Tastes like chicken - not Maker of Yummy Vat-Grown Fungus Sued Over "Dangerous Reactions"
Above, an article on Consumerist.com about a pending lawsuit by watchdog group Center for Science in the Public Interest (CSPI), against the manufacturers of a faux-meat product called Quorn.
CSPI exists for only one reason: to tell people not to eat things. And my, how many things! Instead of listing the foods which CSPI thinks are bad (which would take days), it should just be noted that CSPI essentially urges a low-fat, low-salt, vegetarian diet (with some fish), and no alcohol consumption. They also encourage taxing all foods & beverages which fall outside of this diet.
The curious thing about CSPI is the religious fervor with which they try to demonize enemy foods. They use the most melodramatic language possible to suggest that eating "bad" foods -- even occasionally -- will kill you. It's like fundamentalist nutrition. CSPI also relies heavily on lawsuits and press releases to call attention to the "bad" food of the week.
Their position on Quorn is similar to the war they waged against Olestra back in the 1990s. When Olestra (an uncanny calorie-free fat substitute) was originally introduced, CSPI was largely responsible for the level of panic about the additive's possible side effects. Soon enough, all of pop culture was completely convinced that Olestra gave everyone...well, you know the story. The problem is that the gastrointestinal effects of Olestra were greatly exaggerated. To get sick from eating it, you would have to eat a huge amount in a very short period of time. CSPI had a problem with Olestra simply because it was man-made, new and different. (I also suspect that they felt confounded by the notion that people would be able to eat potato chips with fewer calories and therefore less guilt). In the end, they got what they wanted - everyone was afraid of Olestra, and the product failed on the market.
(By the way -- you can still buy Olestra potato chips at the supermarket, and the FDA took off the warning label a few years ago. Turns out it wasn't really justified.)
A similar situation is happening right now with Quorn. Quorn has been available in Europe and the UK for about 30 years. It has only recently been introduced in the US. CSPI has been doing its damnedest for almost 10 years to make people hate and fear Quorn:
CSPI's Quorn Page
Above, an article on Consumerist.com about a pending lawsuit by watchdog group Center for Science in the Public Interest (CSPI), against the manufacturers of a faux-meat product called Quorn.
CSPI exists for only one reason: to tell people not to eat things. And my, how many things! Instead of listing the foods which CSPI thinks are bad (which would take days), it should just be noted that CSPI essentially urges a low-fat, low-salt, vegetarian diet (with some fish), and no alcohol consumption. They also encourage taxing all foods & beverages which fall outside of this diet.
The curious thing about CSPI is the religious fervor with which they try to demonize enemy foods. They use the most melodramatic language possible to suggest that eating "bad" foods -- even occasionally -- will kill you. It's like fundamentalist nutrition. CSPI also relies heavily on lawsuits and press releases to call attention to the "bad" food of the week.
Their position on Quorn is similar to the war they waged against Olestra back in the 1990s. When Olestra (an uncanny calorie-free fat substitute) was originally introduced, CSPI was largely responsible for the level of panic about the additive's possible side effects. Soon enough, all of pop culture was completely convinced that Olestra gave everyone...well, you know the story. The problem is that the gastrointestinal effects of Olestra were greatly exaggerated. To get sick from eating it, you would have to eat a huge amount in a very short period of time. CSPI had a problem with Olestra simply because it was man-made, new and different. (I also suspect that they felt confounded by the notion that people would be able to eat potato chips with fewer calories and therefore less guilt). In the end, they got what they wanted - everyone was afraid of Olestra, and the product failed on the market.
(By the way -- you can still buy Olestra potato chips at the supermarket, and the FDA took off the warning label a few years ago. Turns out it wasn't really justified.)
A similar situation is happening right now with Quorn. Quorn has been available in Europe and the UK for about 30 years. It has only recently been introduced in the US. CSPI has been doing its damnedest for almost 10 years to make people hate and fear Quorn:
CSPI's Quorn Page
It's pretty low, for a group that uses the word "science" in its name, to exploit people's fears and base reactions to things. It's also extremely immature. First of all, CSPI never misses an opportunity to point out that Quorn is made from a fungus, as though fungus is somehow inherently bad. They also like pointing out that the Latin name of the fungus includes the word "venomous", which is extremely misleading, because the species includes a variety of strains, some of which are not poisonous at all. This is like the authorities of 16th-century Europe who warned people that tomatoes were poisonous, because they are in the same family as deadly nightshade.
