I ate Hamilton’s meat-free burgers: Here’s my verdict

2019 F1 season

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Lewis Hamilton keeps piling up the F1 silverware despite his many extra-curricular activities. Now, to go along with ‘fashion designer’ and ‘guest vocalist’, he can add ‘restaurateur’.

He has teamed up with Ryan Bish and his hospitality firm Cream Group to launch Neatburger, which opened during F1’s summer break. Following the ‘plant-based’ diet Hamilton adopted a year and a half ago, there is not a scrap of meat or dairy on the premises.

Hamilton is keen to switch more people on to the eating regime which he describes as “a life-changer”. And he believes giving punters a taste of the unreal thing is the way to do it.

“I’ve got friends who see me eating a vegan burger and they’re like ‘no, I like the real meat’,” he says, “and then I give them a piece of vegan burger and they’re like ‘oh my god, it tastes amazing’.”

Switching to plant-based food has “definitely had a really positive impact on my daily life in terms of the energy that I have,” he continues, “just the feeling that I have when I’m at work [and] my tiredness – I’m very rarely ever tired.”

So on the Wednesday between the Belgian and Italian grands prix I turn up for a taste test at Neatburger’s first location, on a side alley off the high-footfall Oxford and Regent streets in the heart of London. Even without the star allure of Hamilton, whose association is not obviously promoted in the building, a sizeable media contingent has assembled. But then, free food will do that…

Obviously I have to go with the star draw, the Neatburger itself. The hot dogs aren’t available yet, so I add a ‘This Isn’t Chicken’ burger to ensure my, ahem, ‘research’ is as thorough as it can be.

The burgers pass the first two tests: they look the part and the aroma is pure ‘burger joint’, as distinct from ‘slab of meat’. There’s burger sauce and gherkins and clear evidence of a grill being in action.

The Neatburger itself is a slim thing, buried inside its bun, salad and slick of dairy-free Trump-hued ‘cheese’. It’s produced by Beyond Meat, whose pea protein-based patties have been hyped as one of the most convincing plant-based alternatives to meat, thanks partly to the use of beetroot juice to simulate myoglobin, the liquid commonly mis-termed ‘blood’ which leeches from medium-rare beef.

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Unfortunately for me, but luckily for my shirt, the Neatburger doesn’t perform its celebrated ‘bleeding’ gimmick. I put this down to it being noticeably thinner and therefore drier than the Instagrammable examples I’ve seen online. (Though, to be fair, no smaller than the version in their publicity material, an example of which is above.)

The first bite yields a strong grill flavour and a crust with a satisfying savoury edge. It’s definitely tasty, more so when taken as a whole with its accompaniments. Pull a piece of the patty out and the texture – more mealy than meaty – is not going to fool anyone into thinking this is beef. That said, the whole genuinely reminds me of the last Big Mac I ate, back when Hamilton was dominating Formula Renault.

The poultry-free chicken burger is actually the more impressive of the two. Fashioned from a gluten-based product called seitan, it has a fibruous texture which could genuinely pass for chicken. It too is on the dry side, however.

I have to appreciate the science which has gone into this, though I can’t say either left me hankering for another. The Beyond Meat patties are also available at Honest Burger with a rather more tempting topping of smoked ‘gouda’ and chipotle ‘mayo’ (you do get through a lot of apostrophes writing about vegan food).

Hamilton’s team are hoping the mere fact the burgers are plant-based will be enough to tempt people in. That would be a gamble at any time, and now is especially tough for restaurant owners in the UK, due at least in part to the economic uncertainty arising from the purgatory of Brexit.

As with Hamilton’s other lines of interests outside F1, Neatburger is only going to be tangentially interesting to the motor sport fan. But Hamilton commands a social media army which outnumbers that of all his rivals combined, and many will undoubtedly be swayed by the champion’s encouragement to give vegan food a try.

The world is changing, and so is the world champion. A recent convert to plant-based eating, Hamilton’s arguments in favour of it rest mainly on how the diet has benefited him personally. But we all stand to gain from reducing, if not necessarily eliminating, our consumption of meat and the energy used by its production. For that alone I think Hamilton’s latest venture is one to applaud.

And I hope drivers opening restaurants becomes a trend throughout the rest of the grid. Vettel’s Spätzles, anyone?

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Keith Collantine
Lifelong motor sport fan Keith set up RaceFans in 2005 - when it was originally called F1 Fanatic. Having previously worked as a motoring...

