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The Spoon

Daily news and analysis about the food tech revolution

plant-based eggs

Migros Launches Plant-Based Hard-Boiled Egg. Watch This Video To See How It’s Made

Swiss retail and grocery giant Migros announced last week they were launching a new plant-based hard-boiled egg.

The new egg, called The Boiled, is the latest from the company’s plant-based product line, V-Love. According to the announcement, The Boiled is made with fourteen different ingredients but gets its protein punch from soy. The alt-egg will be on sale this month in stores across Switzerland in four-packs and will retail for 4.40 Swiss Francs (~$4.84).

The new egg looks exactly like an egg and tastes pretty close to one too, at least according to Swiss daily newspaper Aargauer Zeitung (translated): How does it taste? Amazingly similar to the original. Only the consistency of the protein differs more strongly. It has less bite. The egg yolk, on the other hand, has the floury-soft consistency, the yellow color – confusingly similar.

You can get a quick idea of how TheBoiled comes together by watching the video below. The process includes pouring the liquid that forms the white outer portion of the egg into molds. After the white part is formed and solid, the eggs are positioned on an automated production line where the yellow yolk is then injected. The video finishes by showing a TheBoiled egg cut in half.

While Migros claims that the new plant-based egg is the world’s first, there have been a number of companies making plant-based eggs in recent years, and earlier this year Singapore-based OsomeFood launched a hard-boiled egg made primarily from mycoprotein. Migros’ TheBoiled does appear to be the first plant-based hard-boiled egg made with soy.

Eat Just To Launch Vegan Sous Vide Egg Bites in Grocery Stores

Food tech company Eat Just announced today it will expand its retail line of products with the launch of JUST Egg Sous Vide bites, which the company has created in partnership with sous vide food manufacturer Cuisine Solutions.

According to a press release sent to The Spoon, Cuisine Solutions will produce the Sous Vide bites, which will arrive in the frozen food section of grocery stores in March. Customers will be able to choose from four different varieties, each based on a different geographical region and flavored with plants known to that area. They include America (potato, dill, chives, red and black pepper), India (curry, broccoli, cauliflower, coconut milk, lemongrass), Japan (mushroom, yams, togarashi, soy, tamari), and Mexico (poblanos, chipotle chile powder, black beans, corn, lime). The bites will be sold in boxes of four.  

The other major ingredient, of course, is mung bean protein, which is the key ingredient for all of Eat Just’s plant-based egg products.

Yours truly got the opportunity to try all four flavors recently. The flavor variety — which is executed well — is probably the biggest draw, as the ingredients are a welcome change from the usual cheese-tomato-spinach-or-basil mix that’s in most sous vide egg bites out there. Also, if you’re like me and constantly forget to cook breakfast, they’re a very easy plant-based solution. (Personal fave flavor: Mexico.)

The bites can be heated in a toaster, microwave, or conventional oven.

Eat Just hasn’t yet said which retail stores the product will debut at come March, nor how much each box will cost. (Those interested in getting those details can get updates here.)

Alongside the continuing evolution of its plant-based products, Eat Just has also hit a couple major milestones where its cell-based protein business is concerned. At the beginning of December, the company got the world’s first-ever regulatory approval to sell cultured meat, specifically in Singapore. The company followed that news up with the first actual sale of its GOOD cultured chicken bites at an upscale restaurant in the city-state.

Eat Just CEO Josh Tetrick has suggested in the past that the company will continue developing both plant- and cell-based lines of business, rather than focusing solely on one approach over another.

A Leading QSR Chain in China Ditches Chicken Eggs for Eat Just’s Plant-Based Version

Eat Just announced this week its plant-based egg products have landed on the menu of Discos, one of China’s leading fast-food chains. More importantly, Discos won’t just be offering the JUST egg alongside animal-based eggs. According to a press release sent to The Spoon, the JUST egg will outright replace its traditional counterpart in several menu items.

Plant-based foods on QSR menus aren’t new — in fact, they’re arguably standard fare at this point. Eat Just’s news is, however, the first time a major quick-service chain has completely switched out an animal-based protein for a plant-based version, which could signal a new shift for the direction of QSR menus over the next several years.

Discos will start the switchover with 500 locations across Bejing, Shanghai, Guangzhou, Shenyang, Dalian, Changchun, Harbin and Hainan provinces. (The chain has roughly 2,600 stores across 32 provinces in China.) The JUST egg will be in three different breakfast burgers, three breakfast bagel sandwiches, and on a western-style breakfast plate.

Discos’ full shift to plant-based eggs also seems a long-term strategic play for the brand. Demand for plant-based meat in China is expected increase by 200 percent over the next five years, according to a December 2020 study by DuPont Nutrition & Biosciences. According to the firm, the change is “driven by consumer values around health, taste, and sustainability.”

The JUST egg, meanwhile, has been available in China since 2019 in both retail and foodservice businesses, as well as through e-commerce sites Tmall and JD.com.

