Which vegan jerky makes us wanna twerky? – Let’s talk about that. (upbeat music) Good Mythical morning! Now it’s true that we like-a the meats around here. But as growing boys, you know, we’re also down with keeping that pesky cholesterol in check. That’s important. – Oh, don’t say the C word. Vegan jerkies, not to be confused with vegan jerks– – Those don’t exist. – Have become more and more popular as of late. Huh. Did you know that? – Yup, mm-hmm. – So if we’re gonna snack on some cured non-meats, we might as well discover our favorite. It’s time for No Animals Were Harmed In the Making Of This Taste Test: Vegan Jerky Edition. We got a hold of the most popular name brand vegan jerkies to determine which is truly the best, and we’re gonna rank ’em. – Yes, we are. – Right back here. – Yes, we’re going to go from bad to good. Starting with number six, vegan-ning to regret my life’s choices. – Okay. – Ve-gan, but we don’t want to. (Link chuckles) (crew laughs) Ve-bland. I might try this ve-gain. (Link chuckles) As good as Sir Vegan McKellen, which is quite good. And yes, ve-gan! I love those puns. – Can we eat it? (upbeat music) All right, for this taste test, we went with flavors involving barbecue, smoke, and spice because there’s other flavors of ve-jan jerky. (chuckles) (crew laughs) – Yeah, let’s say vegan. – Let’s say vegan. – Yeah, we’re gonna say vegan. – [Stevie] Okay. First up, we have a Texas barbecue jerky by Primal Spirit. – Primal Spirit. – Primal Spirit. – You know, it was founded in 2001 by some vegetarian walking buddies in West Virginia. (crew laughs) – Vegetarian walking buddies? – Hey. – That’s something else we could be. – We could be walking buddies. – Yeah, we could, but vegetarian? – Well, I don’t know. – While on the walk. While on the walk, we’re eat no meat. – We’re vegetarian while walking. – We’re gonna be eating this stuff. – Yeah, so this whole idea of going with things that taste a little bit more like meat, there’s like watermelon jerky and there’s other things that are jerkified things. But we’re kinda going with things that at least seem like they’re trying to get closer to what you would expect if you were eating a regular meat jerky. – It smells okay. – I wasn’t gonna say that. I was gonna say it smells not so great. – It looks scarier than it smells. – [Stevie] Does it have that like, you know, initially, when you open a meat jerky, it has that kind of bad waft. Is it the same bad waft? Or is it a different bad waft? – It’s sweet. – It’s got– – It’s a sweet but bad waft. – It has that, but it has that this ain’t meat kind of smell to it. Do you know what I’m talking about? And it also has a moistness that is, I’m afraid to touch. – What is this stuff made out of? Isolated soy protein, water, unrefined cane juice. Yeah, but what’s the… So it’s soy. – (chuckles) You were gonna say, “What’s the protein?” – I heard what I said. I heard what I said! – Tastes better than it smells. – Mm-hmm. – It really gives you a nice incisor workout. – This ain’t bad. – It’s not bad. – Yeah, ’cause I think I’m in the market for this stuff. Yeah, put it– – I mean, I’m almost confident– – Put it in number two. – Yeah, confident enough to put it as good as Sir Vegan McKellen, which up until just a moment ago I thought was Sir Vegan McKlellen. (crew laughs) (upbeat music) – [Stevie] So did you know that Louisville is not in North Carolina? – Yeah. – [Stevie] Okay, we’re gonna see if Louisville Vegan Jerky knows how to do smokey Carolina barbecue-flavored vegan jerky. – Oh, okay. – Mm-hmm. – And you can mean a lot of things by that. – They mean South Carolina because it says– – Mustard Columbia style. – Carolina jerky comes from the sweet and smokey goodness of authentic Carolina mustard barbecue. – Yeah. – So this is South Carolina. They just didn’t wanna say it. – Well, I can tell you the story of this jerky– – Take a closer look at Louisville, Kentucky. So maybe they do it in Louisville too. Okay. – Well, in– – Tell me the story. – In 2012, Louisville Vegan Jerky founder Stanley Chase III, was with his walking buddy– – No. – No, it’s not another walking buddy story, as much as I wish it was. He