In pretty much all things people do, they are driven by motivators and barriers. The motivators to do something must be greater than the barriers that makes that thing hard to do. A lot of people are worried about the environment and our planet or care about animals. However, only a handful of people are worried enough that the motivation to do concrete actions about them is big enough for them to do anything very significant. Sure, many people recycle their trash or change their lightbulbs to more efficient ones. They recycle because the society has made it easy for them that the barrier is very low. Changing a lightbulb isn’t hard or very expensive either and it comes with the additional benefit of lasting far longer than the old school ones which have also have been forbidden by the law.
Mental gap
The issue with the food industry is that change happens sometimes slowly. Majority of the people still consume loads of meat and when you are interested to try out meatless products those can be hard to find or if there are some (this, of course, depends on where you live), they don’t taste so good. So often consumers just pick the same old meat product they are used to use. There also can be a “mental gap” between meat-eater and vegan / vegetarian. Both groups can have a negative picture of each other. This divide does not help change attitudes towards more sustainable food consumption.
The challenge
So how can we address this divide? It can be done through good food products that bridge the gaps between steaks and carrots. If we can offer positive, ethical food experiences to the masses, then switching to ethical food choices becomes like the lightbulb, where you feel good about doing a small act and actually get some concrete personal benefit out of it too. The people who switch out their lightbulbs don’t feel like they’re missing out on anything compared to their previous incandescent-burning lightbulb lifestyle.
What’s the challenge then? In many people’s views, vegan or vegetarian food is bland and not satisfying. To be honest, there are lots of products out there in supermarkets that can be a bit like that. You also need to prepare these foods the right way and anyone buys the usual supermarket seitan steak is bound to be disappointed if they just open the packet and have a bite like that. You wouldn’t buy a steak either and just have a taste without preparing the meal properly.
Seitan steaks with red wine sauce.
Our offer
We have been working with seitan products for some years now and have seen many friends go through this eye-opening journey, where typically the initial attitude is a bit like “No, I’ve never had seitan before. Sure, I can try it if you insist…”. Their reaction almost every time is “Wow, this is great. Amazing, what is this stuff“. That is the kind of positive experience we’re looking for with our products. We’ve organized tastings in our house with our mostly meat-eating friends, some of them have been eating our foods longer than others. One family said the other day “I would definitely buy these seitan products in addition to the foods we already eat. In many ways, this is much better than meat.”. Another person said “I really do like this stuff, but I wouldn’t buy it because I’m just not used to this kind of products.” – but he was just starting his journey and after more positive experience like this, he would likely start including it in his food options. Another person said “I do love your seitan, but I would be hesitant to order seitan in a restaurant unless I was sure it is good.”. Again, positive experiences with the food reinforce people’s views about this kind of food. Little by little, it becomes a no-brainer and people don’t need to think that they’re missing out on anything by choosing to eat food like seitan instead of a steak. In fact, these people will be like the lightbulb pioneers and will be personally benefiting from eating more healthy too and with a product that is much more versatile than meat, with the taste built-into the steak.
Seitan Hamburger by Casa Maku. We make food you can trust.
What we do
So that’s what we’re all about. We have a new initiative where we are looking for and helping develop food products that help deliver this kind of experience. To start things off, we’re launching our own seitan products, with a very interesting seitan burger kit that comes with vegan bacon and a seitan steak kit, which combines our proven seitan recipe with a great home-made red wine sauce that makes it practically impossible to not to succeed in making a great meal.
We’re looking for like-minded people that are interested in food to help us out. Please visit http://www.casamaku.com and sign up to our newsletter to stay involved in our process. We’ll be launching a crowdfunding campaign soon and we welcome everyone to take part in helping make a positive change in the world.
