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. 2023 Sep 5;15(18):3864.
doi: 10.3390/nu15183864.

Comparison of the Declared Nutrient Content of Plant-Based Meat Substitutes and Corresponding Meat Products and Sausages in Germany

Corinna Gréa  1 , Anna Dittmann  1 , David Wolff  1 , Romy Werner  1 , Christin Turban  1 , Silvia Roser  2 , Ingrid Hoffmann  1 , Stefan Storcksdieck Genannt Bonsmann  1
Affiliations

Comparison of the Declared Nutrient Content of Plant-Based Meat Substitutes and Corresponding Meat Products and Sausages in Germany

Corinna Gréa et al. Nutrients. .

Abstract

Plant-based meat substitutes (PBMS) are becoming increasingly popular due to growing concerns about health, animal welfare, and environmental issues associated with animal-based foods. The aim of this study was to compare the declared energy and nutrient contents of PBMS with corresponding meat products and sausages available on the German market. Mandatory nutrition labelling data of 424 PBMS and 1026 meat products and sausages, surveyed in 2021 and 2020, respectively, as part of the German national monitoring of packaged food were used to test for differences in energy and nutrient contents. Principal component analysis (PCA) was used to describe characteristics in the energy and nutrient contents. The comparison showed that most of the PBMS subcategories had significantly lower contents of fat and saturated fat but higher contents of carbohydrate and sugar than corresponding meat subcategories. For salt, the only striking difference was that PBMS salamis had lower salt content than meat salamis. Overall, the PCA revealed protein as a main characteristic for most PBMS categories, with the protein content being equivalent to or, in most protein-based PBMS, even higher than in the corresponding meat products. The wide nutrient content ranges within subcategories, especially for salt, reveal the need and potential for reformulation.

Keywords: alternative protein; meat products; plant-based meat substitute; reformulation; sausages; vegetarian.

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Conflict of interest statement

The authors declare no conflict of interest.

Figures

Figure A1
Figure A1
Distribution of carbohydrate (A) and sugar (B) contents of PBMS and meat subcategories; boxplot; ● represents an extreme value.
Figure A2
Figure A2
Distribution of fat (A) and saturated fat (B) contents of PBMS and meat subcategories; boxplot; ● represents an extreme value.
Figure 1
Figure 1
Principal component analysis (PCA) biplot of the PBMS and corresponding meat products and sausages grouped among eight categories. Each point represents the considered energy and nutrient contents of one product. Arrows indicate the contribution of the energy and nutrients to the difference; sat. fat = saturated fat; carb = carbohydrate. Each ellipse represents a 95% confidence interval under normality assumption of the PCA scores. Small figures part A–D illustrate the categories extracted from the overall PCA.
Figure 2
Figure 2
Distribution of protein content of PBMS and meat subcategories; boxplot; ● represents an extreme value.
Figure 3
Figure 3
Distribution of salt content of PBMS and meat subcategories; boxplot; ● represents an extreme value.
See this image and copyright information in PMC

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