Horror of bleeding beetroot

OH the horror. Pub chain Marston’s is to put a new meatless burger on its menu. One that sizzles, smells and tastes like meat, even though it is completely plant-based.

After being impregnated with beetroot juice, it even bleeds across the plate just like meat. Let it bleed? Oh the horror.

What is it with fake meat? Why bother? Why not just eat lots of lovely vegetables instead?

Linda McCartney’s Vegetarian Sausages are made with rehydrated textured soya protein and fashioned to look like pork bangers. They are hugely popular, but it makes me feel faint just to think of them; a ghostly alien caricature of a meat product, trying hard to be something they are not. Just like this hideous lookalike and smell-a-like burger.

Look. Being vegan or vegetarian is fine. But why not eat a chickpea or a Portobello mushroom burger, instead of something which has been made to resemble the kind of dead animal product you love to hate? Answers on a meat-free postcard, please.