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124 comments on “I ate Hamilton’s meat-free burgers: Here’s my verdict”

  1. So, if I get this right, your verdict is – “yup, tastes fast foody enough to have a chance, if you do fastfood in the first place”?

  2. Tried the Beyond Meat burger…. Didn’t taste at all like a real meat burger and definitely not worth its price.
    A well prepared burger from quality meat is still leagues ahead of this thing.

    1. For me that might be acceptable, as long as it tastes really good if I don’t expect it to be meat. And isn’t too salty, which a lot of the supermarket meat-mimickers tended to be, though it is improving in concert with most other things nowadays being less salty (is that the case in UK/USA/wherever too, or something Dutch/German?). I do not really eat fast food though.

      1. If i order fastfood i always ask for salt free that helps a lot!

    2. I had actually wondered.. how much did the burger cost? Seems expensive so I’m guessing at least £10…

  3. Do you think some of the minuses, a touch of dryness, lack of advertised ‘bleeding’, may a lack of experience in making them, so that might improve?

    My only personal experience so far dairy free ‘cheese’ (yep, those apostrophes!) was a product that turned out to try and mimic the flavour and texture of cheddar (I think), but I was very annoyed finding out it was mostly fat (acceptable in as far as cheesy feeling needs that, but it was a lot more than most cheeses!), and some filler, and a lot of salt, with nothing protein, which made it useless for me as I had hoped to get those from it, like I’d do with normal cheese. Sadly, I also wasn’t convinced by the flavour and texture. Now, I also don’t love molten cheddar either; but my wife does, and she too didn’t like it.

    As I may have mentioned before, since my kidney transplant early this year, I have changed my diet to be largely vegetarian, with quite a few vegan days. Cheese and yoghurt are a very pleasant additive to many salads and dishes though, and for baking I still find eggs hard to replace.

    I do like that celebrity chains, and other restaurants offer more and more vegetarian (though Berlin has had that for a while).

    1. Cashew cheese is the best cheese alternative, but it’s only an alternate be to cream cheese. All the others made from vegetable and coconut oils are horrid compared to real cheese. At least cashew cheese is good on its own merits, and super easy to make, not highly processed like vegan cheese garbage. Cashew cheese ( I prefer to call it mashed cashew) tastes great too.

      1. I tend to use a lot of humus for spreads in the last year or so. But I can see cashew spread being a good addition yeah.

        I guess it is hard to find anything that can really replace the whole of cheese in slices/chunks.

  4. I also went to Neatburger after a meeting last week… and write this brief review as a fan and supporter of Lewis;

    * Horrifically overpriced, opted for the signature burger with sweet potato fries and a water and it came to £16! They charge 50p per sauce lol.
    * Interior is ok but not a patch on for example GBK, which the prices mirror. Tables, benches and stools are a little low rent but the ambience and lighting is ok. Definitely more fast food than sit down and enjoy yourself vibes.
    * The food is ok. My burger was pretty mealy and the sweet potato fries were limp and soggy, nothing stood out.
    * The service on my burger was ok, a little long to wait but I saw 3 separate people go back to the front with either the wrong order or a problem with their food. Considering I was stood waiting for my food for around 12 minutes that doesnt bode well…

    Overall, needs work.

    I also know Ryan Bish bash mainly through his nightlife ventures which have always been of a very high standard so I’m sure it will improve on the service and ambience side of things but that pricing for what is at the moment average cuisine is excessive would stop this venture really taking off. I hear they want to open more restaurants but they clearly need to nail the formula before they start thinking of that.

    It was very busy though!

    1. Interesting RB13, that’s a useful additional bit of review. If it ever opens in Berlin, I’m inclined to check it out, though probably not in the first week then.

      1. @bosyber Yeh give it a little while, although im sure they will be improvements by the time it goes overseas. We’re the guinea pigs!

    2. Even for London £16 seems out of line for what you’re getting. That price alone would probably keep me out, but as I live in the US I won’t be tempted anyway.

    3. The only way for these plant based alternatives to become truly mainstream is price + taste.

      So far no one has accomplished both.

    4. It’s odd, but indeed meat replacements are a lot more expensive than meat itself. Smaller production runs, more expensive ingredients make the product up to 3 times as expensive.

      Perhaps that’s why it was so expensive?

