Scientists invent "meat spaghetti" to trick kids

Erik says: "Here’s a spectacular idea: many kids don’t seem to enjoy eating meat, so why not change the flavor so you can’t taste the meat, give it an unappetizing color, and extrude it into spaghetti-like strands? The meat scientists who invented this stuff are hoping to bring it to market. Judging from the video the news page offers, which could give you nightmares for weeks, it’s going to be an uphill battle."

"It tastes like meat and it can look like meat but we can actually change the composition of the product quite a lot so we can mask the meaty flavour," Mike North from AgResearch says.
And with busy families demanding more convenient yet healthy foods AgResearch believes it is on to something.

Kids love spaghetti but for many parents it's hard to get them to eat meat - so the meaty, protein saturated, pasta version could be an innovative way of providing youngsters with vital nutrients and iron.

Meat spaghetti - the new food fad? (One News)

Mark Frauenfelder is the founder of Boing Boing and the editor-in-chief of MAKE and Cool Tools. Twitter: @frauenfelder. Come and hear Mark speak at the ALA conference in Chicago on July 1.

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ROSSINDETROIT

I’d have eaten that when I was a kid. I ate *anything*. Now I’m a fussy grownup and that’s just nasty. I mean really, where did they get that picture, a grade C horror movie or a science text about intestinal parasites?
FoetusNail

Young children not eating red meat, many will eat only chicken if anything, is one of the many surprising things I’ve learned in the last four years. This is not to say they love veggies either. But this idea is just too bizarre.
BadKittyM

I think my poor brain just imploded. Aside from the obvious (never knew a single kid growing up who had an aversion to meat unless it was organ meats), this just smacks of “we did it because we could.” Someone needs to remind them that just because you can, doesn’t mean you should.

I seriously doubt this product will be around for long. It’s not just a flaky idea, it’s a bad idea. If a child doesn’t *like* meat products, no big deal. There are plenty of alternatives, rather than forcing the issue via Bizarro World inventions and lying about what they are eating.

P.S. Don’t pretend liver is “steak,” either. Soon enough kids figure out that their parents are full of crap, without adding to the dooky overload unnecessarily.
Karl

Really? If they don’t want to eat meat, then don’t make them eat meat. This coming from someone that eats meat all the damn time.

Give them other types of protein to make up for it.

And maybe the problem is that you’re giving them shitty hamburger helper ground beef with the shit cooked out of it, and they aren’t eating it because it’s nasty.
Anonymous

My kids two (7 and 13) have never had a problem with eating meat. But I can think of another alternative explanation for this product. The carbohydrates in pasta. I am just over 40, and I like steak,fish etc but I also absolutely love pasta. The problem is that, as I age, pasta tends to go to my wasteline. And I exercise many times a week(gym, running).

So to get back below 200lbs I have had to add walking 2 miles everyday and severely reducing stuff like pasta.
If they can give this the consistency, texture and taste of pasta AND it is reasonably natural(no sucralose, splenda, transfats) I will buy it. And I suspect a large number of folks over 30 will buy it.
nprnncbl

Obviously, they should have made it look and taste like tofu, or perhaps seitan.

Seriously, though, as a kid I largely disliked recognizable meats (chicken, pork chops, ham, steak) but loved things that were sufficiently processed: salami, hot dogs, hamburgers (except for the congealed blood), bologna, bacon (sufficiently cripsed beyond recognition as meat), even “livermush” (which I think was the same thing as “scrapple”). Visible fat, cartilege, connective tissue, etc., were all revolting.

Anyone remember the movie “Parents”, where at the end, the grandparents finally get the kid to eat his meat?
Pipenta

Chins up campers! Fret not. These nasty syntho-worms will never sell.
Takuan

mmmm….. in vitro
http://www.usnews.com/articles/science/plants-animals/2008/07/24/what-will-we-eat-in-a-hungrier-world.html
bcsizemo

I don’t remember any kids who did not eat “meat”. I mean maybe fish (my wife doesn’t and never has). But everyone I knew ate hamburgers and chicken. Good grief I grew up eating everything from canned chicken to fillet mignon and I loved it all. About the only “meat” I don’t eat is the really cheap stuff in cans (spam, potted meat, ect..).

Don’t worry they are just prepping our children for the day when cows can only be seen at a science museum and are on the endangered species list.

