Listen, you can convince me that a hot dog is a sandwich, but you can’t convince me that a carrot is a hot dog. It’s all liquid smoke and mirrors. Oh, come on, guys. Join me and let’s eat some plant based ribs with edible bones. Yeah! This is a hot dog is a sandwich. Ketchup is a smoothie. Yeah, I put ice in my cereal, so what? That makes no sense. A hot dog is a sandwich. A hot dog is a sandwich. What? Welcome to our podcast, A Hot Dog is a Sandwich, the show we break down the world’s Biggest food debates. I’m your host, Josh Ayer. And I’m your host, Nicole Inaiti. And today, we have a very special guest joining us today. Please welcome the co founder and chief brand officer of Juicy Marbles, the first to create a 100 percent plant based marbled steak and ribs with bones. Vladimir Michkovich, welcome to the show, brother. Buongiorno. Buongiorno. Buongiorno. Ah, well, Nicole speaks the third most Italian here, so, Nicole, hit him with a little bit of it. Ah, buongiorno, principessa. Che cosa? Was that good? That’s the whole vocabulary that I also have. Oh my gosh, great. Okay, we’re on the same page. I love it. I was only taught the worst things you can say in the Roman dialect. Like mortacci tua, porco dio, and I don’t know what it means. Mortacci tua probably means, uh, die. But I think it’s like, I’m going to dig up your ancestors. The Italians got really inventive with their insults, but, uh. What’s the, what’s the dua in there? I think it’s twice. What’s that dua? I think it’s like, I, your ancestors are buried. I’m gonna bring them back up and then kill them again and bury them. It’s like, and in two words to be able to convey that. I love that, I love that. Um, unreal. Uh, hey, speaking of dead ancestors. No, Vladimir, you. Invented an incredible product, or at least part of the team that invented an incredible product that absolutely floored Nicole and I when we first saw it. Uh, it’s called Juicy Marbles, and to us, I mean, I saw this and I was like, this is the next wave of innovation in the plant based meat department. Something that we’ve seen really explode over the last ten years with a lot of investment. Tell us about Juicy Marbles, man. Hmm. Nice, nice, wide question. Just setting me up to start meandering all over. Meander, we encourage it. Uh, yeah. Um, so yeah, we make plant based whole cuts. I’m very flattered by your introduction, by the way. Thank you very much. Good job, Josh. Um, I’m, I’m, I’m grateful. Uh, so it’s, we just a bunch of friends started a company. Um, because Well, it was, I think we all just really wanted to work with food, if I’m quite honest, and that’s been a wish of mine. You know, I can’t speak for everybody, so I’m gonna just tell my part of the story, and I think a lot of it, I think a lot of it also is Part of other journey, but I can’t speak for all of us. So I’ll just say the following. I really have been influenced by my mom’s cooking and the, the whole hosting and thinking about food in a elevated manner comes from, from the culture that I grew up, which is the Balkans. And then after many years of being just in a industry that is, you know, I worked in advertising. I worked in design and I just started not liking this client work and so forth. So that drew me to open a restaurant because I really, really, really wanted to work with food. The restaurant died during COVID. And then we came together bound by cosmic forces and, um, found the Juicy Marbles. And, uh, it was the product I didn’t invent. I cannot take that, uh, credit. It was created by. Two or four founders while they were in the dorm room. So it’s a very Very typical startup story. It’s not a garage. It’s a dorm room. Um So yeah, that’s kind of how we got together and these guys created this crazy texture. Yeah, um they created a way to make a very very convincing texture and We just gathered around them like moths to the flame You And stuff started happening. Uh, that’s incredible. Now we’re here. Three years later. We have your newest product. Yeah. Because you mentioned the whole muscle cuts, which that was the thing that we first saw on the website. The food photography. I was like, Oh my God, this is insane. How did they do that? So I was from someone who like, you know, uh, worked in like product development and research and development and even food photography, I was like, holy cannoli. How the heck do they do this? So we have your, um, your hell out of here. Your ribs here. I still don’t know. It’s incredible. I still don’t understand. Um, we’re gonna dive into one. Can you pass me a rib? I got you. Oh, what, how did you, how did you make it? So we made a dry rub, uh, pretty simple dry rub, chili powder, paprika, garlic, brown sugar, salt, all that stuff, a lot of black pepper. And then we just kind of blasted it in the oven to get a little bit of caramelization on it. Yeah. Uh, brush it with a little bit of sauce. Let’s cheers. Let’s touch our vegan ribs together. Um, this is so far beyond any plant based meat that I’ve ever seen. It’s the striations. It’s the meat muscle striations that’s setting me for a loop right now. Mmm, this is good. This is insane, man. And I’m, and we, okay. One thing I wanted to ask is I didn’t know this was gonna be like me watching two people eat. That was what your team told us. They said he really likes watching people eat. Yeah, yeah, yeah. And so we’re just gonna park him in front of you. It was a blurb. It