  5. Scroll down to see if Racefans had brought in Gordon Ramsay to write this, apparently not, so I don’t trust the validity of what has been said

    1. maybe Toto could join on the advertising front
      “We do have a strong package for day to day hungermanagement, however we know the BigMacs are incredibly competitive in the midnight munchies sector, which is obviously always a good thing on a saturday. so hopefully we can come back stronger and have a good fight come sunday, but surely Subway will also be in the mix, Max is always very aggressive on the footlong, so we cannot take anything for granted”

      1. I can definitely see a fast food joint run by Toto with that slogan

  6. “But we all stand to gain from reducing, if not necessarily eliminating, our consumption of meat and the energy used by its production.”

    Yeah, we should reduce the energy cost of every single thing we do, be it food, paper, nil polish, computers, whatever. But reducing meat consumption? Not convinced. As an Argentinean, it’s the basis of my diet, and I’m healthy as ever. Same here in Spain.

    Saying this burger is similar to a Big Mac, which is the crappiest of meat available, doesn’t work, but if this replaces McDonald’s as the go-to fast food chain, I’m all for it. The meat these chains sell is garbage…

    1. Well reducing meat consumption is actually a good thing. Im not saying we should go vegan but these days people eat meat every single day. Your body doesn’t need that much meat. If people would eat half of the meat they are eating now, would be a huge win.

      I agree with the big mac meat being garbage lol. But this is never gonna replace that. Its like 4x more expensive lol.

    2. What you stand to gain is not healthier food but a healthier environment – meat production has a huge carbon footprint for example.

    3. Meat and dairy consumption is probably THE greatest threat to humans and our fellow animals!

    4. Big Mac meat in Australia is 100% beef. Deli hams are at most 60-70% meat , in Europe and USA as low as 20%. At least McDonald’s doesn’t add fillers to their beef.

      1. Same in New Zealand, McDonald’s use 100% local beef from contracted farms (as in cattle living in paddocks type of farm).

      2. Deli hams in the EU are certainly not as low as 20% meat though kpcart. Although I have seen things like sausages / hotdogs going as low as 30-35% meat (with about 20-30% fat), as soon as they are anywhere near ham the meat is at least some 55% (with the rest mostly water and salt) but more regularly about 70-85 and better quality up to about 95%.

        McDonalds uses 100% beef in their patties all over Europe. But that doesn’t mean it can’t be the lowest grade of beef off course. Their hamburgers are surely very far off of quality hamburgers one can get, let alone a good steak!

        1. McDonalds uses 100% beef in all their hamburgers world wide. Sure, you can get a better burger and will cost more. Good value for the money, and I’d choose a real burger from McDonalds rather than Hamilton’s fake veggie patty thing.

    5. @fer-no65 – It’s not about stopping eating meat to me. It’s more about making small changes to cut back on over-consumption.

      We (Humans) eat too much meat. We may be healthy but the planet isn’t and with a growing population, things will only get worse. If people can get used to eating meals that don’t contain meat (only once or twice a week) they’ll still be perfectly healthy but CO emissions would be significantly cut. My wife became vegetarian a year ago so I’ve had a few meat-free meals (I never would have had a meat-free meal before) and after the first few, it stopped feeling like something was missing and now I’m not bothered if there’s meat or not now. I still eat meat most nights but not every night.

    6. @fer-no65, you might have the good fortune of being in relatively good health, but the relatively high proportion of meat in the average diet of an Argentinian citizen has been identified as a contributing factor behind the abnormally high rates of colorectal cancer in Argentina.

    7. People are so selfish.

      1. Here in Brazil there’s as much land being occupied by bovines alone as it is used by agriculture + human occupation + other forms of livestock combined. It’s an extremely inefficient mean of producing protein and it’s very damaging to the environment.

  7. A recent convert to plant-free eating

    I think that should be plant-based

  8. And I hope drivers opening restaurants becomes a trend throughout the rest of the grid.

    Hulkenburger’s?

    1. @ben-n I imagine Hamilton turning up at Neatburger one day and discovering, to his horror, that next door has become a branch of Nico Rosbergers…

      1. Everything offered at Nico Rosbergers will be a little too salty…

        1. @keithcollantine – JC – enjoyed both of those!

        2. Rosberger will fiercely compete with Plantilton chain but lose out many years. But one year, the Rosberger chain will be awarded best burger of the world. And then they will stop.

      2. Good one @keithcollantine, @ben-n and JC; I would expect the Nico Rosberger to be Organic horse meat (Ein Ross is a horse in German), prepared without gas (using green energy).

