Having stocked up and reviewed Beyond Sausage previously, I was excited to see Beyond Meat Cookout Classic burgers on sale at the Grocery Outlet, recently. This is a 10-pack of their burgers on sale for $7.99, compared to a normal price of around $17. This was a limited release from Beyond Meat and they are no longer in stock on the company website, so at this point availability is probably very limited.
The Grocery Outlet is also currently selling Impossible Burgers at a steep discount, so it’s a good time to try out these two products and compare them. That’s exactly what I did, and I would summarize the comparison as follows:
- As a vegetarian, I prefer the Beyond Meat burgers to the Impossible Burger, simply because the Impossible Burger tastes too meaty to me and I prefer the more nuanced flavor of these Beyond Meat burgers.
- Conversely, if you are used to eating meat then you may prefer the Impossible Burger – but I’d recommend trying both.
- In both cases I add a lot of dried dill and organic ketchup, along with tomato, napa cabbage, etc., to my burgers, particularly for the Impossible Burger, where I feel that I need to mask the overly meaty flavor.
Bottom line is that I really like the Beyond Meat Classic Cookout burgers and intend to stock up on more of them while they’re still at the Grocery Outlet. They’re also very light on packaging, but I’ll get to that later.
Beyond Meat Cookout Burgers – ingredients.
Water, Pea Protein, Expeller-Pressed Canola Oil, Refined Coconut Oil, Rice Protein, Natural Flavors, Methylcellulose, Potato Starch, Apple Extract, Pomegranate Extract, Salt, Potassium Chloride, Vinegar, Lemon Juice Concentrate, Sunflower Lecithin, Beet Juice Extract (for color), Carrot.
How to cook Beyond Meat Classic Cookout burgers
Basically you store the burgers in the freezer and take them out to thaw in advance of cooking. You can thaw them at room temperature for a few hours if cooking the same day or in the fridge overnight, where you can keep them for up to a week before cooking. I tried cooking one from frozen but it’s not recommended as you may end up with a cold or even frozen center, depending on how you cook them. So thaw and then cook in a pan (non-stick or regular) that’s pre-heated with a very thin film of olive oil – or you can omit the oil as the burgers have plenty of fat in them. I cook them as directed, for 4 minutes per side on medium-high heat and add sometimes a slice of vegan cheese to the top after flipping them (I’ll get around to reviewing that cheese someday!).
You can also take a raw burger and mix in herbs (thyme, sage, etc.) and spices (smoked paprika, mustard, etc.) and then shape the burger into breakfast sausages. The burgers are fairly large so each one can be turned into three or four breakfast sausages.
Ethical rating for Beyond Meat Classic Cookout burgers
I’ve previously written about the sustainability of Beyond Meat on The Green Stars Project, and also reviewed Beyond Sausage on this site. Overall, I think that Beyond Sausage deserves 4.5/5 Green Stars for social and environmental impact, based on these factors:
- A vegan product that avoids hardship to animals.
- A life-cycle assessment showed that Beyond Meat burger is far more sustainable than beef, cutting water use, land use, and greenhouse-gas emissions by over 90% each.
- A 2018 Oxford University study looked at various metrics such as carbon and pollution footprints and land use. Peas and other legumes had the best scores on all fronts.
- Legumes such as peas general require far less fertilizer because the plants fix their own nitrogen.
- Packaging for these 10-packs of Beyond Meat burgers is nice and minimal. There’s a cardboard box and inside is one bag containing all of the burgers – that’s not a lot of packaging for 10 burgers. You can recycle the box and, for bonus points, you could repurpose the bag for something like kitty litter disposal.
- I’d like to see corporate sustainability reports from Beyond Meat and more information on ingredient sourcing.
Summary scores (out of 5) for Beyond Meat Classic Cookout burgers:
- 4.5 gold stars for quality and value
- 4.5 green stars for social and environmental impact
If you have a different opinion, please share your rating! Until next time, stay safe and sane : )
Grocery Outlet Ethical Bargains 