Discos’ chief marketing officer Xie Yahui suggested in today’s press release that the decision to swap out the chicken egg for a plant-based one was a decision driven by consumer preference: “The introduction of JUST Egg at Discos is a product and brand upgrade based on consumers’ increasing interest in nutrition, healthier diets and environmental awareness,” she said. She added that future menu offerings from Eat Just will be based on consumers’ reactions to these first dishes available.

This swap by Discos most likely isn’t a one-off occurrence. Worldwide, demand for plant-based protein has steadily grown for the last couple years, with 2020 being an all-out banner year for popularity and investment dollars. QSRs, meanwhile, are drastically changing, from their store formats to what’s on the menu. Overhauling the amount of animal-based protein on those menus seems a logical next step, for China and beyond.  

Zero Egg Raises $5M for Its Plant-Based Egg Product

Zero Egg, which makes a plant-based egg product, announced today that it has raised $5 million in Series A funding. The round was led by Powerplant Ventures, with participation from existing investors Unovis Asset Management/New Crop Capital and Strauss Group/The Kitchen Hub. This brings the total amount raised by Zero Egg to $8 million.

Based in Israel, Zero Egg just launched in the U.S. last month. The company’s egg product is a powder made primarily out of soy protein isolate and pea flour. It comes it two forms: the EGG Basis is used for scrambles and omelets, and the BAKE Basics is an egg replacement for baking.

Right now, Zero Egg is a B2B play, selling its egg replacement to food service companies and restaurants, though it plans to eventually sell to consumers. With the new funding, Zero Egg plans to grow its brand in the U.S. and launch new products over the coming year.

Though overall sales of plant-based foods have been growing over the past couple of years, plant-based eggs are a small category. According to the Good Food Institute (GFI), the plant-based egg category was only worth $10 million at the end of 2019. Though GFI noted that while the smallest, it is also the fastest growing category of plant-based foods.

Part of the reason for the small sales numbers for plant-based eggs is that they aren’t a suitable replacement for baking purposes. JUST Eggs, which are made from mung beans, are tasty as part of a burrito, but you wouldn’t make a cake with them. Over in the U.K., Crack’d launched its plant-based egg made from pea protein and nutritional yeast, which the company says can be used to make things like quiches and cookies (something we haven’t tested ourselves).

The Spoon’s Ashlen Weddington was sent a sample of a pre-made Zero Egg patty and thought it was pretty good. With today’s news, a lot more people here in the U.S. will be able to weigh in with their own thoughts on the eggless egg.

Eat Just Is Offering a Plant-Based Take on Meal Kit Deliveries for NYC

Two things we’ve seen increase during the pandemic: online food deliveries and demand for plant-based protein. Alt-protein company Eat Just is bundling those two ideas together with a new delivery offering that’s looks to be part meal kit and part virtual cooking session for homebound NYCers in need of brunch. The company is giving away free “Brunch in a Box” kits to residents of the Big Apple via a hotline users can text to get their meals.

Each kit contains ingredients for one of three recipes developed by Eat Just: eggs Florentine, eggnog French toast, and buckwheat crêpes. To get one, users text BrunchNYC to 35344, designating which of the above three meals they would like to cook. A spokesperson from Eat Just said all kits include every ingredient needed to create the recipe. The kits will be fulfilled by Amazon Prime Now.

An accompanying series of online cooking tutorials led by Chef Bec shows users exactly how to prep and cook the meals.

The idea is to help consumers recreate brunch at home, which I suspect will be happening a lot now that cold weather is here and the pandemic continues to restrict restaurant dining rooms. Bringing brunch indoors via delivery is one way to do that. “Our team wanted to help make the transition back indoors easier by sharing some new recipes featuring seasonal ingredients and healthier twists on brunch classics,” Eat Just’s spokesperson said of the new program.

The “Brunch in a Box” kits will be available for a limited time for free. Adding another virtual layer to the project, the company is working with local influencers to get the word out. Those include Priyanka Naik, NYC food blogger Dominek, and Vegan in the Hood.

The company’s most recent NYC outreach isn’t strictly limited to the online realm, though. Last week, Eat Just along with a handful of other alt-protein companies announced their Plantega project. Through it, the collective will offer grab-and-go options at the local bodega, with the goal of getting plant-based foods to areas of the city where they might otherwise be harder to access. 

“Everyone, regardless of their zip code, should have the opportunity to enjoy food that is good for their bodies and good for the planet,” Eat Just founder and CEO Josh Tetrick said in a statement emailed to The Spoon. “Growing up in the South, eating meals that were convenient and cheap but bad for my health, is what motivated me to start a company that could help bring meaningful change to the food system.” 

Plantega will include offerings from Eat Just as well as Beyond Meat, No Evil Foods, Miyoko’s Creamery, Good Catch, and several others. Goods are available now in Brooklyn at the Don Polo Meat Market and Gourmet Deli, as well as at My Deli Gourmet & Grill in the Bronx. 

Eat Just said it that the success of these initial locations will depend on whether the Plantega project expands to locations in the future, in both NYC and beyond. 

Crackd to Launch Its Plant-Based Egg in the U.K.