Soylent red for me!
fantasmaglow

I am not a vegetarian, simply a self loathing meat eater, and this disturbs me immensely. My four year old brother refuses to eat meat and throws a fit if he sees anyone else doing so. He thinks it is terrible and mean to eat dead animals, which is strange because he hasn’t been raised in a vegetarian household.

What parent would deceive their child into eating some long dead corpse of a poor innocent animal thats gone through the playdough extruder? If your kid doesn’t want to eat meat, consider it a good thing. It is just ignorant and stupid to continue to condition your children to be carnivores, when the meat industry is such a detriment to the environment, not to mention meat is terrible for your health. There are many other sources of iron and protein that don’t involve death.
coldspell

It’s people! Meat spaghetti is people!
magic whiskey

Growing up I always hated meat and salads. I was always a fan of Asian and Italian noodles and rice.
Most meat was far too tough for me to like. I did like chuck roast though (fall-apart meat I used to call it.) I also was crazy into Pudding Pops.

I still wouldn’t want to try meat noodles. Just the words look terrible.
Tony Moore

i guess i’m in the minority of apes who doesn’t pretend they’re something new. For all my endeavoring to humanity’s higher goals in art and science, i do not deny that i constantly think about procreation (at least “practicing,” anyway) and the good lord gave me pointy teeth and a lust for the seared flesh of my fellow creatures.

the truth is this, kids will get away with whatever you let them. i grew up in a house where the dinner table wasn’t a restaurant and you ate what was served, or you didn’t eat. But i was also introduced to a lot of things, many of which i really enjoyed as a child until i grew up and found out what they were. Nowadays, I’ll eat just about anything, and good food is one of my very few vices, which is great that my wife’s a chef.

I think by giving kids too many options, particularly at the dinner table, you ensure that they’ll grow up to want hot dogs and macaroni every night and have no appreciation for the finer things. And this business of trying to fool kids is silly. Every has to do things they’re not fond of, and teaching a kid to eat well is a good place to learn this.
LadyEssex

This is why I’m a vegetarian.
I agree: This is probably the worst ‘spaghetti’ in London.
Jenna

What. The. Hell?

1- I’m sick of whiny, picky kids. Proper discipline is essential to avoiding this. Whiny, picky kids are so because you give them the choice to be whiny and picky! (I’m not talking about the kids who don’t like mustard or similar– you can order the food without it, etc.) If you have a kid who eats only chicken nuggets and fries, you got a problem. If you have a kid who loves carrot sticks and doesn’t like meat, what the hell are you whining about??

2- God forbid you can’t make your kid eat meat!! Please, no! No beans or nuts or tofu!!!! Not eggs or milk! Not delicious things with lower ecological impact! I wish my parents HAD fed me more stuff like that!

3- I’m not a vegetarian. Dinner was a double cheeseburger with bacon and avocado. Me likey meat. I find this excuse for a meat more vile than Spam and Vienna Sausages. I’ve not been poor enough to eat those in over 20 years, do you think I really want more mystery meat??

4- The inventors should be beaten. Don’t they realize that to get the kids to eat this, the adults have to also? I ain’t eating that!!!

5- Man up. you can’t force kids to do what you want. They don’t want meat, they can eat the veggies and sides. If they don’t want it, their very intelligent bodies are telling them that they don’t need it either. If they needed it, their body would make them want it. Obviously, no malnourishment, so let it ride.

6- Kids (much like cats) haven’t overcome their physical selves by years of programming. They don’t force themselves to eat something they hate. Something makes them feel that what’s in front of them is revolting. Maybe it makes them sick. Maybe canned peas are gross and should be banned (my vote!). Try things and give your kids options without letting the brats lead you around by the short and curlys. Of course, this means that the parents have to be adventurous, too. I think that’s the greater problem. (eat this cholesterol, sodium, and fat-laden food that’s relatively unpalatable, NOW!)