was a blurb. They got me again. They got me again. Um, I mean, no, no BS. This is far and away the best vegan meat or best plant based meat that you’ve ever had, right? Yeah, no doubt. It’s really damn good. My, my question is, um, and I know this is always a loaded phrase of like, Who do you want to buy your product? Because it’s like, uh, whoever has money and wants to put it in their mouth, dude. Everyone would be nice, yeah. No, but I guess my more specific question is what percentage of, like, vegan slash plant based dietary aficionados versus omnivores do you expect to buy the product? If you were a Benton man. Uh, I’d lose a lot of money in that one, you know, whatever I would bet, you know, cause I feel there’s just, it’s so hard to put a pulse on that exact, you know, just to go to the initial question there, you know, it’s really, this question gets asked a lot. I think every journalist out there says like, so who’s your audience, uh, omnivores or meat eaters or vegans. And then I just don’t know how to think about people in that way because, you Just in this question, it kind of assumes that these are two homogenous groups with the same value systems and, and lives and so forth. So you can kind of bulk them together and talk, but you know, Um, it, I don’t think people, I don’t think it really gives you any kind of idea if you say meat eater, who that person is. Yeah, yeah, very true. Or, or, or vegan for that matter. Um, so I have no idea, honestly, you know, and, and, Um, I know that the lords of marketing would probably be upset that we don’t have this, you know, profile of a person that we market to. Um, but I, I think we kind of try to just think of what we like and I don’t, I like food. I like eating with friends and enjoying it and all that. I don’t know. And then we kind of think of stuff like that when it comes to marketing communication. So ultimately. I wish the juicy marbles would be perceived as just yet another food brand, which you either like or you don’t, which I feel that’s the case with food. It either works for you, you know, flavor wise and like the later how you feel, or it doesn’t. Um, that’s my, that’s my dream. Um, but, uh, I have no idea how to get there in this cultural landscape, which is, uh, which favors the extremes, um, in terms of narrative. Well, it is a really interesting cultural landscape right now, especially as you look to, like, what I view as like the promise of plant based meat, right? Like, I remember when It’s the future. It’s the future, but like impossible and beyond. When they came out, it was seen as such a massive, not only innovation in food, but like a tech innovation. And they got a ton of Tech VC money. Yeah, Silicon Valley went like bananas. They went bananas. But when I learned that the innovation in Beyond, with all due respect to their product, which I think are like perfectly fine. Yeah, it’s great. Yeah. They just put like some beet juice in it. And if you cook it to not fully done, the beet juice leaks out of it. So it bleeds like meat. And I was like, this does seem like a little bit of smoke and mirrors in the technology, like. Morningstar Farms. I was thinking Boca Burger. Fieldhouse, Boca, right? Uh, falafel to me is the perfect veggie burger, and it was invented 8, 000 years ago in Egypt. You know, like, some of this, it’s not exactly new new, but what you’re doing does seem incredibly new. How do you think, like, the innovations of Beyond and Impossible and what they did specifically to the American market Sort of like affects how your product is perceived. Good question. Cause it’s also been like a little bit politicized, right? In the sense that like plant based meat is coming for the American farmer and they’re trying to take the beef off of your table. It’s hard to really pinpoint the details, but on a general macro scale, I think, I think it offended people, how these companies came, you know, I feel like we really cherish food culture and, um, and it’s been thousands of years in development and I think. Somewhere in the communication, I’m not going to break it down where, but some throughout all of it, the message was akin to you are a bad person if you continue eating meat from now on. Yeah, the ethical nature. Yeah. Uh, you know, it wasn’t directly spoken like that, but it was, it was somewhat branded in that way. And I think also the attachment to veganism, which is. I think a very admirable ideology, but it’s really hard for people, uh, um, to get into stuff just like that when it’s identity driven. Fair. Yeah. And it just, these forces are so much bigger than we imagined that, um, I think it took people, people took it personally in a way. So it, I think it didn’t, as much as they were trailblazers. And they opened up the space. So I’m like, eternally grateful. At the same time, right now, everybody associates us with veganism and Animal rights and environmentalism and people ask me about emissions and I’m like, I am not a climate scientist. I’m deleting all my emissions questions. Uh, and you, you don’t, you never say like to your buddies, like, Hey, want to come over for some environmentally friendly tapas? It’s just this, this whole notion, I think. We had to take a stop somewhere. Cause you know, if, if we go in further, it was like, first they took our sugar and then they took our carbs and then, you know, they came for the meats. And then we were like, hold it right