“Cheap meat isn’t a win. I want people to spend the same amount on meat as they do now, and buy better meat, but less of it." This quote from a vegetarian-turned-butcher seems right on to me: the problem isn't meat itself, it's the industrial production of beef in particular. This dovetails perfectly with an article in today's Wall Street Journal on climate change. As we've talked about on this blog before, a big part of the solution to climate change involves changing what we eat and how it's produced. According to the WSJ article, about 1/3 of the earth's usable land is dedicated to pastures. "The resources used to produce a serving of beef release four times the greenhouse gases as a calorie-equivalent amount of pork, and five times as much as an equivalent amount of poultry."
Put differently, “Some dietary choices require more land and water, and cause more emissions of heat-trapping gases than others,” said Debra Roberts, Co-Chair of IPCC Working Group II. “Balanced diets featuring plant-based foods, such as coarse grains, legumes, fruits and vegetables, and animal-sourced food produced sustainably in low greenhouse gas emission systems, present major opportunities for adaptation to and limiting climate change,” she said.
AND FINALLY! Today was the first day that the Impossible Whopper was available from Burger King, so I marched right down (after Googling where the nearest Burger King was!) and had one. Well, I can report that it has nice fresh lettuce and onions. As to the burger, the best I can say for it is that it wasn't memorable. The onion rings were ok, though they would have been better if they were still warm when they arrived at my table. I have to say that while as a somewhat careful consumer I am happy to see these burgers out there, but I am not too optimistic about these meat substitutes. I hope that they work out, but the Whopper is more expensive and no more tasty, so I would be surprised if they catch on. Update: apparently they are gathering much more interest than I hoped, with food service providers Aramark and Sodexho signing up. Well, go fake meat!