7- Perhaps the kids don’t like meat because you’re serving shi*ty meat. Or cooking it to death. Or not cooking it enough. Or drowning it in gross sauces. Maybe you suck as a cook. Maybe you suck as a grocery shopper. Knowing that, maybe you shouldn’t be feeding them meat noodles. Savvy?
nikos

As a child who often cooked for himself, I loved my dead animal body parts as whole and in the case of cows and lamb as bloody as possible. The sensation of tearing through and masticating the flesh of dead land animals was near enough to ecstasy.
I don’t understand the idea of tricking children who don’t enjoy the thralldom of flesh eating into doing so. Meat spaghetti is a mindfuck.
I don’t like to eat land critters anymore for various reasons, but I’m glad that at least I got to know what I was eating – then really got to know what I was eating.
Purly

So like… yet another way to trick the poor vegetarian student that forgot to make their lunch that morning.
Anonymous

@Itsumishi
“Good luck with that. I’m sure the process of taking a natural food completely changing both the flavour, texture and shelf life (how long can meat that’s got as much surface area as pasta stay fresh?) will be a completely natural process.”

haha, fair enough, you are probably right.(I particularly like the surface area observation) Although I like to remain optimistic about such things,… until horribly disappointed. I’d point to the innovation (by a clever human somewhere) that produced “regular” pasta, tofu and bread. And even if the first “corporate” attempt is highly flawed (with nitrates and other crap) there is always the possibility that some natural food focused individual somewhere will produce a more natural variant. So while I personally avoid stuff like nitrates, sucralose, splenda, d-tagatose and unlikely stuff like that I am a big fan of sushi, capsicum, pasta, pho and wasabi all crazy innovations of the past. So I would like to see what category this stuff lands into.
IWood

Something about that makes me want to be attacked, disemboweled, and eaten by zombies.
Anonymous

I was a very picky eater as a kid when it came to meat, and my parents tried all sorts of ideas to get me to eat it. I’m now been vegetarian for 10 years, and I wish my parents had understood my early feelings.

At least offer them some fake meats, which have most of the protein but none of the fat or gristle. Talking to your kids about their feelings might be nice too.
buddy66

I’m not telling scary Great Depression stories, but when I was a child my sister and I understood that we ate what we were served or we would starve. There were NO menu options. Today I WOULD KILL THE MAN who tried to make me eat potato soup with dumplings.

Or canned peas.

Lima beans….
darngooddesign

@ #30

Get a note from your guardian and we’ll take a trip up to see her. She makes a mean beef lasagna…which under these circumstances confuses the hell out of me.

I guess this makes Chef Boyardee the top meat scientist.
MsAnon

See, this just reminds me of my childhood. I simply did not like food, or so I thought. I did not like meat, potatoes, vegetables… at least not as we ate them– over-cooked, from boxes, artifically reconstituted potatoes, mushed vegetables in sodium broth, fake margarine, “pasturized processed cheese food product”. I ate some junk food. I drank three large glasses of milk per day. I liked cheese that was real. And I was often hungry, I just couldn’t eat.

But looking back, I was seriously not nourished. Judging by the rest of my family I should be two or three inches taller.

Then I grew up and was exposed to fresh vegetables (I love spinach!) and non-artificial foods. Suddenly food is great and cooking is a passion. Vegetables–Amazing, who knew! Whole grain bread is wonderful!

The problem now is going home and, if I eat the chemical white-trash crap served, I’ll be ill. I once decided I’d make a dessert of my childhood–Jello-pudding poured into a bought piecrust, with coolwhip on top. I seriously gagged from the chemical taste.
Takuan

moodles?
Takuan

what if tissue culture meat were to be used?
FourFiveFire

#40, your logic confuses and terrifies me. Stop eating meat if you’re against it! More for me. Deeeeee-licious.
FoetusNail

moodles. Ha!
Takuan

the cuisine of televison
Joe

My 10 year old daughter decided to become a vegetarian some time ago, and has been off meat for months. I eat meat, but I’d never consider tricking her in this way. Instead, it’s her parents’ job to teach her how to eat healthy as a vegetarian and get all the protein, vitamins, and minerals that she needs.
ndollak

I’m not sure where they find these kids. I’m vegetarian due to an enzyme deficiency, but until I was about 6 I think I ate any meat Mom dished up. (By the time I was 10 or 12 I pretty much couldn’t keep down any meat, regardless of which animal it used to be.) I still get taunted or lectured or at the very least treated like a curiosity whenever anyone finds out I don’t eat meat, and nearly anyone I encounter who “sides” with me is usually a vegetarian because of some moral reason. I respect it, but I do hate when they get all preachy about it. Then again, I guess most of the people who ridicule me expect me to get all preachy as well, and it ticks them off all the more when I casually point out that I’m not interested in what people eat; I simply can no more digest meat than you could a glass of Drano, because I lack certain enzymes.