there. Stop right now. And I think that needs to be respected. How would we look at it? And, you know, and, and nobody can just act objectively, you know, like I can. I can say, yeah, ideally we were all compassionate and looking out for the big picture and the environment and the animals and every neighbor and everything. But I don’t think culture functions that way. Um, people want to retain some semblance of fun loving. I think until it, until plant based meats become better and more convenient, which is gonna take time and culture is gonna evolve slowly, it’s gonna be nice and easy, you know, like these companies came ten years ago, they said ten years away, ten years from now it’s gonna be a vegan society. Yeah. Whoa. I don’t know. That was, that was, I think, a good way to get VC money. Apparently it was a great way to get VC money. It almost reminds me of the way that tofu was perceived, still is perceived by a lot of like white Americans in the 80s and 90s as like a meat alternative. And it was sort of devoid of the actual culture that is like thousands of years old in East Asia, right? Yeah. And so there’s a lot of people that have this negative perception of tofu in the same way they may have a negative perception of plant based meats because they associate it with bland, crappy, moralistic vegan cooking. When if you’ve ever had like Mapo tofu, it’s the opposite of bland. It is the, my God, what a flavorful thing. This is also the opposite of bland. And this is the opposite of bland too. Like, but this is the thing we, we’re not talking, you know, the debate wasn’t around Hey, we’re adding this new amazing thing into the food culture, but it’s like, Oh, the food culture and everything, you know, is morally wrong. We’re going to have to completely change it. This is the product. And then, you know, So what proceeded to happen was a lot of copycats jumping on, on the green money train and making absolute garbage products, you know, like retailers putting out their versions of burgers and sauce. I mean, everybody was racing to put out plan based anything. You remember it was, it was like crazy, of course there was nothing even mattered. Like you could coagulate starch and put some yellow color on that and call it cheddar. And that was it. You know, it was just. Absolute pandemonium and you know, then some people for them, that was the first time they tried something plant based this hyped up future of food like, man, are we going to let these nerds dictate what the food cultures, you know, I think people respond in that way. Um, so yeah, I mean, it’s, it’s interesting. It, it, it both helped. Uh, the, the, the ascension of, uh, uh, impossible and beyond, but it also created a communication nightmare. Right now it’s just unavoidable, um, and it’s super tense. So yeah, I don’t know. I mean, I really wish people would just chill out and try it. And if you like it, buy it again or not. Yeah, you know, um, but it’s really, it’s so tied to the identity now that it’s kind of sickening. I had a, weird run in with, uh, vegans recently. So I, I, you know, went to college with a bunch of, you know, very staunch ethical vegans. And we were, are you still friends with them now? Not like great friends, but you know, it was a little tough to go out to eat with them. And I, the thing is, I fully understand their position and I think they’re probably right. Right. Living creatures deserve sovereignty and self determination and all that. I totally understand it. But, I think a lot of that ends up stepping on people trying to do a little bit of good if they’re not morally pure. And this isn’t me being like, eh, the vegans were mean to me, but I had a clip where I was talking to Joseph Gordon Levitt on a show about the myth that almond milk takes more water than dairy milk. That’s a myth. That’s a myth. And I thought it was a really fascinating PR campaign, and a vegan page reposted that, And then I got a bunch of hate messages be Because people clicked into my profile and saw me holding a ham, because I’m also a man who enjoys a ham. You’re a ham man. I’m a ham man. But you’re also an almond milk man, too. Well, I’m an almond, but people are complicated, right? Of course. I’m an, I’m a truth guy. And also, I really love, from a food nerd perspective. I love food nerds, yeah. This is an incredible product. If you devoid yourself from the moralization or the environmental concerns, the emissions, like, this is a fascinating miracle of food that Couldn’t have existed 10 years ago. Totally. Like where do your personal motivations come in? Is it from the food nerd, the environmental efficacy? You know, it’s hard to just take one of these thing and say, oh yeah, I’m, I’m super motivated by environment. I think just gradually, over years, it’s an, and it’s a super uninspiring story, , but I think gradually over years. I just wanted my way of paying rent to be more fun and give more back to society in any way possible, you know, and then you’re, you’re etching a little bit and I, I, I can’t, you know, to what you said, you try to be a little better. And I think often the movement as is presented doesn’t. doesn’t celebrate little wins. And I’m a win and I can’t put a blanket on that, but I just see examples that are often so grueling. Like, I don’t know that Arnold Schwarzenegger came out saying, if anybody tells you that you need need to be strong, tell them that that’s not true or