This isn’t a usual Bitten post. Well, it is in that it involves food but it doesn’t involve food that’s in Oxford – but it might be one day.

One half of Bitten is currently in California for a work conference (I know, right!?!) and gets to eat out at least once a day so there’s a lot of pre-planning on where to eat. Sadly avocados have only made one appearance so far – in a cheese burger but given that even McDonalds put the green superfood in their burgers this could increase very quickly.

Somewhere that hadn’t registered on the Foodie Wishlist was Umami Burger – a small chain of burger restaurants. A Facebook friend posted a photo of a friend about to dive into a big, dirty burger known as the Impossible Burger  and I instantly registered that as a challenge! A look on their website told me more about the burger that looks like beef, feels like beef, smells like beef, tastes like beef but isn’t beef. Nor is it some weird kind of bean burger. It’s an engineered burger made from plants. Yep, a beefy burger that is made from wheat, potatoes, coconut oil and something called heme that apparently makes meat meaty. According to Impossible Foods who designed this:

Because we use 0% cows, the Impossible Burger uses a fraction of the Earth’s natural resources. Compared to cows, the Impossible Burger uses 95% less land, 74% less water, and creates 87% less greenhouse gas emissions. And it’s 100% free of hormones, antibiotics, and artificial ingredients.

A beef burger that isn’t made of beef, but will still please a carnivore? Hmmm. And yet…… It kind of did. The bun is fabulous, there’s crispy lettuce, proper tomato, loads of pickle, dripping cheese and two planty patties.

Did it smell like a proper burger? Yes.

Did it taste like a proper burger? Yes.

Did it feel like a proper burger? Well… almost. I like my burgers pretty well done on the outside so you get that contrast of almost crispy exterior before a hot juicy interior. This didn’t have that, the two thin patties were pretty mushy and the same texture throughout which was somewhat disappointing. I ate some of the “meat” on its own and it genuinely tasted like beef – had the texture been more varied I would have been hard put to tell the difference. I’m pretty sure if you served this up to a full on meat eater without telling them, they wouldn’t know any different.

We also had French fries with a truffle cheese fondue on top which were sublime, spicy edamame and an additional order of Japanese chicken wings.

So be prepared for plant based food to be coming your way in the not so far future and be prepared to actually like it.