Anyway, I have yet to meet a single youngster who won’t eat meat. There may be some, but I see a very limited market for this product.

And as for tricking a kid into eating something… If the kid’s anything like me, it won’t work. Someone sold me a piece of lasagna, claiming that it was vegetarian. After completely losing that and the rest of my lunch all over the floor, I realized that I probably should have asked “Beef or chicken?” instead of “Does it have meat in it?” as some people will sacrifice their integrity to make a sale. Since I got sick within two meters of their table, though, I guess that kind of killed their sales for a while. Honesty is still the best policy.
- Antinous
  
  I’ve known a few children who wouldn’t eat meat. One couldn’t digest it and was doubled over in pain if he ate it. The others were just grossed out by it. I ate meat as a child, but we ate really good meat. I couldn’t stand anything obviously fatty. Butter curdles me, and bacon would have to be very carefully disguised. If my mother had served really fatty hamburgers instead of lean, ground sirloin, I probably would have been grossed out by it.
stygyan

I think the problem was that kids eat TOO much meat, and no veggies. Any ideas about veggies spaghetti?

By the way, my nephew is picky about eating fish. And it’s my dad’s fault. The kid was served a big sardine, and he was loving it. Until the point old grandpa said something in the lines of “Look! You’re eating Nemo!” Gonzalo started to cry and told us “i don’t want more”. Talk about infancy thraumas.
buddy66

slimy overcooked noodles
druranium

mmmmm sodium nitrate
less food crapification science
more problem solving science, please
rAMPANTiDIOCY

if kids don’t like meat, why not try a healthier, more sustainable, less cruel vegetarian or vegan diet.

nah, fuck that!
Anonymous

Or you could just make pasta with eggs and a high proportion of Amaranth flour, which has a perfect amino acid profile, no meat required, ever.
ROSSINDETROIT

The article says that they invented this ‘by accident’. Now I’m going to lose sleep wondering just what they were trying to accomplish when they stumbled on moodles.
buddy66

I never knew a kid wouldn’t eat meatâ€”unless his pregnant mother was frightened by a vegetarian.
Takuan

is this a good time for a chorus of Cows with Guns?
moonracer23

This sounds more like the meat industry being paranoid and desperate because people are eating less meat. I’m sure we’ll see increasingly crazy stuff like this if meat consumption declines.
TheKarpuk

Deceiving kids into eating red meat by convincing them it’s pasta seems almost as bizarre making ice cream resemble a hot dog because your child doesn’t like ice cream.

I think if my child swore off meat but accepted meat-pasta I would have to leave the dinner table, lock myself in my room, and quietly weep.

What I don’t get is why these guys are so proud of themselves. The food industry has been pretty direct in telling us that they can shape your favorite basic food material into anything you might want it to see. Burger King Crowns, Marvel Super Heroes, Steam Punk Boxcar Hobos, it doesn’t matter, they can make it with your meat or vegetable material of your choice.

I demand jerky action figures!
Adam Fields

Wylie Dufresne did this a few years ago – he makes shrimp pasta using transglutaminase:

http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/6915287/
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Transglutaminase
ROSSINDETROIT

This moodle experiment comes from New Zealand. My guess is there’s excess livestock production and they’re attempting to invent new uses for it. Nice try, but back to the drawing board.
ROSSINDETROIT

I’m not surprised that Meat Inc. has turned to Science to develop more ways to get kids to eat meat. Per capita meat consumption has been trending down, most strongly among those under 20. They’ve wisely decided to motivate younger consumers to develop meat eating habits early. I’m surprised by how many children I hear of who are self determined vegetarians and their parents are allowing it. Mine wouldn’t have. I’d have eaten the spaghetti with meat balls or gone hungry. I didn’t quit eating meat until 15 years ago as an adult.
A decade before that, the only vegetarian that I knew well told me the hardest part of not eating meat was all of the explanations people seemed to require. Now I know what he meant, but I would add busybodies in restaurants reading the menu for you to point out all of the non-meat, potentially modifiable and forbidden items, as though you were illiterate or a moron. I’ll order for myself, *thanks*.
neurolux

I got yer meat noodle right here!
chgoliz

Can’t talk…still trying to find my lower jaw somewhere under the desk here. =:-O

But yay for all the fellow veggies here!
WhyBother

“many kids donâ€™t seem to enjoy eating meat”

I’ll be honest with you, I’ve never heard of such a thing in my life. My fiancÃ©e has a cousin who ate nothing but toast for five years straight, but that’s about it. Is this really a widespread phenomenon? If so, either make your kids eat the meat, or let them not eat it.

