways to slightly improve your life without really trying’ and therein existed a snippet of moral gold.

Coming in at number 29 in this Guardian article was the tip, “Eat meat once a week, max. Ideally less.”

What it did NOT say was, “Eat meat once a week, max. Ideally less. But in the meantime poison your system with highly processed, salt-laden, fat-riddled meat alternatives posing as health food.”

No wonder Robert Plant wouldn’t advertise it.

After this article is published I fully expect local McDonald’s restaurants to have a picture of yours truly stuck up behind the counter with a yellow sticky suggesting, ‘Do not serve this man’.

And so what if they do… They’d undoubtedly be doing me a favour.