Quorn Roast

[tarannau]

It's weird just how much some people hate quorn and act superior over those who eat it. What's the big deal?

Eh? Where's anyone suggesting how much they hate Quorn on this thread?

Is this an auto response on your part?

 

[scifisam]

Er, this does sound pretty much like you hate Quorn.

Ach, for much the same reason why I wouldn't buy 3-4 prepared industrialo food products (fishfingers, pizzas, filled pancakes and the like) I suppose. Prefer to know what I'm eating to a large extent, eating as 'naturally' as possible.

And in a world filled with such a variety of vegetables, pulses and grains, it seems almost neglectful to eat a doubtful fungus produced in giant vats in an industrial estate somewhere near Hemel Hempstead.* Especially a weird fungus shaped to look, feel and taste like the most inoffensive and least likeable of battery produced meats. If anything Quorn's most like a factory farmed chicken breast, the anodyne variety used in McNuggets and friends. Each to his own, and everyone values convenience, but 3-4 times a week seems pretty high to me.

*Ok, so it may not be Hemel Hempstead, but you get the idea.

One of the reasons I like it is also that most Quorn products are gluten-free, unlike other burgers and sausages and so on.

 

[tarannau]

No it doesn't. Why would I hate a clumsy, industrially produced meat substitute fungus? It's inoffensive rather than unpleasant, a kind of replica of the most anodyne type of meat.

Quorn has its place once in a while - I've cooked and eaten it a fair few times place - but I would suggest that eating it four times a week seems excessive in some ways. I feel much the same about eating any other branded convenience product so repeatedly fwiw.

 

[cyberfairy]

Eh? You've had a people on this thread talking about using Quorn a lot, some even 3-4 times a week, one even to the extent of brainwashing her cat into eating the stuff near exclusively. That poor feline, her hunting instincts curbed in favour of preferring to source fungus protein from the frozen/chilled foods section of Tescos.


Feckless, lazy cooks lie on both sides of the veggie/omnivore fence.

My cat refuses fucking Sheba, every other cat food, hand pulverised meat, fresh salmon, crab, turkey, meat gravy-the lot-I am a veggie but do not want my cat to be as cats need meat-however she hates the stuff. I have gone to huge amounts of effort to make her eat it but no-she is a fucking freak cat so she eats cat biscuits and quorn. And bizarrely nearly a whole frittata the other day. Her hunting instincts suck. We have a small walled garden in which live a family of toads and tons of birds come down in-one year one and she has slightly touched one toad. Then got scared and ran away.
And yeah, quorn is convenient-I am busy and disorganised so do like it once a week, maybe shock, horror, even twice. Not gonna make me a saffron and halloumi stack when pissed.
Oh and quorn damn low calorie so good to have a low fat substitute to stop me reaching fatly for cheese.

 

[Epona]

I like quorn, I don't understand many of the objections on this thread, as quorn is no more a 'convenience food' than minced beef or a piece of chicken. It's a valid ingredient in its own right, it's what you do with it that counts, but honestly the food snobbery that crops up on this forum is quite frankly unbelieveable.

We're having bolognaise tonight made with quorn, which will take me a good couple of hours to put together from scratch what with all those tomatoes to deal with, and it will be bloody lush, it's one of my favourite meals. Convenience food my arse, you don't know what you're on about.

 

[cyberfairy]

I like quorn, I don't understand many of the objections on this thread, as quorn is no more a 'convenience food' than minced beef or a piece of chicken. It's a valid ingredient in its own right, it's what you do with it that counts, but honestly the food snobbery that crops up on this forum is quite frankly unbelieveable.

We're having bolognaise tonight made with quorn, which will take me a good couple of hours to put together from scratch what with all those tomatoes to deal with, and it will be bloody lush, it's one of my favourite meals. Convenience food my arse, you don't know what you're on about.