      3. He should team up with Kimi to create Icebergs lettuce burgers.

        I’m partial to a Gregg’s vegan sausage roll myself, but no one beats the meat quite like Lewis

        1. Kimi should brand Iceman Finnish vodka – it would be a much greater success than these ersatz-burgers.

      4. As long as he’s not playing his Heineken advert where his acting makes me vomit a little into my mouth every time i see it then fair play.

    2. I tried a Gerhard burger once, but it kept playing jokes on me

  9. When it comes to this sort of stuff…nothing beats BOCA burgers.

  10. I don’t see the point of meat-emulating patties, seriously, and that’s coming from someone who ate quite a bit of black beans burgers before realizing the most problematic element of a burger wasn’t the meat, but the )!”/*$(“/%&! bread.

  11. How many neat burgers does Hamilton need to eat to offset the carbon footprint of his private jet?

    1. @aliced None, because he doesn’t own it anymore.

      1. Yep, he improved his carbon foor[tint, and his tax footprint ;)

        Formula GONE! Lewis Hamilton sells his £25m private jet as part of move toward greener lifestyle – after it was named in notorious Paradise Papers over £3.3m tax refund
        Lewis Hamilton has sold his £25million candy red private jet to a UK company
        The plane became notorious after appearing in the Paradise Papers
        It was owned by a British Virgin Islands company that leased it to two others
        F1 world champion got £3.3million VAT tax refund on the aircraft

    2. Less than the number you would need to eat to offset the hot air you create on this forum alone?

      1. 😂😂😂😂

  12. I must say, I’m not sure I would have tried Dominos pizza with the plant based meat alternative if I hadn’t read about the launching of neatburger on this very site. So the social media aspect is spot on, it was the novelty of it that made me choose it when I saw it on the menu.

    The pizza was fine, you could tell the little blackened balls of whatever weren’t beef, but it was tasty enough for me to want to try the other plant based meat option next time.

  13. Great website this. Everything from F1 to food !!

    1. Just wait for Jay Rayner’s new F1 column

  14. Lewis Hamilton keeps piling up the F1 silverware despite his many extra-curricular activities. Now, to go along with ‘fashion designer’ and ‘guest vocalist’, he can add ‘restaurateur’.

    You forgot ‘movie producer’, ‘voice actor’, ‘video game character’, and ‘movie extra’

    1. Movie extra-Zoolander 2? Moviestar stand in-The Martian?

    2. With his tatt Lewis would be a good spokesperson for Viagra 😐

  15. Problem is that, plant based or meat based, these burgers seem just another piece ultra-processed fried, salty and sugary junk-food, far far away from real food.

    1. This is a point that rarely gets mentioned. I have been a vegetarian for more then a decade, but i don’t eat these on a daily basis. Most if it is not healthy and the things they claim, like increased iron or vitamines are misleading. They are not in a form the body can easily convert. Not to mention the vast amounts of forest that is being destroyed to grow soja beans.

  16. If I were vegan, I’d be aiming to make the best possible vegetarian food, not stupid fake meats. So much processing goes into making these fake meat products that never taste like meat. The best meat alternative is Qorn, made in a lab super fast with fungas protein, and it has its own great taste. I have no problem with vegetarians, but vegans mimicking meat is a bad contradiction, they initially want us to avoid meat, but eating fake meat makes you think of meat.

    1. I don’t know. I like a good steak but with the population increasing at the rate it is our capacity for producing meat is becoming unsustainable.
      With the leaps being made with both lab-grown meat protein and insect-based protein I can definitely see myself becoming a non-vegan-meat-eating-non-meat-eater

    2. And what about the people who like the taste of meat and are used to it but want to make a lifestyle change? There’s a million bad product ideas out there and you’re getting worked up over this?

    3. I’ve been vegetarian for 35 years and I’m not interested in plant-based products trying to mimic the taste and texture of meat. That’s fine – I’m not the indended audience. These products are aimed at flexitarians or those who eat meat regularly.

      1. Or as mentioned, those who love meat but want to make a change. Would have thought it was obvious and a lucratively large market to tap into but I keep seeing one dimensional comments such as this everywhere.

        It’s like saying why does Diet Coke exist? Well it’s because you like the taste of sugar and want to cut it down not because you don’t like the taste of it!

    4. (Disclaimer: I’m an omnivore).

      I have to admit that I don’t like Quorn beause it tastes like heavily-diluted mushrooms to me – though it is a good thing to have on the market due to the sheer variety of shapes it’s available in. My favourite “I-can’t-believe-it’s-not-meat” products are those items that are basically compressed vegetables into the shape of meat products, that are usually then breaded. My primary school had a burger version and they also exist as fish finger shapes, both are suitable for vegans.

