Fake It Until You Eat It
McDonald’s announces a partnership with Beyond Meat in creating a new burger called the “P.L.T.”
More stories from Jake Ilkka
Both White Castle and Burger King offer Impossible Foods plant-based menu items. When asked on how the Impossible Whopper tastes, junior Roger Lopez thinks that Impossible burgers have their taste perfected. “It takes almost exactly like a normal Whopper.”
In an attempt to entice customers, fast food companies McDonald’s, Burger King and Kentucky Fried Chicken have found their newest gimmick: plant-based meat. California based companies Beyond Meat and Impossible Foods each have found ways to genetically create food that tastes like meat while using plants, soy and milk.
Junior Roger Lopez thinks that the new menu items are a good idea, but they may cause stress on workers making the new menu items.
“They’re offering a good choice for people who do not eat meat,” Lopez said. “I think since so many restaurants are partnering with Impossible Foods and similar companies, it’s going to create a big demand for those companies to make more food.”
McDonald’s and Kentucky Fried Chicken decided to use Beyond Meat in their test locations of Ontario and Atlanta respectively. Kentucky Fried Chicken has not made any announcements on the future of Beyond Meat chicken. However, advertisements for the “P.L.T.” has garnered widespread interest from consumers. In an interview with CNBC, Edward Jones’ analyst Brian Yarbrough said McDonald’s late entry into adding plant-based burgers will lag behind their competition.
“If McDonald’s eventually launches [its burger] in the U.S., it does eat away some at Burger King’s first-mover advantage,” Yarbrough said.
Impossible Foods partnered with Burger King and White Castle to bring new burger variations to consumers. White Castle has kept its Impossible Sliders on their menu for over a year, while Burger King has its Impossible Whopper as a limited-time menu item. As each company that has released a plant-based menu item experiences success, it is unknown how many people will continue to eat these new menu items in the future.