Indeed-should not have to apologise for for what you like eating. I make a mean veggie sausage hotpot stuffed full of apples, peppers, potato etc-the quorn sausages (all two of them chopped up) add an extra texture and also the whole sausage aspect.
I hate the whole veggie food should be healthy thing-I am veggie but also demand cheesy chips and cider sometimes. Reckon as a veggie, eat more than my fair share of veg every meal every day so tis nice to have the texture and texture of quorn as opposed to say aubergine. And also, cheese and huumous can be dead fatty but can be a staple veggie lunch bap so prefer quorn 'ham' and pickle for a change sometimes.

 

[Maggot]

Jesus, people go to all that trouble to make a simulation of nasty 99p fishfingers and fecking frankfurters?

I don't get this meat replacement thing. Quorn is pretty nasty - there's no way on earth it can effectively simulate a roast. You get a lump of featureless, rubbery smeg made out of a fungus and it's meant to replace a top quality joint of animal? It's a veggie option made of lose and distinct second best. It's virtually teasing yourself with something bound to be inferior.

There are so many amazing veggie options to cook that this stuff just seems surplus. I'm all for convenience once in a while, but swapping shitty meat products for imitation meat products, all from big corporations, just seems perverse to me.

I'm a veggie and I like the taste of frankfurters and cheap ham. It reminds me of the meat I used to eat before I became veggie.


I still haven't found quorn roast though. Went to another Sainsburys, Tesco and Iceland today and couldn't see any.

 

[sonik]

I'm a veggie and I like the taste of frankfurters and cheap ham. It reminds me of the meat I used to eat before I became veggie.


I still haven't found quorn roast though. Went to another Sainsburys, Tesco and Iceland today and couldn't see any.

Asda they have it for sure

 

[scifisam]

I'm a veggie and I like the taste of frankfurters and cheap ham. It reminds me of the meat I used to eat before I became veggie.


I still haven't found quorn roast though. Went to another Sainsburys, Tesco and Iceland today and couldn't see any.

Quorn roasts do seem to be hard to find, even in places which sell lots of other Quorn products.

 

[Maggot]

Asda they have it for sure

Cheers!

 

[alsoknownas]

Can I just ask again (as a fan of Quorn), is Quorn packed full of artificial flavourings or not? If so then surely I'm right to be worried about my regular intake? (dosage? ).

 

[pogofish]

No, it was hippies, I'm pretty certain it was hippies. Love & Hugs Inc., I think it was.

No, there are several stories kicking about but it was first developed as a chemical warfare agent by the Japanese military & rejected as being too bloody dangerous to actually use, decades before its "chance" discovery in the back garden of the MD of Marlow foods, who just happened to have the bioreactor technology from Porton Down on hand (in the 1950's,when it was still one of our greatest national secrets) to make an industrial food product out of it.

Of course the post-war research programme into cheapest possible mass-market food alternatives that was going-on at the time had nothing to do with it at all.

 

[pogofish]

Can I just ask again (as a fan of Quorn), is Quorn packed full of artificial flavourings or not? If so then surely I'm right to be worried about my regular intake? (dosage? ).

Absolutely - It has very little flavour of its own, so it has to be added when processed into something edible.

 

[Sadken]

No, there are several stories kicking about but it was first developed as a chemical warfare agent by the Japanese military & rejected as being too bloody dangerous to actually use, decades before its "chance" discovery in the back garden of the MD of Marlow foods, who just happened to have the bioreactor technology from Porton Down on hand (in the 1950's,when it was still one of our greatest national secrets) to make an industrial food product out of it.

Of course the post-war research programme into cheapest possible mass-market food alternatives that was going-on at the time had nothing to do with it at all.

Hahaha, that's hilarious

 

[pogofish]

Hahaha, that's hilarious

It is also quite true I'm afraid.

Links are on an earlier Quorn thread.