actually forgot to set a timer on his vegan manapua, a Hawaiian and Cantonese bun usually filled with barbecue pork, and he overcooked the barbecue soy protein by mistake, thereby creating vegan jerky. – This looks like, like a moist– – [Rhett] Ooh. – Seasoned fry that’s like four days old. – Looks can be deceiving. – Why is it shaped like this? – That’s got a lot of flavor. – Good South Carolina barbecue flavor. – Wow! – Again, this is soy protein. – But there’s not anything off-putting about this. – The last one had 10 grams of protein. This one has five grams of protein. – In how much though? What’s the serving size? – Three per container, so one ounce, a third of this. – Serving size. – This is good, homie. – 28 grams. – But this is better than the first one. – Which is one ounce. – This is better than the first one. – I think significantly better. – Because the first one was so, it was too moist. It was too juicy. – My expectations were down, my expectations for this were below. You can’t even see where my expectations were for vegan jerky. – I can actually see it. It’s pretty low, I’m gonna tell you. – So the fact that this is here– – Yeah. – This is right here at mouth level. – Move that to two. I’m gonna actually now move this to four. And you wanna take that and do that for me? – I do wanna do this for you. – You’re gonna zip, what are you, we might wanna go back in there. – Well, I might take it home. I don’t want it to dry out. – I don’t like the shape, but I really like the flavor. Number two! – Oh. No, not number one, because we’re holding out hope because now, our whole scale of vegan jerky has been impacted. – Yep, yep. – What are the limits? (upbeat music) – [Stevie] Up next, this is It’s Jerky Y’all vegan jerky, prickly pear chipotle flavor. – Of course, this also has a story, Link. – Tell me the story, Rhett. – It’s Jerky Y’all’s founder, Brett Christoffel, created his company in 2018 after over 40 years of eating meat and deciding to stop because of his love of animals. – But not love of eating animals. – Did I hear y’all talking about a love of animals? (laughs) – Yeah, yeah. – It’s me, your friendly neighborhood doomsday prepper, Otis Jeremiah Timothy Chalamet Malachi. (group laughs) – Good to see you, Malachi. – Yeah! When y’all said animal loving, it reminded me of an old bunker buddy I used to have. He went to prison. I don’t know why, nor do I care to know. So we eatin’ some jerky? – Yeah, come on out here. – You wanna join us? – Yeah. – It’s Jerky Y’all. I like the name. It’s an announcement to the world. What’s this? – It’s jerky, y’all! – (laughs) Yeah, yeah. – It’s lots of fun. – Yeah, I used that as my catch phrase when I auditioned for Saturday Night Live. (group laughs) – How did that turn out? – Yeah. – Not well. I am not currently on that program. – Oh, yeah, I noticed. Oh. – It’s the same– – How does that strike you? You got a lot of jerky experience. – It’s the same fingerling style as the previous, which we put at number two. – Yep, I got a lotta jerky in the bunker for when the poop goes down. And honestly, this is some of the best I’ve had. – (chuckles) It’s not bad. And it’s spicy. – This is real good. – What’s your opinion on soy? – I love soy. I love tempeh. I love any, any protein replacement. That’s right, I’m a complicated man. (Rhett laughs) – Seitan? Do you like seitan? – I don’t care for seitan ’cause it sounds like the devil. – Hmm. – It does. This is smokey. (crew laughs) – They’re doing a similar thing but it’s not as good as this. – It’s not sweet like, you’re gonna need to– – Ooh. I’m gonna try some of this. – You’re gonna need to taste our number two because– – That’s real good. – Oof. (Rhett laughs) Dang. Oh, I like this. I like this a lot, and I like this much better. – Yeah, agreed. – Right. So we’re wanting to put this lower. – Number three. It’s better than four. – But it’s better than the Primal Spirit. – Yeah, yeah, yeah. – [Link] ‘Cause it’s dry. You don’t want your jerky as wet as that is. – Yeah. And it is actually moist on the inside but you can touch it. That’s like touching the tongue of an animal. – Right. – Did your friend ever touch the