Veggie Burgers Made a Breakthrough in 2016

A recent feature published in media outlet Grist explored the current state of plant-based burgers. Writer Nathaniel Johnson said that while meat-free burgers have been around for decades, 2016 marked the first time a convincing facsimile of meat—the Impossible Burger—was embraced by the general public. “For the first time,” Johnson writes, “you could go to a restaurant and eat something that had never been through a slaughterhouse but tasted enough like meat to fool the unsuspecting.” This year, Impossible Foods launched its burger that bleeds—thanks to plant-based component heme—at several restaurants including New York’s Momofuku Nishi, San Francisco-based Cockscomb and Les Jardiniere restaurants, and vegan eatery Crossroads in Los Angeles. Johnson believes the humble veggie burger has experienced a breakthrough, stating, “Someday we’ll look back at 2016 as the year we realized we might be perfectly happy to give up meat.”