 

[tarannau]

No, there are several stories kicking about but it was first developed as a chemical warfare agent by the Japanese military & rejected as being too bloody dangerous to actually use, decades before its "chance" discovery in the back garden of the MD of Marlow foods, who just happened to have the bioreactor technology from Porton Down on hand (in the 1950's,when it was still one of our greatest national secrets) to make an industrial food product out of it.

Of course the post-war research programme into cheapest possible mass-market food alternatives that was going-on at the time had nothing to do with it at all.

Pogo's story sounds more than slightly alarming, but it should be noted that it's actually slightly more plausible than the 'official' story of the discovery of Quorn. You know, the one where good hearted wandering white coated scientists 'discovered a special mushroom protein growing in a field near Marlow, Buckinghamshire' and decided that, despite being closer to athlete's foot fungus than mushroom, they decided that it'd be good eating. Hmmm...

Point remains, I wouldn't recommend this stuff for regular everyday eating. It's industrially grown, full of additives and flavourings, and is about as natural as cheese strings.

 

[crustychick]

See, the thing about quorn I find, is that it’s actually quite nice. Now, it’s been a long long time since I actually ate any meat, but as far as I can tell, it has the most resemblance in terms of taste and texture to the actual meat stuff it’s attempting to replicate. The quorn roast referred to in the op is also quite tasty iirc and my sister swears by it – she calls it the quorn hog! Due to it’s amusing “lump” type shape… and you can’t deny that it’s just so versatile! Look at the vast variety of products they have managed to make – most of them successfully…

However, since it’s actually spawned by the devil, I choose not to eat it – it actually makes me feel physically nauseous thinking of all the nasty processes that have to occur before it ends up in my plate, and eventually and essentially, part of me… bleurgh. I much prefer to use nice things such as lentils and tofu, which I think do the job of “mince” and other “meat bits” in dishes which need them anyway….

 

[Epona]

Can I just ask again (as a fan of Quorn), is Quorn packed full of artificial flavourings or not? If so then surely I'm right to be worried about my regular intake? (dosage? ).

Various different quorn products will have different flavourings, but they don't tend to be artificial - the ingredients of quorn mince for example are: mycoprotein, free range egg, roasted barley. If the idea of eating mycoprotein itself doesn't scare you, then there's nothing else in there to worry about

 

[Maggot]

No, there are several stories kicking about but it was first developed as a chemical warfare agent by the Japanese military & rejected as being too bloody dangerous to actually use,

Do you seriously expect anyone to believe that?

 

[tarannau]

It's still more believable a tale than the nice folks at Astra Zeneca stumbled onto this wonderful mystery fungus in the MDs garden and immediately thought of making a range of food products out of it! Mushroom my arse.

IIRC Quorn is the pretty much the same fungus known for years as 'head blight', which can affect serious damage to some grain crops. Not just in damaging yields, but also dangerous affecting the quality of the grain - it can cause serious food poisoning, cause miscarriages and (male) fertility issues. It can create serious mycotoxins the Quorn fungus, and shouldn't be taken lightly. Production of Quorn is a really fiddly, weird process, involving harvesting the filaments of the above fungus, heat treating and rendering them harmless, and then processing into strange shapes.

I wouldn't share any confidence in Pogo's 'chemical warfare' assertion, but it's far from the bounds of credibility. This fungus or relations have the real potential to decimate a country's food crops, rendering the entire food supply toxic and causing widespread infertility. And that's just what an unimaginative, non-chemically qualified knobber like me can come up with. If I was a megalomaniac evil scientist...

As I say, it's got its place, I just wouldn't recommend eating it all that often. Quorn's unusual proteins can cause some severe reactions in a fair few people and long term there's no real research

 

[pogofish]

Maggot - Search back if you want but yes, I was as surprised as you might be by that. Turns out that umpteen Fusarium Moulds have been explored as bio/chemical warfare agents by different countries over the years. OTOH, it was around the 1920s that Japan took an intrest in the one that eventually became Quorn.