something like that. And the comments are just like, he’s not even mean and destroying the man for like, like you, you can be multiple things. You can. You know, I’m not vegan, but I try to eat as much plant based as possible and I try to champion that. I try to make a company that makes as best possible product that you can. And I think unless we make a very, very, even better than what we have right now, it’s going to have to get even better and there’s going to have to be more of it. And then slowly people are going to start adding it into their diets. Uh, another moment was like I was on this vegan podcast. And we started discussing about the intricacies of change and culture and so forth. And, um, I asked them, would you be satisfied if in 15 years, 10, 15 years, people ate 50 percent plant based and 50 percent animal based? Which to me, or it sounds like a lofty, lofty goal. Um, somewhat not based in reality, but you know, maybe. And they couldn’t. They were just like, hmm, but what about the 50 percent of animals on the other side? They wouldn’t be happy about it. And so it was immediately, immediately the discussion went towards the animal and it was like, man, but you, that would be a huge win. You’re, you’re, you’re thinking something, you’re putting something negative into this, which would be a monumental gargantuan shift for humanity. Like you don’t see the good in that. So there’s a detachment from reality in the movement, which is probably fueled by good idealism, you know? Um, but I wish that it kind of went to a more realistic place where everybody could then be involved. Because as soon as you start saying unrealistic things, people just don’t take you seriously and so forth. So, it’s, it’s kind of hardcore. Yeah. I have to ask you, why adding bones? Why do you think adding bones is good? Because, I mean, a lot of the time it’s kind of, did you bite the bone? Bite it. It’s cool. Right? It’s, it’s, it’s bone adjacent. Interesting. Can you eat the bone? Yeah. You can’t eat it. It’s not very good. You can eat the bone, but you can eat it. How does the bone taste? You can eat anything one time. . The bone’s a little tough. It’s a bone. But no, like, it’s so interesting how like, I mean, a lot of the times I’ve seen a lot of vegans that are like, oh, why add, like a, like I used to go to this awesome vegan restaurant in LA called The Newsroom, very old school. And they had this, um, incredible chicken tender that was on a stick. Mm-Hmm. . And I’m like, oh, like. Why are they putting on a stick you can use a fork and knife and it’s just the the action of eating something with a bone So my question is why did you guys decide we’re gonna add a bone into this if you have an answer for that? I’m just curious Uh, well, we just keep making stuff in our um, Test kitchen and you know people like to play and we did we did very weird bone porpoise Prototypes and stuff like that. Um, then, you know, the discussion happened right before launching the prototype one year ago online. We were like, you know, Do we want to do this? Then we made a survey and we asked people, Hey, if we put out, um, ribs, would, uh, would you like to have them with bones or not? You know, and we did make it clear that it’s, it’s not rational to put them in there. Yeah. They’re heavy. I mean, it’s like the weight of them, like, like, it adds, yeah, it adds costs. It does. Process. La la la. Yeah. Um, but there was two things. Luckily we do have a side stream of protein in our process that. might otherwise go to waste. So we, we thought that we could utilize that because the bone is basically almost pure protein. So we found a way to utilize what might’ve been waste into then dehydrating it into these shapes and then making bones out of it. So in a way it was a good move for us. And then, you know, seeing the overwhelming vote for yes bones, like I think over 80 percent or even 90, I can’t remember. We were like, all right, I mean, yeah, another proof that people aren’t rational agents. I love that. I, I, I absolutely love the result of that survey and we put them out and, um, yeah, people were like, yeah, it’s fun. You can eat it with your hands. It kind of implies that you, so we’re like, yeah, of course. I mean, you want that, you want to nibble around the bone and that whole experience. Uh, so we just went with it. I don’t know, you know, like a lot of decisions that we make are just like. Feels right. Seems alright. Let’s do it. I like it. Phenomenal business ethos. I’m all about that. I’m all about yeah, let’s try it, dude. I love that. Right when you said, why put bones in it, I went And I sucked the barbecue sauce off the bone, not even thinking of it. But that’s why, dude. It’s a rib. You sucked the sauce off the bone. I love hearing you speak about this plant based meat product because you talk like a chef, man. You really do. You speak from a place of love and whimsy and creativity. You really do. Whereas I think the last 10 years especially it’s been dominated by like environmentalism and moralism and tech bros and tech bros So we’re like talking about no that means so much to me and I mean we you know have worked with so many chefs in the past and there’s a lot of people who are like Every act of cooking is an act of chemistry and I’m like technically that’s true But also some of the best chefs I know can barely read Yeah, and dropped out of high school when they were 14 sure, but