tongue of an animal? – I think that is part of why he is in prison, yes. (Rhett and Link laugh) – Okay. – Now as much as I’m enjoying sitting here munching on some jerky with y’all– – Uh-huh. – Oh, are you leaving? – I will leave, but first, if you’ll allow me to slip in a little plug. (group laughs) As you boys know, I only read three things, the Bible. – Okay. – The Constitution. – Yep. – And Archie Comics. – Yeah, yeah, right. – I’m especially excited about an upcoming Archie horror collection called Pop’s Choklit Shoppe of Horrors. – Wow. – You can pre-order it now, or you can pick it up from your local comic bookstore on March 22nd. It features a story from a talented writer named Jordan Morris, who I have never heard of. – Ah. – Well, I’m off to my day job, professor of women’s studies at Mount Holyoke College. (group laughs) – Somebody’s gotta do it! (upbeat music) – [Stevie] This next jerky is Beleaf’s spicy flavored vegan jerky. – Hey, listen. This one has probably the most heartwarming story yet. – Stories are important, apparently, for vegan jerky. – Yeah, yeah. – Let’s hear it be. – Beleaf Corporation was founded in September 2017 and is located in City of Industry, California. (crew laughs) Brings a tear to your eye. (chuckles) – The end. – Yeah, yeah, yeah, that’s it. – Okay. City of Industry. – You ever been down there? – I’ve been down there. It’s like– – A lot of industry. – Lots of things being– – A lot of smoke stacks. – Being created. Yeah, lots of conveyor belts and people with weird carts. Oh ho ho, what the– – Look at that. – What the hell? (crew laughs) That’s the– – It’s a little tough. – That’s not it, man. – But it’s purdy. – Whoa, these are bigguns. These are some bigguns. – I have noticed a pattern. Every single one of these that we’ve been talking about has been founded like in the past 10 years, maybe past five or six years. So there’s a little bit of like a trendiness to this, it feels like. – Is this one also soy? Is it? Could it be? – Well– – They all are, I think. – Yeah, yeah. Soybean fiber. – Soy and wheat. Wheat, but this is like a husk. This looks like a freaking fire starter, you know. All you gotta do is light this and whew, it’ll just take care of your whole– – Man, that’s tough. – Take care of your whole. (crew laughs) Oh my goodness. – You gotta get your jerky teeth out for this one. – You can kinda peel it. – Yeah, you can kinda peel it like string cheese. – Uh-huh. It kinda looks like a pork rind. It’s very sweet and then spicy. – This is actually chewier than these ones that we really like. – Mm-hmm. – What’s happening to me is I’m constantly recalibrating how bad Primal Spirit is. – Yeah, yeah. The good thing about Primal Spirit that I’m now reminded of is the chewiness. I feel like this is certainly superior than It’s Jerky Y’all because it’s chewier. It’s jerkier. We’ve lost the jerkiness. – Ooh. Bring in that one though because, no. – Our number two. – The one that we don’t know about that you’re saying is not as good as this. – This one is sweet and spicy. That one’s just spicy. This one’s got, it’s hard, man. – Taste that one again though, man. The flavor’s so much better though. – I really like this consistency. Jerky needs to have this. – Sometimes you get a really soft jerky and it’s nice. – Yeah, it is. Well– – I don’t dislike this one. – We know we’re moving this one down here. – I’m not, I actually, you know what? This doesn’t taste bad. I’m fine with putting, I don’t really, those two are both good. – Yeah, let’s just get it to the middle. – I do prefer It’s Jerky Y’all just so, let the record show. – Well then, I’ll let, I’m fine with like these basically tying. They’re tying for losing ’cause we know they’re not beating Louisville. (upbeat music) – You know, every time we take the time to rank something like we’re doing today on this show called Good Mythical Morning, the good team over Sporked.com will take that and turn it into a little article at Sporked.com, along with all the other things that we’ve ranked and a bunch of other stuff that the Sporked team has ranked. Okay? – Mm-hmm. So every time that you’re shopping for something, like, “Oh, I