TWO ALL-BEEF PATTIES V TWO NO-BEEF FATTIES
Vegan burger patties can have more saturated fat than couple of Big Macs
VEGAN burgers can contain more saturated fat than two Big Macs, a Daily Mirror probe has found.
More shops and high-street chains are offering 100% plant burgers to cater to the growing numbers going meat-free.
But many vegan patties are laden with coconut oil rich in saturated fat.
And some contain more than a teaspoon of sugar, which could come as a shock to the one-in-three of the UK’s 500,000 vegans who told a recent YouGov survey they follow the diet for health reasons.
Dietician Helen Bond said: “Wellplanned plant-based diets can be nutritious and healthy. However, don’t think all plant-based foods are healthy – or that all meat burgers are higher in fat and saturated fat than vegan ones.
TRENDY
“Ingredients such as trendy coconut oil, which is 87% saturated fat, are used to glue the burger mixture together.”
The Moving Mountains B12 burger, sold at Marston’s pubs and other outlets, has 20g saturated fat in a standard raw patty.
That is the entire recommended daily limit of saturated fat for women, and twothirds of the 30g for men. There is 9.5g in a whole Big Mac, including the bun.
Aldi’s vegan burger from The Meat Free Butcher has 15g saturated fat in a patty.
Beyond Burger, sold at Tesco and chains including All Bar One, has 5g saturated fat.
Iceland’s No Bull vegan burger contains just 1.6g saturated fat but 5.8g of sugar.
The vegan burgers’ fat content is for the raw patties. Some will be lost in cooking.
Simeon Van der Molen, of Moving Mountains, said: “The saturated fat in our burger is from natural coconut oil, which contains zero trans-fat, zero cholesterol and is rich in antioxidants unlike the saturated fat in beef burgers.” Aldi said: “Nutritional info is displayed on the packaging to enable customers to make informed choices.”