they know their craft and they know the love of the food Right and I think that’s what You’re capturing here. Why put the bones? I don’t know man. It’s rad. Like that’s That’s an incredible thing Life’s short at the bones I really like this packaging. I also think you like demystify of like vegan Product too because a lot of the times the packaging and stuff is like scary. You know what I mean? Yeah, it’s like so tech heavy and you’re just like, uh, I don’t want to know about all the heme and whatnot That’s going in the end and the yeast going in here like the packaging also makes me feel like it’s so much more Accessible this way and it’s yeah, it’s for now. It’s not for 10 years in the future or 50 years Yeah future like this is packaging that I’m into and like I would grab because it reminds me of stuff That’s already in my pantry. You know, I mean Man, did you get me on this podcast just to make me feel really, really good? We heard you were hanging out with your in laws, so we’re like, just come on and hang out with us and feel good a little bit. But like, kind of, yes, because, no, like, dead ass serious here. We, we get sent, like, a lot of products, we get sent a lot of PR email blasts for a new, they found a new sprouted seed that you could puff and put in a package, and it sold at Whole Foods for 20, and they have all these micronutrients or whatever, but when we read the marketing materials for Juicy Marbles, True. Yeah. It was the first time we’d ever seen a plant based meat talk about their grandmother or their mother’s cooking, which is incredible. And I, it felt like a seismic shift a little bit, right? Yeah, totally. Because it was either Demystified. The tech bro, Impossible Meat, big investment of the mid 2000s. Right. Or the late 90s, everything was like, had, what are they called? Mandalas? Do you like Dreamcatcher? The very like, vegan, macrobiotic, the design. Yeah, yeah, yeah. There’s, there’s like, uh, you know, hippie, vaguely, like Hindu symbols on the packaging. And you’re like, why does my vegan hot dog, you notice that? You noticed that, I love that you noticed that. That was one of the reasons that I opened the plant based restaurant. I kid you not. I, I’ve always been enthusiastic about the plant based space. And whenever something opened in my hometown, I would go immediately to check it out. And they opened this thing, I should have known from the name. It was something, a play on words, veg, and then a leaf for a logo. You know, it was just screaming red flags. It was crazy. And, and, and inside I was thinking, my God, why does every single place have to include mandalas? So funny. You know, and there was like laminated little A4 printed posters of cows that have friends not food. And it was just like conversion, uh, conversion chapel. It wasn’t a restaurant. And that’s what, that, that was one of a profound moment because I was like, man. If only they marketed it as food, not as an ideology, you know, and I think a lot of mandalas kind of come because people who are Who care about animals so deeply are Most likely also spiritual in some sense, and you know, a lot of the spirituality comes from, from East, and I love that shit, by the way. I love, I love reading, uh, Eastern philosophies. It has really, It changed my life, my early 20s, getting all it’s so I’m not coming from a place of judgment, but I do as a communicator see that a lot of people just don’t want to be, you know, they take these symbols and they say, Oh, this is for hippies. This is that kind of people. You, you, you, you see mandalas, you see cows in all that kind of communication and you say, not for me. I, you know, and, and another profound moment like that was when our restaurant also had a range of products and we were trying to get into retail. So they, they organized like a tasting and their whole sales team was there eating our products. And I’m watching these three dudes eating the pastrami that we had with like the most glee. You can see they’re like, man, you know, like this, when you’re surprised that something is good. Hmm. And I come to them and we start chatting and the guy’s like, man, I gotta tell you, this is really, really surprisingly good, but you know, it’s not for me. And I was like, what is what just happened? And I, and then, then I realized, yeah, it’s identity. You know? That’s business baby. That’s the thing. Yeah. Yeah. It, it just comes down to that he, even though he liked the taste. Which in any of if somebody if that was a real piece of meat, he would be asking me where’d you get that? Where can I get that? but in this case, it was like great, but you know If I bring that home, what’s the missus gonna think, you know what I mean? It is so bizarre because food is It’s like damn near one of the things that everybody has in common. And not everybody eats for just pure nutrition or pure taste, right? There’s so much culture locked up into it. But like, we seem to have gone too far down this rabbit hole. Even in L. A., we saw this shift from that very hippie, you know, Eastern philosophy branded, uh, macrobiotic vegan restaurants All right. Do you remember all the like punk junk food, vegan restaurants that opened up? Yeah. Domi home cooking where it was suddenly Yeah. Overcorrection to everything is just, yeah. Fried soy covered in, uh, you know, big cheese, cashew, cashew cream. Blended with yeast. Yeah. Yeah. And into these big