wanna buy some vegan jerky,” you don’t have to pull up this episode and like scrub to the end. – [Rhett] That’s right. – [Link] Just go to the search function on Sporked.com. – [Rhett] Mm-hmm. – Vegan jerky, and this result will pop up. – Yes. – What we got, Stevie? – [Stevie] This is our only vegan jerky not hailing from the US. It’s a Canadian brand, Noble Jerky, and this is their sweet barbecue flavor. – Sweet barbecue. – Mm-hmm, mm-hmm. – Again, very heartwarming story. Noble Jerky is owned by Herbana Brands. – That just makes me wanna get emotional. – But I will say– – But I can’t because of my medication. – Right, yeah, yeah, yeah. Herbana Brands has been around since 1968. Now, I’m not reading this. I just know this from memory. – [Link] They all have that. – And they have, up until 2018, they made like cured salami, stuff like that. And then they got into the plant-based game. So these were like meat experts making a transition into plant stuff. – Did their expertise translate? Whoo! – Tastes like spaghetti sauce. – Ooh, you just ruined it for me. (crew laughs) I was about to gush about how awesome it was. – [Rhett] It’s too sweet, bro. – [Link] It is very sweet. The consistency– – And it’s wet. – Is not too wet. (crew laughs) It is moist, but it’s not wet. – I think you need to up your medication. (laughs) – Listen, listen. This stuff, this Primal stuff was just, was wet. Look, you can see juices just kinda like forming. – Yeah, but– – But this is just, this is moist but it’s not wet! – But look at your fingers now. Take that out and look at what, look at the residue. You don’t want that. – But that’s sticky– – I’m just saying we just experienced all this other jerky that’s dry, it doesn’t stick to you, and now it’s like somebody left spaghetti in the sun. – The taste is not the best. It tastes like spaghetti sauce. But the consistency is the most meat-like we have tasted today. – It does have good consistency. You’re right. – I gotta give ’em that. – I don’t like the wetness, and I don’t like the taste. – I would really be into other flavors from Noble Jerky because of the consistency, man. – Y’all hear that? He’d be into other flavors. Give ’em your address. – What? I thought, I thought– – Give Noble Jerky your address. – I heard a helicopter when he said, “Did y’all hear that,” and I thought you were talking about the helicopter. – Y’all hear that? Cut. – Malachi, is your ride here? – Otis Maybe it’s the black helicopters that Jeff Bezos sent to scan our brains! – Yeah, right, mm-hmm. Yeah, you should see the smile on his face when he said that. (laughs) – [Otis] I was right! – Come in here, show ’em the smile on your face. – I was right! My kids called me crazy when they went to live with their mom, but I was right. (crew laughs) Them’s copters and they’re scanning our brains so Jeff Bezos could put secret messages into Bosch. (Rhett laughs) – [Crew Member] What? (crew laughs) – Here you go. – Ooh, yeah, come on. Oh, gimme! Yeah, bye! – Wow. Yeah, yeah, yeah. He’s been proven right. (Link laughs) Every year that passes, he’s proven more right. I think it’s better than Primal – And I’m gonna– – You seem to like it a lot. – Primal is just a disappointment. – You’re gonna make it better than meatless vegan jerky, uh– – See the problem is– – We tore the brand off that one. That’s why I’m not saying the name of it. – This is what I wanna do. – But this is so, like, dude, you’re doing a disservice to people if you’re putting It’s Jerky Y’all so low. – Now I’m putting this one lower. But since that one’s tied with that, now we’re putting this in between so this is– – That’s actually perfect. – What? – That’s perfect ’cause they’re not actually tied ’cause this one is better. And now you’ve forced yourself to admit it by having to put Noble Jerky in between it. – Foiled again. – Yes. – The number one slot is still open. – It is. (upbeat music) – [Stevie] Okay, this might be the ultimate test of this whole episode because this final round has big daddy Beyond Meat hi-hot and spicy flavor. And so how does it compare? – Hype hot and spicy? – [Stevie] Huh? – Did you say hype? – Did you say hi-hot? – Hype