 

[pogofish]

As for Marlow/Astra-Zeneca, they have put out at least three conflicting stories about Quorn's "discovery" over the years.

 

[tarannau]

Maggot - Search back if you want but yes, I was as surprised as you might be by that. Turns out that umpteen Fusarium Moulds have been explored as bio/chemical warfare agents by different countries over the years. OTOH, it was around the 1920s that Japan took an intrest in the one that eventually became Quorn.

Fuck me Pogo, I didn't actually read the last thread, but Google suggests you may have a real point:

The fusarium fungus can produce a range of toxins that are not destroyed in the cooking process, such as vomitoxin, which as its name suggests, usually produces vomiting but not death. More lethal compounds include fumonisin, which can cause cancer and birth defects, and the very lethal chemical warfare agent fusariotoxin, more often referred to as T2 toxin.

During 2000, the U.S. Congress planned to use fusarium as a biological control agent to kill coca crops in Colombia and another fungus to kill opium poppies in Afghanista

(Source IPS News )

Plant murdering CIA-engineered Quorn bastards.

 

[pogofish]

It was the toxins/effect that caused serious lung damage that was the old object of military interest IIRC but was generally rejected as it proved too unpredictable & persistant in the environment - the risk to their own troops/territories was too high.

 

[tarannau]

Well, I must admit that I though that you were pulling our tadgers a little too hard with the chemical warfare stuff, but it's a compelling backstory to Quorn. Sure the finished product is pretty darn safe, but suddenly MRM seems somewhat natural.

Good excuse for getting off work mind - I contracted a vomitoxin allergy off Quorn last week boss. Honest, guv.

 

[pogofish]

There is actually a study or two into the toxicity/reactions to finished, sterilised Quorn kicking about. Which was why it was took so long to get food approval in the US & other countries - seems there were some very real concerns that were only toppled when major intrests got involved.

Another point to remember is that food-state Quorn processing often involves hard fats, which are pretty appaling in their own ways.

 

[alsoknownas]

Various different quorn products will have different flavourings, but they don't tend to be artificial - the ingredients of quorn mince for example are: mycoprotein, free range egg, roasted barley. If the idea of eating mycoprotein itself doesn't scare you, then there's nothing else in there to worry about

Oh. That's quite reasuring. . I'm off to do some label reading.

(I'm just ignoring all this chemical warfare stuff, all it's gonna do is put me off my dinner.)

 

[pogofish]

(I'm just ignoring all this chemical warfare stuff, all it's gonna do is put me off my dinner.)

Though tricothecene mycotoxins (produced by fungi) are members of a large group of 40 or so naturally occurring toxins produced by a species of Fusarium fungi, one of the trichothecenes implicated as a warfare agent include the T-2 toxin, first recorded as possessing a poisoning effect in Russia in 1891. The initial effects include burning sensation in the mouth, tongue, throat, esophagus and stomach, and inflammation of gastric and intestinal mucous. Vomiting, diarrhea, and abdominal pain often accompany this burning and inflammation stage. The white blood cell count begins to drop, though during this second stage the patient often feels well and is capable of normal activity for a week to several weeks. However, a transition to a third stage occurs rather suddenly when hemorrhages manifest on the skin of the trunk, arms, thighs, face, head, in the mucous membranes in the mouth, palate, tongue and tonsil areas, and in the nose, stomach and intestines. Skin discoloration becomes obvious. Death of cells begin to be experienced on the lips, fingers, nose, jaws, eyes, and in the mouth. The vast majority that reach this stage will die. Without treatment, the mortality rate approaches 100 percent. These toxic tricothecenes have been shown to affect both DNA and protein synthesis.

Enjoy!

 

[cyberfairy]

Enjoy!

Meh-can say the same thing about booze and cheesy chips and they are still fine in moderate dosage

 

[pogofish]

Think a booze & moneymaker overdose might be a tad nicer though!