      I doubt I’d ever be in the area to try a Neatburger, but it was interesting to see how they are made, because now I can do a version with items I know I will like, in a style to my liking (when it comes to vegetable-based products, I prefer undercooked and liquidy enough to “well-cooked” and dry) that doesn’t require me to travel 150 miles to find it (let alone pay £3.50 more than I would to get a burger and fries combination at Silverstone). Lewis might never make a dime from me, but he probably won’t mind if it helps people eat more greens.

  17. Is this really Hamilton’s company, or is he just an investor?

  18. And I hope drivers opening restaurants becomes a trend throughout the rest of the grid.

    May be a new career for Grosjean when he loses his ride at Haas. Being a chef in his own restaurant.
    He has published a cook book a couple of years back.

    1. It’s actually an ok cookbook as far as they go

  19. I ate Hamilton’s meat-free burgers

    Didn’t he mind?

  20. Hmm, with Hamilton having so many extra curricular activities, how about a RaceFan’s series with detailed looks/reviews of all the other things F1 drivers do, like Villeneuve’s (infamous?) album?

    1. I’m quite certain @keithcollantine enjoys life too much to listen to that album.

      1. I like his second album more, the song with Alsonso guest starring:
        https://youtu.be/dQw4w9WgXcQ

  21. If we are not supposed to eat animals why are they made of meat?

      1. Amen. If we were not meant to burn coal and oil, why is it in the ground? :-)

    1. Championships won by meat-eating Hamilton – 4
      Championships won by Vegan Hamilton – 1

    2. Because plants eat plants and all animals made of meat are eating meat, seems reasonable.

  22. For those of you in France who happen to work in la Defense near Paris, I was pleasantly surprised by bioburger. It’s a burger joint where everything is organic. They have meat options but also allow to have a vegetable steak instead. And I was surprised to actually like it and find it a worthy alternative. I could live with it. Plus it’s cheaper than Hamilton’s chain.

  23. If you shred cardboard and add enough salt to it *poof* you have the Beyond meat burger. Millennials will eat anything they view on Instagram .

  24. The Mediterranean diet is based on variety and this have to go with the seasonal food. Too much meat (everyday) it’s not good for the planet. Better have a good quality one, two times a week, and then get your protein from fish, beans, eggs, cheese, soy, lentils, tofu, etc.

  25. you do get through a lot of apostrophes writing about vegan food

    LOL :)

  26. “…the economic uncertainty arising from the purgatory of Brexit” – please keep Westminster politics out of this. The democratic vote of the UK to leave the EU should be respected. The undemocratic efforts of the Westminster ‘elite’ to keep the UK in the EU should be condemned.

    1. Yes, UK folks, please leave, been long enough, bye, bye.

      1. We are, and getting rid of the elites who ran our country and giving it to the common man-Alexander Boris de Pfeffel Johnson and Jacob Rees Mogg, obviously both Eton and Oxford. :)

    2. @gnosticbrian As I always have, I will continue to cover any political angle here I choose to. In the case of Brexit (which has already been covered here many times before) the only point I made here is that it’s contributed to economic uncertainty, which is undeniable, as is the fact it has negative consequences for businesses such as this.

      Your points do not relate to any of that, and they sum up why I don’t agree with leave supporters. The efforts to deliver Brexit have failed because the fantasy which was promised to leave voters three years could never match up to reality. Now those who were promised a fantastic deal are being told they actually voted for no deal at all. That’s not democracy, that’s a bait-and-switch scam. Denying what people were promised at the referendum disrespects those who voted leave. No wonder poll after poll shows the country has since swung in favour of remaining. No true democracy would deny the people that right to change their mind, yet I don’t see the current prime minister hurrying to put his ‘no deal’ option to a vote and see it go down in flames.

      None of that it relevant to the above, however, and I mention it only because you brought it up.

      1. “the fantasy which was promised to leave voters” – really?

        If you are referncing the £350m on the bus; the official OBR figures for 2016 are:
        Total gross contributions £23.148 billion (£445m a week)
        Gross contributions less rebate £17.865 bn (£343 m a week)

        Before the referendum we were told that if the UK voted ‘Leave’:

        1. European Council President Donald Tusk, said western political civilisation would be destroyed;
        2. David Cameron told us that World War 3 would be upon us if Brexit occurred;
        3.George Osborne predicted tax rises and spending cuts would be implemented;
        4. There would be an immediate recession if we voted leave;
        5. 3 million people in the UK will lose their jobs if we voted leave;

        Politicians, of all stamps, are prefessional liars. That is why I took issue with you bring Brexit into the debate on Hamilton’s new food venture.