junk food platters. But I’d love that this, it feels like whole. Wholesome, nutritious food. The label is really clean. The branding is not moralistic. It seems like, I hope we can get to a place where we’re just eating things for eating’s sake. Sure. And I hope that happens, man. I think we’re on our way. This show is sponsored by BetterHelp. So whenever my husband and I moved in together, we started doing something called microdosing responsibility, uh, because we, uh, only lived with our parents beforehand. And the first thing that we did was buy plants to learn how to take care of them, nourish them, and make them feel good. But recently, some of our plants have been dying, and I took the initiative to ask people for help. I started asking people that I know are great plant parents what to do, and they’ve slowly been getting better and better. I think it’s a really important thing to be able to learn new skills as you get older because the thing that people don’t tell you about getting older and this is something I’ve actually been reconnecting with in therapy is that um everything gets a little duller and you start to feel less because you get locked up in this drudgery but for me I’ve been learning how to like and take a lot of joy in little things like, I don’t know, plants, but like actually enjoying my pet, right? This sounds so lame, like staring into Pippin’s eyes and really being like, Wow, what a beautiful thing that I do have this responsibility and I do have this fun little relationship. If you’re thinking of starting therapy, give BetterHelp a try. It’s entirely online and designed to be convenient, flexible, and suited to your schedule. You just fill out a brief questionnaire to get matched with a licensed therapist, and switch therapists anytime for no additional charge. Rediscover your curiosity with BetterHelp. Visit betterhelp. com slash hotdog today to get 10 percent off your first month. That’s betterhelp, H E L P dot com slash hotdog. Alright, Nicole and Vladimir, we’ve heard what you and I have to say. Now it’s time to find out what other wacky ideas are rattling out there in the universe. It’s time for a little segment we call OPINIONS ARE LIKE CASSEROLES! Did you like our song? I love everything that you guys are doing. Aww. I’m just so amazed. I’m sorry, no, her voice is pitchy right now. I’m, I had a lot of ribs. I had a lot of ribs. Alright, Vladimir, so we have asked our fans for their hottest takes about plant based meat. We got a couple responses. We’re gonna read them out. You’re gonna get first crack at responding. You good with that? I hope I am. Alright, this, uh, let’s, we’ll go in order, Nicole. Alright, um, Soy Chorizo is better than the original and I will die on this hill. It’s the only good meat substitute. Have you had Soy Chorizo or the brand name Soyrizo? I have had Soy Chorizo, but I have not had this brand. Um, I, I see where the sentiment is coming. I see this, you know, it’s like these sausages with their intense salty flavor are, I guess, and I guess I’m going to come in from a food nerd perspective, but they’re easier to make because it’s kind of a mince kind of thing, right? And I feel like all minced products are slightly easier to mimic and especially it’s really, um, once you get into the spicy stuff with a lot of flavor. Um, that has been added by a garlic and chili and this and that. These are really good. Yeah. I don’t think I could even tell the difference between, um, anything ground beef versus vegan at this point. And a blind test? I don’t think so. Yeah. It’s like the farther you get away from the whole muscle cut, the easier it is to reproduce because you’re adding so many things. I, especially you’re, you’re probably scrambling it with eggs as well. Or some sort of, you know, vegan egg, if that’s your jam. Uh, you talk about like, meat eaters not being a monolith, and I was thinking about my brother, who, he’s four years older, but we have the same genes, and so, you know, he’s got high cholesterol, because it runs in our family. So he stopped eating red meat. I’ve started to phase out red meat at home. And so he’s somebody that, you know, Yeah, he’ll just use soyrizo, or he’ll, you know, eat Beyond Burgers, Impossible Burgers, whatever, because we’re trying to not die at 55. Okay, well, these are my thoughts on soy chorizo. So, my husband cannot digest it. Like, it makes, like, it gives him the worst farts ever. Oh, yeah. So, our house is a, is a not soy chorizo house anymore, after like trying it twice, um, so we’re just regular chorizo people. What is the point? Beef chorizo though, right? Yeah, yeah, we don’t eat pork in the house, but yeah, beef chorizo, if we eat chorizo. So, I don’t, I don’t care either way, but my household is just, it’s a, it’s a no chorizo zone, if you want to know the truth. Um, My stomach has never been so destroyed as when I, I, I’ve dabbled going vegan or plant, fully plant based for like a month or two at a time. I have too, and I’m sure you have too, yeah. It was seitan, it was the pure wheat gluten. And I think I am hyper gluten tolerant, like I, I run through bread. Um, but I ate so much seitan that I remember just getting the craziest bubble guts, man. Yeah, it was horrible. Oof, oof, yes. I, I, just when I heard what seitan is I could never get behind that, like, just conceptually, but I don’t think I’ve even had a good one. Maybe I just wasn’t lucky, lucky in