Plant-based egg brand Crackd will soon launch its 100 percent vegan liquid egg replacement at stores in the U.K., according to Green Queen Media. The company’s product, called Crackd The No-Egg Egg, will be available at select retailers in December.

Crackd uses cold-pressed pea protein, nutritional yeast, and black sea salt for its signature egg product, which the company says “cooks, bakes, acts, and tastes just like an egg.” Among the items Crackd says you can create with its egg are quiches, cookies, Yorkshire pudding, and sponge cake. It can also be turned into scrambles, omelettes, and other traditional egg dishes, though Crackd says on its FAQ page that it takes about 15 minutes longer to cook than a regular chicken egg.

The company’s claims that Crackd can be used in a variety of cooking scenarios are big, since eggs have 22 functions, some of which are difficult to mimic with a plant-based substitute. Baking, in particular, requires functionalities like binding and aeration that are hard to recreate in plant-based egg products.

We have not yet tried Crackd’s product, but I’m waiting eagerly to hear customer reactions around how the well the product translates to that wide variety of food items — and how those finished products taste. Making a sponge cake with a plant-based egg is one thing. Making a sponge cake that tastes good and doesn’t have the ol’ plant-based aftertaste is another.

Crackd joins the likes of Zero Egg, which just launched in the U.S., and Eat Just, probably the most well-known player on the plant-based egg scene right now. Interestingly, Eat Just CEO Josh Tetrick told me at SKS 2020 that his company is “about two years away” from a plant-based egg you can bake with. 

We’ll have a better idea of how Crackd stacks up to these other plays come December. Crackd The No-Egg Egg will be available at Marks & Spencer stores nationwide across the U.K., as well as at online specialty store The Vegan Kind.

Plant-Based Zero Egg To Launch On World Egg Day

Zero Egg will launch its plant-based egg powder alternative in the U.S. on October 9th, which, fittingly, is World Egg Day.

To celebrate the launch, Zero Egg invited me to join a virtual Zoom brunch and taste test products made with its plant-based egg replacement. It was certainly the highlight of my week to be shipped a large box filled with vegan brunch items; the delivery included muffins, a breakfast sandwich, cookies, caesar dressing, prosecco, OJ, and a sample of its flagship egg powder product.

The Zoom brunch included members of Zero Egg like co-founder and CEO, and Executive Chef, Mario Rodriguez, who explained how to use the Zero Egg products. Even though the breakfast sandwich sent to me came frozen, I was impressed that after warming up, the egg patty in the sandwich was fluffy and had the proper texture of a real egg.

The actual product that Zero Egg will be selling to foodservice operators and food manufacturers is a plant-based egg powder made mainly out of soy protein isolate and pea flour. The powder comes in two forms; EGG Basics as a direct replacement for scrambles or omelets, and BAKE Basics for specialty baking.

The company faces competition from Just Egg, which has been rapidly expanding this year. Just Egg has established itself with consumers through its plant-based liquid egg and frozen folded egg patties made from mung beans and has plans for international expansion. Zero Egg has partnered with Gordon Food Service for distribution to foodservice operators and food manufacturers, but will soon expand its offerings to directly target consumers.

Zero Egg has already partnered with several restaurants and bakeries in Israel, where the company was founded. Next year the company plans to launch a consumer version of the product at the retail level, as well as a plant-based egg patty sometime in the future. The company has raised an undisclosed amount of funding led by Unovis Asset Management-New Crop Capital, Strauss Group-The Kitchen Hub, and Valor Siren Ventures.

Video: 50 Million Plant-Based Eggs Later, Eat Just Keeps Innovating

Between massive disruptions to the supply chain and growing evidence of COVID-19’s zoonotic origins, it’s little wonder that both demand for and investment in plant-based protein choices has escalated to previously unseen heights in the last several months.

Helping lead the charge and change in the way we humans get our proteins is Eat Just, a San Francisco-based company whose plant-based egg product is on store shelves everywhere between Whole Foods and Costco. The company now has its sights set on international expansion and, more importantly, on further helping us humans understand the negative impacts of our over-reliance on animal proteins. Those impacts include (and are definitely not limited to) further harm to the planet and the likelihood that COVID-19 won’t be the last pandemic we see.  

“There’s a collision that’s happening between human beings and animals and that collision is causing a spillover that is increasing the risk profile of our food systems,” Eat Just founder and CEO Josh Tetrick explained to me over a Zoom chat recently.

Eat Just was one of the early innovators in the new generation of plant-based food and one of the only companies with plans for both plant-based and cultured protein products. Given all that, I wanted to get Tetrick’s take on the current state of the market and how things are changing as the pandemic situation plays out.

Watch the video below to see our full conversation, where we discuss:

  • The versatility of the egg and how we can replicate it using plant-based alternatives
  • How the pandemic is changing the way consumers think about not just the foods they eat but where those foods come from
  • The recent United Nations report that outlines how our increasing demand for animal protein is the number one driver of zoonotic diseases
  • How plant-based protein companies can work alongside — not replace — established CPGs and other food industry players to spark change in the way we eat