        1. Gross != Net

          And no.. he’s not referencing the bus “promise”. He clearly wrote:

          “Now those who were promised a fantastic deal are being told they actually voted for no deal at all.
          That’s not democracy, that’s a bait-and-switch scam.” The next line after your quote.

          Whataboutism and rage posting doesn’t help a complex discussion.

        2. I’m not British so maybe I shouldn’t intervene, but my experience is that Keith is right. I have sat in boardrooms in Paris where investments in new offices in London have been switched to Germany because of uncertainty. And the prospect of no deal will certainly not change that (except maybe afterwards, when you become a tax haven with little to no employee protection, which I guess is your unelected leaders’ plan. Will probably work too)

      2. Stop Using Logic Keith. We all know that’s not allowed.

  27. Any one here a fan of Halal slaughter? Seems to be underrated.

  28. I had a seitan burger a few weeks ago, it was awful! Bean burgers with a massive mushroom on top are still the best alternative. I eat more fish than anything though these days, I think that’s meant to be more ethical as fish do not have a soul. Errr, I think.

  29. Eat meat, drink milk, stay normal!

  30. I look forward to Toto’s blend of Africa-meets-Eastern Europe cuisine “Hungary Like the Wolf”

  31. While I appreciate Hamilton’s desire to offer vegan fast food, have a little trickle of disappointment he didn’t pour his energies into vegan water as well.

    1. His new pal Will Smith’s son already beat him to it :D

  32. I haven’t eaten Beyond Meat myself, but from everything I’ve read from people I trust, it’s waaay overly salty, mealy, and generally not great. They’d be better off getting Impossible Meat, which is genuinely shockingly meat like given that it uses real heme, the main part of hemoglobin in blood, it’s funny that Beyond market themselves as the meat substitute that “bleeds,” when their competitor literally is that. Beyond Meat may be fine for vegetarians or vegans, but if they want to appeal to meat eaters, which is what will have the biggest carbon offset, they should get Impossible. I finally had an Impossible Whopper at Burger King last weekend, and was really stunned at how great it was. It was difficult to tell that it wasn’t meat, and in any case it was delicious in its own right. The texture was nearly perfect. I can’t wait until Impossible is available in stores to cook with at home, I’ll definitely be using it anywhere I would’ve used ground beef.

    1. Impossible isn’t available in the UK.

      Beyond Meat is.

      I’d love them to cross over the pond though.

  33. This is a top story?

    What next? What you thought about his new fashion line?

    Enough of this. We get were your loyalty lies, but this is just gushing.

    1. Pictures of Keith and Dieter in Hamilton fashion. Yes, please.

    2. Thank you for adding to the 75 comments and counting. You know it makes sense.

  34. No wonder he was sick a few races ago. Stop imitating Meat and the taste of meat and the smell of meat and the texture of meat if Meat is not suitable for human consumption. Just eat a cucumber burger or a carrot burger instead.

  35. I have to wonder which would be better for you (or the least bad?), a 100% ground beef patti, or the processed neatburger patti? Environmental considerations aside, I’d put my money on the beef.

  36. Ridiculous. One more political post. Which was the point isn’t it?

    1. No, it’s a post about a F1 driver’s side-venture, which is perfectly legitimate for a site primarily about F1.

    2. I’m astounded by the previous post taking ombrage at a sentence reminding the impact brexit uncertainty has on business in the UK, another saying thinking about the impact of our consumption on the planet is left wing policy and you associating an article on an f1 driver business venture as political. How easily can one be triggered really ? I must be missing parts of the debates going on in the UK.

  37. Why is this an article?
    Other drivers have opened cafe’s and resturants in the past and there hasnt been an article on it?
    Sick of everyone pushing their left wing agenda in all aspects of life. Lewis Hamilton, has seen the $$ to be made by people jumping on this bandwagon and good on him for pursuing that idea. But to suggest that we are all wrong by eating meat is absurd, its like trying to convince a muslim that chrsitianity is right and vice versa. Each to their own, but as always there are two sides to every story and is there any mention of the impact on the environment about these processed fake meats? Our ancestors most definately did not eat these foods to survive for thousands of years, and we dont know the long term effects of them.