that sense, but oh my, just, it’s pure gluten. That’s just I like the bounce. There’s almost nothing else there. It’s like a rubber ball. Yeah, it’s great. It’s fun. Okay, yeah. We’ll give it the bounce. It has the bounce. Yeah. Should I read the next one? Yeah, do it. Uh, Shane says, It’s probably the long term answer for the human race, but needs to become near indistinguishable to meat in a blind taste test before the leap can be made. Mmm. They’re talking about the singularity. It’s like a Turing test. The meat singularity. Uh, I don’t know. I don’t know about that. I, I can’t. Think about what was the first part like about saving the world or saving the human race It’s probably the long term answer for the human race I don’t know if I can dabble in In these grandiose concepts. What is the answer for the human race? I mean, I still thought it was 42 Reference From hitchhiking, yeah. Shout out to Douglas Adams. Um, yeah, I don’t know, man. Uh, I do think he’s right in the sense that plant based meats are gonna have to get much, much, much better. But as we talked earlier, we’re also going to have to make some chill moves in terms of culture and how we talk about food and, yeah, I don’t know how to describe it differently. On a political and social scale, we’re going to have to get way more chill. That is the perfect way to do it. That’s good. Yeah, that’s, that’s how I see it. But he is right. Yeah, dude, what’s the answer for the human race? It’s like, how long are we gonna last before AI, uh, you know, reaches A robot overlords? I have no idea, man. I don’t know what the answer is. All I know is like, to do one good thing is better than to do zero good things. I agree! And eating plants seems to be more Environmentally efficacious than like you just like whatever man. Um, I don’t know i’m in my post ethical bimbo era You know that and so, uh for me I just I cared about I used to be like an environmental journalist and these are still things that I generally believe in Right, but also I realized that whenever I wrote about them people would just get pissed off and it would create Infighting with groups that already believed whatever they were going to believe right You And so I could write about the most environmentally ethical pig farm in the world, and then the vegans were gonna get pissed off, and then the, uh, hardcore industrial farmers were gonna get pissed off, and then everybody was fighting. So at this point, it’s just like, I don’t know what the answer is. Do I think it needs to be, uh, perfectly indistinguishable from meat? I think it could help, but I don’t know that we’re ever going to get there because, uh, you know, nature is as it is, and there are certain intricacies to, to meet that I don’t think could ever be replicated. I would add to that, I don’t think it has to get exactly one for one. Right. You know, I think it just has to become really, really, really good, um, better than it is now on a, on a whole scale. Yeah. But I, you know, just like pork is not the same as beef, and it’s not the same as chicken and so forth. You know, like you can’t expect. Soy or pea or whatever the protein base is to give you exactly that, but I don’t think it has to. Um, but there is a problem because we do compare it to the originator, right? So as soon as you compare it, and then it’s not exactly like it, you see it as lesser, most likely. Um, but I, I think it, it doesn’t have to become identical, but it has to become better. Yeah, I agree. Then all of our problems worldwide will be solved. Finally! Yay! Someone’s gonna do it. That’s why we, that’s why we started Juicy Marbles. To solve all human problems. Via plant based steaks and ribs. Yeah, agreed. Why make the bones, Nicole, to solve all the world’s problems? Simple. I’m telling ya, it’s all about the bones. I don’t, my problem is, I don’t think about this stuff too much. enough to have an answer. My opinion is, I just don’t think about the human race in that, in that large context. I don’t think I’ve like gained, I don’t know, like awareness. I’m, I’m 31 and I just don’t, I’m 31. I’m married. I like avocados. I do a podcast and I don’t know crap about the human race and how to fix it, but I’m glad that maybe this podcast and maybe some, you know, plant based meat can make people happier. And that’s where I stand. Here she comes. Miss America! Like such as! Nicole, that’s, I wish more people Just spoke like you did right now and say I don’t know the big answers to the human race because if you go online You’ll just see people. I’ll tell you what are you gonna do to save the world? No, I’ll tell you what I do It’s like everybody seems to know the answer to all the human problems And I I just I find it very refreshing when somebody says I don’t know. Yeah. That’s me. Like, 90 percent of the time. I don’t know. Especially a podcast host. I don’t know. Same. Take the next one, Josh. All right. Uh, this, this is fun. Uh, plant based buffalo nuggets are indistinguishable from real chicken nuggets to me. If the option’s there, I’ll get them because the more texture, since ground up chicken doesn’t taste like chicken anyways. Plant based buffalo wings are, um, just that is. So it’s like, uh, a ground up, uh, like, boneless wings. Like a ground up chicken nugget that are then fried and coated in hot sauce. So they’re saying the vegan version of that is indistinguishable. Yeah, that’s what I said earlier, you