From greenqueen.com.hk
Meat-eaters find most plant-based alternatives inferior to animal protein in taste and texture, but some industry-leading products show how to bridge the gap.
Vegan meat alternatives have a taste and texture problem, and it is what’s keeping omnivores and flexitarians away, according to sensory testing by Nectar, a non-profit initiative focused on accelerating alternative protein transition through taste.
In its second annual Taste of the Industry report, the organisation conducted a blind test of 122 plant-based analogues with over 2,600 meat-eaters. Only 30% of participants liked the average meat-free product, compared to the 68% who liked conventional meat. Across all 14 categories, 46% said they ‘liked’ or ‘liked very much’ the leading vegan products.
Off-flavours, a weird aftertaste, mushiness, and off-colours were some of the biggest weaknesses identified in the tested products. On the plus side, 20 of the plant-based leaders were rated the same or better than their animal-derived counterparts by at least half the taste-testers, providing an R&D roadmap for the rest of the industry.
Investment in R&D offers strong returns – Nectar’s research found that the leading products in each category capture a 28% market share, versus just 18% for other offerings. In fact, for every 5% increase in the share of consumers rating plant-based meat as the same or better than conventional meat, sales of the former grew by $1.5M.
Plant-based burgers, nuggets and fillets most appealing to meat-eaters
The analysis revealed that meat-eaters tend to find vegan burgers, nuggets and meatballs more appealing than bacon or hot dog analogues – the better-performing categories have five to 15 times higher market penetration.
“These leader products are outperforming average products primarily in flavour,” says Nectar director Caroline Cotto. “Also, plant-based chicken as a category is winning in R&D over pork and beef, with no chicken products showing a big gap in liking between the average plant-based product and the leader product.”
“Our research shows that the biggest opportunity for plant-based products to catch up to their animal counterparts is on texture. For some categories, like nuggets, burgers, turkey, etc, mimicking texture is significantly easier than for other categories, like bacon, bratwurst, and whole-cut steak,” she says.
“The balance of fattiness and chewiness in bacon, the snap of a bratwurst casing, and the tender but firm chew of whole-cut steak are all textural elements that require further R&D if plant-based products want to meet omnivore consumers’ expectations in these categories,” adds Cotto.
While the analysis didn’t look at chopped steak products like the ones offered by Beyond Meat (and recently Impossible Foods), for whole cuts, reducing the off-flavour and aftertaste, mushy texture, and dryness and toughness are the biggest opportunities.
At the same time, the research suggested that people prefer unbreaded chicken fillets over strips or chunks. “One of the biggest R&D opportunities across all categories was juiciness [or] tenderness,” explains Cotto. “That played out in this category clearly where perhaps the smaller pieces have more problems retaining their moisture.” Fillets were rated as juicy or tender about 1.5 times more.
Further, strips and chunks were found to have weird aftertastes or off-flavours more frequently than fillets, which Cotto says could be because Nectar tested some of the lower-performing brands instead of industry leaders here.
The best plant-based meat brands, according to meat-eaters
Nectar is also launching the Tasty Awards to celebrate innovation in the category, with the winners announced at a ceremony in San Francisco today. They honour brands that were found to be the most-liked in its tests, with products that over half of omnivores say taste the same or better than animal protein.
A total of 13 companies won an award across the categories, with Impossible Foods the biggest winner (with wins in six categories). Brands seem to be performing the best with burgers and unbreaded chicken fillets, categories where five companies won an award each.
This includes Heura, Meati Foods, and Swap – a sign that consumers are perhaps more inclined towards ‘clean’ labels and short ingredient lists. However, Cotto clarifies that the actual base ingredients don’t have a large impact on purchase intent.
“Our research found that coconut oil had the best consumer perception, over seed oils like canola or sunflower, but relatively no impact on taste,” she explains. “Mushrooms and mycelium were conceptually appealing ingredients to consumers, leading to a positive change in purchase intent, but products with these ingredients actually had lower overall liking ratings.”
Cotto suggests that “taste parity is on the horizon”, but “no plant-based products in this year’s study” achieved parity with or outperformed an animal product. She reiterates that texture innovation is the most important lever for plant-based leaders to catch up with animal proteins.
“Plant-based products were described as juicy 62% less often than the animal, leading to decreases in liking of 1.1 points – increasing tenderness and reducing mushiness are meaningful secondary priorities,” she says.
Meat-free offerings were found to be savoury 35% less often and have a weird aftertaste or off-flavour five to six times more often than animal proteins. “These differences were associated with a 1.5- to two-point liking gap between animal and plant-based products,” says Cotto, noting that flavour is the “biggest opportunity for plant-based as a whole to improve”.
“We think it’s important for the industry to raise the standard of the average plant-based product because the average product was generally disliked,” she says.
https://www.greenqueen.com.hk/best-plant-based-meat-brands-vegan-taste-texture-products-survey/
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