Second, the photo they use calls attention to the fact that Quorn can be made into various shapes and textures. Well, so can textured vegetable protein, another non-meat protein which is now ubiquitous in vegetarian products like fake sausages, fake chicken, fake bacon and fake turkey. I don't really like the texture of TVP products, so I doubt I would like Quorn, but it seems disingenuous to demonize one and not the other.
The "Medical Evidence" section of their Quorn site is pretty laughable. It's got one unpublished study, several peer-reviewed studies which did NOT find a strong adverse effect of Quorn, and several letters which CSPI's executive director sent to journals stating his own opinions. The few corroborative pieces of evidence are articles about a handful individuals who have allergies to Quorn - certainly not enough to justify a huge scare campaign.
The brunt of CSPI's case against Quorn is their database of customer complaints -- complaints which they solicited. As they report, "Since 2002, more than 1,400 British and American consumers have filed adverse reaction reports on a website maintained by CSPI, quorncomplaints.org."
7-8 years, 1,400 complaints. (They say "more than", but it's probably between 1,400 and 1,500, or else they would have said "more than 1,500"). That averages out to about 200 or so per year. Quorn's manufacturer reports that in that timespan, 40 million servings of Quorn have been sold in the US, and something like 500,000 servings are consumed PER DAY in the UK. It would be one thing if CSPI wanted to play the cigarette card and say that Quorn will eventually kill us all, but from what is actually happening right now, I don't think their ire is justified.
The fact of the matter is that CSPI isn't anything more than a cult of personality for its Executive Director, Michael Jacobson. I have never seen another human face connected with CSPI. He makes all their public statements and press conferences. Whenever an article mentions CSPI, only he is ever quoted. Everything he eats is OK, and everything he doesn't eat must be banished.
Second, the photo they use calls attention to the fact that Quorn can be made into various shapes and textures. Well, so can textured vegetable protein, another non-meat protein which is now ubiquitous in vegetarian products like fake sausages, fake chicken, fake bacon and fake turkey. I don't really like the texture of TVP products, so I doubt I would like Quorn, but it seems disingenuous to demonize one and not the other.
The "Medical Evidence" section of their Quorn site is pretty laughable. It's got one unpublished study, several peer-reviewed studies which did NOT find a strong adverse effect of Quorn, and several letters which CSPI's executive director sent to journals stating his own opinions. The few corroborative pieces of evidence are articles about a handful individuals who have allergies to Quorn - certainly not enough to justify a huge scare campaign.
The brunt of CSPI's case against Quorn is their database of customer complaints -- complaints which they solicited. As they report, "Since 2002, more than 1,400 British and American consumers have filed adverse reaction reports on a website maintained by CSPI, quorncomplaints.org."
7-8 years, 1,400 complaints. (They say "more than", but it's probably between 1,400 and 1,500, or else they would have said "more than 1,500"). That averages out to about 200 or so per year. Quorn's manufacturer reports that in that timespan, 40 million servings of Quorn have been sold in the US, and something like 500,000 servings are consumed PER DAY in the UK. It would be one thing if CSPI wanted to play the cigarette card and say that Quorn will eventually kill us all, but from what is actually happening right now, I don't think their ire is justified.
The fact of the matter is that CSPI isn't anything more than a cult of personality for its Executive Director, Michael Jacobson. I have never seen another human face connected with CSPI. He makes all their public statements and press conferences. Whenever an article mentions CSPI, only he is ever quoted. Everything he eats is OK, and everything he doesn't eat must be banished.
Great article on Quorn vs. CSPI. I've been enjoying Quorn for years and years - it tastes delicious, is totally natural and high protein, low sodium, low-fat, low cholesterol meat substitute. (I am NOT a vegetarian, I just like to eat all different things!)
If you are curious about why CSPI is so viscerally opposed to Quorn, you might examine the relationship between CSPI and a company called Morningstar Farms which produces a competing product.
It is sad to see a non-profit consumer protection group such as CSPI be blatantly hijacked and turn into just another corporate shill, albeit one with the ironic duty of attacking one corporation on behalf of another. sigh.