know, like with the burgers and the chorizo, it’s one of those foods which is like already a processed, ground down, far from the original version kind of thing with a lot of spices and then, you know, the buffalo. Has also this sticky sauce over it, right? Yeah, that’s the one. Yeah. Yeah, so Yeah, man, you know chicken nuggets even before veganism were Always kind of like scrutinizing we, you know, one of the first, you know, one of the first viral videos from the food industry was like how nuggets are made and everybody was like, wow. I remember that. Looked like taffy. So, yeah, I mean, they are undistinguishable. I don’t think I, you know, I don’t even know what chicken nuggets taste like. Yeah, they don’t. It’s a weird food. Vladimir, I think you’re lying. You can totally tell the difference. Can you? Yes! I don’t know. What do you mean? A soy nugget versus a chicken nugget? Yes, you can absolutely tell the difference. I don’t care how much sauce, how much X, Y, and Z you put on it. Chicken tastes like chicken. It just does. We gotta put your money where your mouth is. We gotta see. What do you mean? It’s obvious. You’re right, you’re right, Nicole. I think you’re right. I mean, the thing is, I never had like a blind test. But my assumption is I have tried. I have tried very, very good and convincing vegan chicken tenders. Um, uh, I’m just gonna shout out to Tindle. Like, I really love what they did. Uh, I had a chance to try it once, and I don’t know, man. Yeah, chicken tastes like chicken, but you know, so does beef, but then you add ketchup and mayo and this and that. And I, maybe I would assume that it’s super hard to tell, but yeah, you know, I can tell. I’m going to challenge the assumption that chicken tastes like chicken. Here’s why. No, no, hear me out. Hear me out. Hear me out. As plant, as plant based meats get better over time, meat based meats are getting worse. Our chicken is getting so Okay, so Maybe it’s just staying the same? No, it’s not. Have you ever had like an heirloom breed of chicken? Not for a long time. I had a chicken that was raised for four years in somebody’s backyard. Wow. And it tasted Did it go to grad school? Shut up, dude. It tasted 10 times more like chicken than a chicken breast you would get. At the grocery store. Okay, fair. Chicken is tasting less like chicken over the years because they are prioritizing the growth in the breasts. And now these birds can’t even move to get blood flow through the muscles. So chicken breast doesn’t taste like anything anymore. Not only that, what is it called, like, woody tissue syndrome? Yeah, yeah, yeah, the woody chicken. Do you know about woody tissue syndrome? It’s something like, it sounds awful. I know. So chicken boobies get so big that the muscles, tell me if I’m wrong. Yeah. The muscles basically outgrow and then it creates these striations where the chicken is basically solid. Woody and gross. How many times have you bought chicken breasts from the store? Seven. And then tasted it and had to throw it away because it has. This disease that we can’t track seven eight times at this point It sucks like chickens literally getting worse over time and it’s cheaper. It’s easy to produce beefs getting more expensive yada yada And so like again the singularity we’re gonna cross the the axes on the graph are gonna cross at some point and it crosses in buffalo nuggets Yeah, but that’s the thing, you know, I think I think that’s what industry does like it also take took chicken an amazing thing and ruined it Uh, ultimately, I think it’s just you can’t have an animal based system that feeds all people. Um, so, uh, uh, but to your point, I don’t think nuggets are like, they don’t have chicken properties really, because it’s super ground, right? Like, uh, what kind of nuggets are we talking about? Are we talking about that McDonald’s? Or are we talking about pieces of chicken that are fried in batter? Because that may be, you’re right, that would be harder to copy, because I’m talking about the ground stuff. I think also the texture of chicken. The texture of chicken, I think, adds a lot of the sensorial property of chicken, I guess. I mean, whenever I eat the ground stuff, it tastes like chicken to me. Maybe I just need to do, I need to just do a blind taste test, put this all to rest, Vladimir, come on the show, hang out with us, we can all eat it, and then we can really determine it. How about that? We need to get to the bottom of this. We gotta, you said you could taste the difference between Coke and Pepsi and you were lying when we did a Grand Theft Auto. I wasn’t lying, I was overconfident. There’s a difference between lying and being overconfident. On that note, thank you so much for listening to A Hot Dog is a Sandwich. We got new audio episodes every Wednesday and the video version right here on Sundays. If you want to be featured on opinions are like casseroles, Hit us up at 833 DOG POD 1. The number again is 833 DOG POD 1. Make sure to check out Juicy Marbles products. Vladimir, you got anything else to share? No, nothing. More, more chill, man. Bring more chill. So chill. Last, last, last podcast they asked me that and I said, you know, last, next time I’m going to say I had nothing to share, absolutely. You shared it all, you shared enough with us, but I do really appreciate you, man. Uh, you’re rad, incredible product, we weren’t just blowing smoke. Yeah, thanks for coming on.