this post was submitted on 04 Jun 2026
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146
Vegan Burgers Just Beat Beef in Germany’s Most Respected Consumer Test (open.substack.com)
submitted 6 days ago by Shailu45@lemmy.world to c/vegan@lemmy.ml
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[–] geneva_convenience@lemmy.ml 5 points 5 days ago (2 children)

Was it a head to head comparison? The article looks a bit out of context

[–] Ephera@lemmy.ml 13 points 5 days ago (2 children)

Generally, how these Stiftung Warentest tests work is that they a pick a product category, like here patties, then they come up with disciplines to rate them in and then they grade each product accordingly.
Some of the disciplines here were (translated by me):

  • sensory rating
  • nutritional-physiological quality
  • microbiological quality
  • user friendliness of packaging

I would assume that they did a blind taste test and all that jazz, too. It is their business model to sell the data to industry, investors etc., so if their methodology wasn't up to snuff, they'd be out of business pretty quickly.

[–] geneva_convenience@lemmy.ml 1 points 5 days ago (1 children)

The article is totally unsupported by the test then as it says it is only about taste.

[–] Ephera@lemmy.ml 10 points 5 days ago

I am very confused. Are we seeing same article? @Captain_Buddha@lemmy.world below also seemed to not see a direct quote from the article.

Here's the part of the article describing the results that I see:

The result

Vegan patties came out on top, and it wasn’t particularly close:

  1. Overall rating

    Seven out of ten plant-based patties rated “good.” Only three out of ten beef patties did.

    The three top-scoring burgers came from Aldi MyVay, Garden Gourmet, and Beyond — and they were all vegan.

    This is a dramatic reversal from the last time this test was run in 2021, when meat still held the edge. The improvement in plant-based products over just a few years has been remarkable.

  2. Fats

    Vegan patties averaged 43% less fat and 20% fewer calories than their beef counterparts — and the fat they do contain skews toward the healthy, unsaturated kind, while beef patties lean heavily on saturated fat.

  3. Taste

    Plant-based options scored better on average for seasoning, juiciness, and overall cooking results. Some beef patties, meanwhile, showed up with off-putting smells, flat flavors, and shelf-life issues.

  4. Food safety

    Antibiotic-resistant bacteria were found in 40% of the beef patties tested. One contained genuinely pathogenic bacteria. The vegan patties? Zero contaminants.

  5. Price

    The vegan patties were, on average, 20% cheaper than beef. And that’s before accounting for the massive government subsidies that artificially deflate the price of conventional meat. Without those subsidies, the gap would be even wider.

[–] ColeSloth@discuss.tchncs.de 0 points 5 days ago (1 children)

So would have completely lost in a test based on "what tastes best".

[–] Ephera@lemmy.ml 6 points 5 days ago (1 children)

There might be an issue with not everyone seeing the same article text. Here's what it says for taste:

Plant-based options scored better on average for seasoning, juiciness, and overall cooking results. Some beef patties, meanwhile, showed up with off-putting smells, flat flavors, and shelf-life issues.

The original source lists more rating categories and the source we're getting it from is biased, so maybe some taste categories with opposite results are left out here.

But it can't be too biased either, though, because the original publication from Stiftung Warentest is also titled "Vegan beats Beef" ("Vegan schlägt Rind­fleisch"). They would not write that, if it misrepresented their data.

[–] ColeSloth@discuss.tchncs.de 0 points 5 days ago (1 children)

That definitely sounds like a rigged test. Lol. "Vegan burger is better than beef... Made with rancid meat"

[–] Ephera@lemmy.ml 4 points 5 days ago

From the original source:

Wir untersuchten gekühlte Pattys am Mindest­halt­barkeits- oder Verbrauchs­datum oder bis zu zwei Tage davor, die tiefgekühlten Produkte im Laufe der Prüf­phase.

Which translates as:

We evaluated cooled patties on the Mindesthaltbarkeitsdatum (legally required at-least-good-until-date, like a shelf-life-date) or on the use-by-date, or up to two days before that. The frozen products were tested at any point throughout the evaluation phase.

If the product has started rotting at that point, that is entirely the fault of the producer, since they specify those dates.

[–] SloppilyFloss@lemmy.ml 7 points 5 days ago

You can find more information on the Stiftung Warentest site itself.