(I wouldn’t call myself a carnivore…I’d say I rest comfortably at the top of my food chain. Maybe when we clone a Tyrannosaurus, I’ll reconsider.)
Itsumishi

@ #40 Fantasmaglow

“not to mention meat is terrible for your health.”

Um. No, it isn’t. Like most foods it’s actually quite beneficial providing you don’t eat too much of it. Iron, Protein, B12 and Fat.
Yes it is actually beneficial to eat some fat.

However you shouldn’t eat too much of it, you should also probably avoid nearly all processed meat as this really cuts back on the beneficial parts and replaces it with crap such as preservatives, salt, etc.

As a result of this I’d much rather give my kids a nice steak (and if they’re not little porkers I’ll keep the fat on) then any horribly processed meat spaghetti. Hell I think if kids believe that this is what meat is actually like no kids will want to eat it!

@105 – “If they can give this the consistency, texture and taste of pasta AND it is reasonably natural”

Good luck with that. I’m sure the process of taking a natural food completely changing both the flavour, texture and shelf life (how long can meat that’s got as much surface area as pasta stay fresh?) will be a completely natural process.
buddy66

HERBIE! Herbie ”got it right here” Mullins! Where you been since junior high?
Noelegy

Anecdotally speaking, I was an atypical kid. I didn’t like meat, but I did like fish, which a lot of kids don’t like unless it’s in fishstick form. I liked vegetables, because my grandmother had a huge garden and we had a steady supply of fresh fruits and veggies, so I was getting my veg in about the best form possible.

Years later, I made the decision to go vegetarian, and it was almost completely painless. My mom recalled that I had not been much of a meateater as a kid, and she actually apologized for having “forced” meat on me. But like others who’ve posted in reply to this thread, I grew up in a generation where kids ate what they were served. I remember dumping a LOT of ketchup on hamburger patties to disguise the taste.

Having said all that…this news item is simultaneously hilarious, bizarre, sad, and infuriating.

AND it makes me think of “Sweeney Todd” and that scene in “The Wall” where the kids fall into the meatgrinder and come out looking a lot like this.
uberfalafel

OK, first there is no way in hell highly processed meats – and large portions of them from the look of this – are healthy for little kids.

Second, what is this trend of trying to sneak “healthy” food to children. No wonder we have a bunch of obese kids – we’re not teaching them what to actually eat. Instead we’re sneaking some strange (probably not actually) health food via brightly colored chemical edibles that are supposed to taste like other foods? Not creating a good foundation for when your kids are choosing in the lunch line at school or, heaven forbid, when they choose their own food.
Chocolatey Shatner

ZuZu, you are my new best friend. Call me every five minutes.
The Unusual Suspect

Can I have my meat spaghetti with pasta balls?
trr

Every single comment in this thread is hilarious (well, up to the point where I stopped reading anyways). Wish I had something good to add.
GregLondon

Meat spaghetti???

just cut your bacon into strips and call it a night.
zuzu

They can’t seriously expect us to swallow that tripe.
bobsyeruncle

Apart from liver, does this really happen? No meat for me, mom, and pass the broccoli!
sammich

bwchicago @63 – you want tripe…
http://www.abc.net.au/tv/cookandchef/txt/s1755614.htm
itsgottabeodin

I don’t believe you can call pure meat pasta “convenient yet healthy”
Brett Burton

Um… Wait they got it backwards. Vegetables are good for you and kids don’t like to eat them.
jennybean42

This is not a wonderful thing.
normajean241

i HIGHLY do not agree with this type of food. why can’t this company find different types of protein for children that is better for them than actual meat? i will be boycotting this product, and several other thousand of people who care what they give their child to eat. maybe try meatless spaghetti or some fake bacon. you will boost your sales for the product if that happens. please change from meat to no meat. seriously would you eat that?
allyson moffatt
aldasin

“meat scientists”
See, there’s your problem right there.
MichaelRN

Best served with a nice glass of spang on the side.
mdhatter

“You can’t have any pudding if you don’t eat your meat!”
Anonymous

Wait, so kids like to eat tape worms?
joshhaglund

I suspect that there isn’t really much of a demand for this product. But a supply of meat requiring extrusion, colorization and flavor modification before becoming palatable (even to meat eaters), there is plenty.