    1. Promoting a better diet based on something we know has a lesser carbon isn’t exactly a left wing view. However, it remains to be seen that something like this is actually better for us as they are highly processed, and processed foods no matter where they come from are not good for us as something natural, it’s a fact. As others have said, a fish, vegetable and bean based diet is probably as good as you’re going to get without wrecking the planet.

    2. Presumably none of the team has been to any of the other driver’s culinary ventures.

    3. There are twos ides to each story, but not when you’re dealing with facts. Then there’s just knowledge and degrees of uncertainty.

  38. Vettel’s Spätzles, anyone?

    @dieterrencken I think I’d be more interested in some Vesvet Frikandels

  39. This is just sad…

  40. Less articles like these please! First it was
    Dieter complaining about his commute to the circuits, now complaints about free food.

    MORE F1, LESS FILLER! No news posts on a slow f1 news day is ok!

    1. I think some people are taking this all a little too seriously/literally. It’s a decent article and does offer some relevance because of the Hamilton connection, and I personally would much rather see a filler such as this (meat-free or not!) than nothing at all.

  41. Yeah, I tried to buy some of these organic vege burgers from my local supermarket, kinda made feel a bit nauseated after eating it.

    I’m not a big meat eater, can’t even remember the last time I ate a burger…but yeah, a vegetarian diet is probably the best way to go, I certainly feel a lot better just eating veges.

    …but the one thing that is non negotiable is dairy products…thou shalt not take my milk, cheese and yogurt away!

  42. This article reminds me some part of Wayne’s World movie ….

  43. More like Soylent Green ?

  44. Amusing how a burger review on an f1 site has more comments than any of the last 20+ F1 / motor sport pages :D It is even one of the more recent posts. Are burgers more interesting than F1 to many here or something or more worth talking about?

    1. Ask any F1 forum, Liberty, broadcaster, national newspaper, etc. The answers the same-its interesting because its Hamilton.

    2. When was the last time any of us saw a burger review on a F1 site? Novelty has a lot to do with it ;)

  45. I’ve had a Beyond Burger at a local Cafe Restaurant and they’re excellent.

    Interesting that NeatBurger opted to go with a thinner version as the big “Quarter Pounder” style versions are juicy (Thanks to the beetroot) and thoroughly delicious.

    I’m a meat eater but I’d eat these any day of the week. For those who opt for a Vegetarian or Vegan diet, they’re great and goes to put paid to the myth that veggie food is all “rabbit food”.

    I wish Hamilton and his business partners success in this venture but the vegan market is hotting up, so they’ll be facing stiff competition from the likes of *checks notes* Gregg’s?!

    1. Nice sales pitch

  46. This kind of article is what the site needed to improve the quality of the comments, well done. Appreciate your effort @keithcollantine but a little underestimation of the consequences here.

    Now why don’t you throw a Linux vs Windows debate in the mix just to spice up the things?

  47. My thoughts.

    1) Each to their own etc, but I don’t think that vegan cuisine should be adopted by the masses. Over time that will make a heck of a lot of people poorly, from lack of essential nutrients etc that a meat based diet provides. In particular the brain will not have gained all is required to be healthy as older age approaches. We are meat eaters, and we have not evolved to eat a solely plant based diet.

    2) A subsititute is just that. It’s not going to be as pleasant as “the real thing”.

    3) This is clearly a marketing move on Hamilton’s part (which is fine) but I wouldnt be surprised if he either currently sneaks in meat in his diet, or, will reintroduce after he retires (again you’d never know would you).

    4) What happens to all of the animals that provide us with our meat intake? Do they get mass culled as not “required”? Do they become extinct?

    5) It’s not meat intake that is in need of reduction to help the planet, it’s things like reduced use of plastics in general, more efficient supply chains, better health care, and people being more aware of their impact on society and the planet that are important. Remember, we are just a mere blip in our planets’ existinal timeline. We will be long gone and our planet will exist way beyond the time where all of the human produced waste has broken down over the passage of time.

    1. I am not a vegetarian or vegan but I don’t eat much meat at all, and I’m sorry but most of your points are just not true.

      1) Each to their own etc, but I don’t think that vegan cuisine should be adopted by the masses. Over time that will make a heck of a lot of people poorly, from lack of essential nutrients etc that a meat based diet provides. In particular the brain will not have gained all is required to be healthy as older age approaches. We are meat eaters, and we have not evolved to eat a solely plant based diet.

      Everything needed can be gained from a meat-free diet it’s a fact, I’m not sure where you got the idea that ones brain will suffer in older age.