hot and spicy. – [Stevie] Hype is, yeah, hype hot and spicy. – There’s a lot hype around this. – You didn’t say hype. – [Stevie] No, I just– – I heard you say hype. – [Stevie] You’re highlighting a mistake that I made. (crew laughs) – Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah. – Hype hot and hasty! – Now this really does have an incredible backstory. You see, last year, a couple of internet comedians named Rhett and Link got a show on the Food Network, and they actually got to go to the Beyond Meat plant. – Lab. – The lab to see them make stuff like this. And you know what? The Food Network loved it so much that they did not ask for any more episodes of that show. (crew laughs) – They did not ask. – Did not ask. This is the first one that doesn’t have– – Soy. – Soy. It’s mung bean pea protein. – Mung bean. – Mung bean pea protein. – Everything they do is the mung bean pea protein. – Not everything. – Everything. (crew laughs) – But we’ve seen them manipulate this protein in the lab. We know the secrets. – Oh, wow. It definitely requires some jerk. – Without doubt, even more so than the last one, the most meat-like, which it makes sense because that’s exactly what they’re trying to do. They’re trying to, actually, on a molecular level make meat. And so it’s got a very meat-like consistency. – Yeah, I mean– – And a meat-like flavor. – Look at that. When you just open it up and start pulling it apart. – But it doesn’t have something that I’m looking for. – Flavor. – It does not have– – [Stevie] Hype. – The intensity of the hype. – Hype. (crew laughs) There’s no hype. – It doesn’t have flavor. – It doesn’t live up in the hype, Stevie. – So I actually think that the compensating that these non-meat jerkies are doing in order to bring the flavor is making them better in a side-by-side test. – Yeah. – Like this is the most meat-like but it’s not nearly as good as that Louisville jerky, the Carolina flavor. And I also don’t think it’s as good as It’s Jerky Y’all. But– – It’s not bad. – It’s not bad. The only one that’s bad, I think, is Primal Spirit. And actually, it wasn’t bad. It’s just in comparison. When we ate it at the beginning, we were like, “It’s pretty good.” We put it in number two. – And it’s not that spicy. It seems like it should be spicier for it to just be hot and spicy. Again, not living up to that hype. I kinda wanna, I don’t know. You know what? I’m kinda going against that a little bit. Hmm. – [Stevie] Well, texture-wise, you were like all about that the spicy one. – Yeah. – [Stevie] How does the Beyond texture compare to that one? – This is the superior texture. – They nailed the texture. – So that’s why it’s going to number three. And why if you wanna– – Oh, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah. – Move it to number two. Which means Louisville Vegan Jerky Company, you’ve done it! You’ve made our number one jerky with smokey Carolina. – I’m interested in the other flavors of this ’cause I don’t know if we were just so impressed as Carolina Boys, even though we’re from North Carolina and this is from the underbelly, South Carolina. – It’s my favorite barbecue sauce. – But– – That’s some good stuff. – They’ve really done it. – I highly recommend. – But overall, you can make a lot of really good choices with vegan jerky. I mean, like– – Yeah, I mean– – I expected to be really disappointed. – I know. – None of ’em were that disappointing. – I’m not disappointed at all. Look at my face. – Hmm. (crew laughs) – Is this the look of disappointment? – No. – No. – Thank you for subscribing and clicking that bell. – You know what time it is. – Hi, we’re the Laurens from Plainfield, Illinois, and we just finished our 19 frozen pizzas taste test. – [Group] And it’s time to spin the Wheel of Mythicality. (Rhett chuckles) – 19. – Yeah, yeah, yeah. – Good work. – They’re feeling the burn. (Rhett and Link laugh) Click the top link to find out which is the toughest non-beef jerky in Good Mythical More. – And to find out where the Wheel of Mythicality is gonna land. – [Rhett] You can check out written versions of past Gut Checks, blind taste tests, and rankings over on Sporked.com.