I didn’t like eating meat as a child and stopped when I got old enough to be in charge of what I eat. Parents who serve this are lying to their kids. I imagine it’s rationalized with “we know what’s best for them” Still a lie.
FourFiveFire

SOYLENT SPAGHETTI IS CHARLETON HESTON!
ralphleon

I would _love_ to comment on this article, but since I’m vegan, I will restrain my self. *twitches nervously*
Takuan

chaser pics

http://www.bobblumer.com/sgdishes.html
SeamusAndrewMurphy

A bad idea whose time has come.

Now if only they can shape pizza into pasta strings.
badc0ffee

I was pretty picky about meat growing up. I used to hate the fatty ground beef and cheap, grisly stewing beef my parents bought in the early 80s. Those crappy dark meat chicken patties you can’t buy anymore were another loser. Corned beef in a can (don’t forget to pour off the slime layer!) and “sausage ends” (the poor man’s poor man’s cold cuts) were sometimes waiting for me at lunch. And to this day I’m not a fan of breakfast sausage.

Somehow I don’t think this “meat product” is much of an improvement.
Drew Blood

Like RalphLeon, I’m vegan, but this article has made me realize THIS is what I’ve been missing! Get thee behind me Seitan, I need a box of noodlemeat, stat!
oneswellfoop

Yay! Yet another extra extra processed meat product for parents that can’t stand up to their kids. I don’t have one yet, but when I take care of my nephew, he eats what I tell him to. He pitches a fit before he ever tastes it, then loves it after the first bite. Why? Because I cook him good, fresh, local food…not this crap processed stuff.
Down with the man.
dainel

Why not feed them some juicy earthworms instead? Fresh and healthy!
DeuceMojo

Awwwww, hamburgers _again_? Why can’t we have some meat-like bloated worms covered in marinara sauce??
Yamara

It’s the sacrament of the Flying Spaghetti Monster.

Stop laughing. Show some respect for other people’s faith.
mdhatter

“Yay! Yet another extra extra processed meat product for parents that can’t stand up to their kids.”

I know!!! Whatever happened to being made to sit there until you ate the offending element, or being sent to bed directly and without dessert?
soni

@14 I need a box of noodlemeat.

Dude, that just sounds…wrong.

I am, however, carefully wrapping that tasty bit of verbiage in tissue paper and putting it aside in the same box as “jigglebits” that I got from FARK the other day, to be taken out and enjoyed in a time of need.
hagbard

The noodle is a lie
Daemon

There are kids who don’t like the taste of meat?
scionofgrace

Seriously? My brothers and I have always loved hamburger, sausages, and bacon. What kind of kids are these, anyway?
darngooddesign

If vegetarians can have fake meat made from tofu, we can have fake pasta made from meat. Seems fair to me.
erissian

I wonder what course of studies one has to take in order to pursue a career in the Meat Sciences?
Tits McGee

No.
Takuan

can they form it into mock vegetable shapes instead?
ill lich

They’re going about this completely wrong– there are plenty of kids who don’t like pasta either. They need to make meat CANDY. . . hell, make vegetable candy too, then we’ve solved all our child nutrition problems.

(Wait. . . aren’t Slim Jims essentially meat candy?)
tomic

It’s un-American to not eat a lot of cows!
GregLondon

Tastes just like chicken.
arkizzle

It’s pretty funny the people who are saying “i’m a vegetarian, and this is just wrong”.

Conceptually, this is no worse than veggie burgers/sausages or TVP. Shaping food to look like other stuff is a veggie mainstay..

Veggie ribs?
Soy chicken breast?
Veggie chicken nuggets?
Meatless Beef Strips??

Meatless Beef? Haha, classic!
Seriously though, wtf is going on here? How can it be called beef or chicken anything, if it isn’t..?
arkizzle

I’m sick of whiny, picky kids. Proper discipline is essential to avoiding this. Whiny, picky kids are so because you give them the choice to be whiny and picky!

Man up. you can’t force kids to do what you want. They don’t want meat, they can eat the veggies and sides. If they don’t want it, their very intelligent bodies are telling them that they don’t need it either. If they needed it, their body would make them want it. Obviously, no malnourishment, so let it ride.

That is completely contradictory.