      4) What happens to all of the animals that provide us with our meat intake? Do they get mass culled as not “required”? Do they become extinct?

      Of course not, the animals just don’t get born in the first place and of course they don’t become extinct.

      5) It’s not meat intake that is in need of reduction to help the planet, it’s things like reduced use of plastics in general, more efficient supply chains, better health care, and people being more aware of their impact on society and the planet that are important.

      Sorry this is just not true, meat production has a MASSIVE impact on the planet. Like I said I’m not a vegetarian or vegan and I’m not trying to ‘preach’, but…

      More than a third of all raw materials and fossil fuels consumed in the United States are used in animal production.

      The production of one calorie of animal protein requires more than ten times the fossil fuel input as a calorie of plant protein.

      Producing a single burger uses enough fuel to drive 20 miles and causes the loss of five times its weight in topsoil.

      Nearly half of all the water used in the United States goes to raising animals for food. It takes more than 2,400 gallons of water to produce 1 pound of meat and only 25 gallons to produce one pound of wheat.

      To produce a day’s food for one meat-eater takes over 4,000 gallons; for a lacto-ovo vegetarian, only 1200 gallons; for a vegan, only 300 gallons.

      Animals raised for food produce approximately 130 times as much excrement as the entire human population and animal farms pollute our waterways more than all other industrial sources combined. Run-offs of animal waste, pesticides, chemicals, fertilizers, hormones and antibiotics are contributing to dead zones in coastal areas, degradation of coral reef and health problems.

      Raising animals for food (including land used for grazing and land used to grow feed crops) now uses a staggering 30% of the Earth’s land mass.

      Seven football fields’ worth of land is bulldozed every minute to create more room for farmed animals and the crops that feed them.

      Of all the agricultural land in the U.S., 80% is used to raise animals for food and grow grain to feed them—that’s almost half the total land mass of the lower 48 states (“Major Uses of Land in the United States” by Marlow Vesterby and Kenneth S. Krupa)
      Air

      The massive amounts of excrement produced by livestock farms emit toxic gases such as hydrogen sulfide and ammonia into the air. Roughly 80% of ammonia emissions in the U.S. come from animal waste. When the cesspools holding tons of urine and feces get full, factory farms will frequently get around water pollution limits by spraying liquid manure into the air, creating mists that are carried away by the wind.
      Air pollutants generated by animal farms can cause respiratory illness, lung inflammation, and increase vulnerability to respiratory diseases, such as asthma. Emissions of reactive organics and ammonia from animal farming can play a role in the formation of ozone (smog) and air pollution.

      In the U.S., 70% of the grain grown is fed to animals. It takes up to 16 pounds of grain to produce just 1 pound of meat.

      The world’s cattle alone consume a quantity of food equal to the caloric needs of 8.7 billion people—more than the entire human population on Earth.

      Animal agriculture is responsible for 18% of the total release of greenhouse gases world-wide (this is more than all the cars, trucks, planes, and ships in the world combined). Livestock account for an estimated 9% of global CO2 (Carbon Dioxide) emissions, estimated 35-40% of global CH4 (Methane) emissions and 65% of NO2 (Nitrous Oxide) emissions.

      By replacing your “regular car” with a Toyota Prius the average person can prevent the emission of about 1 tonne of CO2 into the atmosphere, By replacing an omnivorous diet with a vegan diet the average person can prevent the emission of about 1.5 tonnes of CO2 into the atmosphere.

      This is U.S. based statistics but the same can be applied to anywhere in the world (but of course with differing percentages etc)

      Makes interesting reading IMO.

  48. Beef burger ingredients: beef

    Beyond Burger ingredients: water, pea protein isolate, expeller-pressed canola oil, refined coconut oil, contains 2% or less of the following: cellulose from bamboo, methylcellulose, potato starch, natural flavor, maltodextrin, yeast extract, salt, sunflower oil, vegetable glycerin, dried yeast, gum Arabic, citrus extract (to protect quality), ascorbic acid (to maintain color), beet juice extract (for color), acetic acid, succinic acid, modified food starch, annatto (for color).

  49. Make sure if you grill up a Beyond Meat burger you top it off with a slice of individually wrapped processed “cheese” on a chain store bun (the ones that seem to stay “fresh” for a couple of weeks), so you get the full processed food “what the hell did I eat and why does it feel like there’s a brick inside me?” feeling an hour or so later.

  50. A Burger without meat is like a non petrol car!

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