100% vegetable fat! For 5 months, a young company based in Paris has been offering a soy-based bacon. It is made in Vendée. This French innovation is meeting with some success on the very buoyant vegetable meat market.
It’s a rising trend. Meat, without animal protein, installed at the very heart of a charcuterie department in a large Angevin supermarket. It is one of the brands that distribute a brand new product presented as a vegetable bacon.
One of the co-founders of this new brand, Nicolas Schweitzer, bet on vegetable fat. An innovation from this young shoot, La Vie Foods, based in Paris, and which has its products manufactured in Vendée by Sodebo.
This bacon produced without pigs has an honorable carbon footprint since it generates 7 times less CO2 than its animal counterpart during its manufacture.
Reducing the carbon footprint is one of the main arguments put forward by its designer.
Global warming is clearly an entry key, because meat represents 18% of our carbon emissions. This is more than all emissions from all transport combined
Nicolas Schweitzer, co-founder of La Vie Foods
A finding that goes hand in hand with “a real awareness that we will have to adjust our eating habits”.
For the moment, in the imposing charcuterie and “bacon” sections of supermarkets, the vegetable option is still modest. But more and more clients are taking the plunge, like Kilian, whose wife is vegan. “I try to adapt, he said. I don’t see any difference. From a conscience point of view, I find myself there”.
Better for the planet, for the animals. After organic, local products and bulk, it’s the turn of the vegetable market. In any case, this is the observation made by Pierre-Emmanuel Vasseur, Director of Carrefour Grand Maine in Angers, who clearly sees the trend asserting itself on his food shelves.
“These products do not stop growing from year to year. We are at nearly 200 references, that meets the expectations of some of our customers”.
Soy-based bacon bits, with vegetable fat? Is it good for our taste buds, and our health? We went to ask the question to a nutrition coach. She specializes in coaching high-level athletes. His first impression is very positive on the taste. But Marie Canard does not just taste, she turns the packaging and deciphers.
“I will mainly look at the composition because what is important when you buy a product and especially in the plant, is to look at the label.
I see they are quite low in calories and have a good protein content. This is important because we are trying to reproduce an animal protein…. Afterwards, everything that is industrial must be consumed sparingly
Marie Canard, nutrition coach
In Angers, a restaurant has been offering for a few months not lardons but vegetable bacon. Another innovation from the young shoot. It is not yet the rush on this product but the manager of the restaurant, Priscilla Reignier notes that “de base, customers like it but it’s all new, with time it will come”.
Because the awareness is there among many customers, as among his two high school girls seated in front of a mixed salad. “Maybe it’s a good habit to get into. In the years that follow, we may not have enough resources. That’s what they say, we’ll have more meat. I think that later it will be a habit and everyone will have to reduce their meat consumption”.
“We work with a lot of restaurateurs. We have chefs who help us design recipes for restaurant customers who would like to incorporate our products on their menu”, explains Nicolas Schweitzer who adds that, soon, his soy bacon should be offered at the table of a starred restaurant.
Fewer animals and more plants in our concerns and on our plates. The trend whets many appetites including that of big brands. With its co-founding partner, Nicolas Schweitzer, managed to raise 25 million euros and attract very media support, such as American actress Natalie Portman. Perhaps the beginning of a “success-story” for this French start-up which aims to develop on a European scale in the short term.