So which is it? Are kids picky because they lack discipline, or because their “very intelligent bodies” don’t need whatever you try feeding them? Or does this only apply to selected, meat-biased circumstances?

What about all the obese kids, who eat junk all day and no veggies? Is that “very intelligent bodies .. telling them that they don’t need” good food, or bad discipline?

Regarding your malnourishment comment: You clearly have no idea how far a troubled child can go without eating certain, needed, foods. The body is not always on our side in these matters, so I wouldn’t rely on the kids appetite to gauge their health.
BWChicago

“There’s very little meat in these gym mats”
Trent Hawkins

I tried some of those veggie substitutes from a vegan friend and they all just taste like salty burnt tofu.

I suppose that if you didn’t eat meat for 10 years you might get fooled in to thinking that it might in theory be meat like in flavor.
wangleberry

i will never understand how people can NOT like meat… allergic to delicious?
MajorD

Oh, swell idea!

Now how about making an Oreo that looks and tastes more like broccoli? And maybe a peach pie with the flavor and appearance of overcooked peas and carrots?

Or, why not some time-wasting maroons that look and act almost like real scientists? Oh, wait… they’ve already got that one. Good job, fellas!
gabu

SPEAT! SPEAT! SPEAT! SPEAT!
cory

man what the HELL

If you just need them to get some more protein, go to the store and buy dried milk powder. You can put it in lots of foods, they’ll never know it’s there, and it’s lots of instant protein.
hagbard

With meat pasta and veggie burger “meat”, all we need is a red sauce made out of wheat paste.

Oh, and a chianti made out of olive oil.
Neener

Ok, I’m a vegetarian and this is totally ridiculous.
Gilbert Wham

“I demand jerky action figures!”

I’ll second that.
Jardine

Another good source of protein: peanut butter. Too bad so many schools are banning the stuff.
RJ

Mmmm, meatnin’s.
Doug Nelson

Another attempt to treat our children like playdoh, molding them to what we want them to be instead of who they are. We teach them about baby jesus, which parts of their body are dirty, what races of people to mistrust, and who not to socialize with. So why not trick them into eating meat?
Takuan

find the most expensive Buddhist vegan/vegetarian Chinese food restaurant you can. The taste is indistinguishable.
MollyMaguire

Disgusting. Not necessarily the food itself but what it represents about our food system. We have a global food industry that has trouble bringing affordable nutrition to millions of people and then we have these “meat scientist” shills turning grain-fed, diseased, karmically-destroyed cattle into an edible food-like substance so that rich parents can overfeed their kids.
LogrusZed

When I try to get kids to eat my protein filled noodle I just get arrested, then I have to go tell my neighbors why.
The Unusual Suspect

darngooddesign, ask your mom if I can stay for dinner. Pleeeeese?
cyan

@ #11 fourfivefire: WIN! LOL!
darthdelicious

Wow. You can eat this while you’re riding your Segway and playing Virtual Boy.
jharder

Awesome. Because American kids are obviously not eating enough. What with the childhood obesity.

Maybe next they’ll invent toothpaste made of high fructose corn syrup to encourage kids to brush more.
cyan

You’re right, Takuan, they even nail the texture.
flwombat

I dunno, Tony Bourdain keeps telling me that good food comes from persistence and ingenuity in the face of limited choice of ingredients. Maybe if you locked a rural Italian cook in a house with nothing but meat noodles you’d be rewarded with meat noodle haute cuisine. Or something.

On second thought I think I’ll just go back to hounding my 5-year-old about her lack of vegetable consumption.
Spinobobot

@40: There are many other sources of iron and protein that don’t involve death.

Speaking as a former vegetarian (I abstained from meat, other than fish, for 5 whole years), I do not mean to be antagonistic or anything, but all sources of protein require killing something (plants live!) and unless you’re sucking on magnets, something’s gotta die before you can get that iron. Life feeds on life, man!

I think you meant “that don’t involve suffering” or somesuch.
Snowpea

Uhhh. Ewwww?
Ethan

Reminds me of when Heinz introduced (supposedly) kiddie-friendly green ketchup… because there’s nothing more likely to get a child to eat their recommended daily allotment of then to make it the color of spinach.
travispulley

But…

Does it have electrolytes? That’s what kids crave.
chgoliz

Think of all the skin cells we kill on a daily basis. And brain cells? Every alcoholic is a mass murderer.

English is such a fun language. Multiple meanings to so many words, just ripe for the wordplay.