You can't live off of oat milk
The Business of Food
by Jennifer Barney
You can't live off of oat milk
3-min read
Everyone is going gaga over oats as an alternative dairy ingredient. People think all alternative dairy (oat, almond, hemp) are healthier substitutes for cows milk.
Therefore, the market is flush with plant-based protein options.
But not all proteins are created equal.
While there’s tons of interest in protein innovation, there is confusion among consumers and industry professionals about the quality of proteins and the amount of water it takes to “make” different types of protein.
Last week I talked about how much water it takes to make 1 gram of protein from various popular protein sources. With the focus on health and sustainability, food manufacturers and brands will need to put into greater context the balance between what is most nutritious for the body and least impactful for the planet. Brands catering to sustainably conscious consumers have a difficult time because there is not a great deal of information widely available about protein quality values for all the different and newer alternative protein foods.
Complete proteins
Protein quality is measured in the U.S. by PDCAAS, or protein digestibility-corrected amino acid score. It is a measure of the nine essential amino acids in a protein (of which plant proteins contain at least some), and the ability of humans to digest them. Animal proteins are “complete” proteins - the most bioavailable and have the highest PDCAAS scores.
You can't live off of oat milk
There was some news a few years back about a severely malnourished baby having been fed only almond milk. Almonds, one of the more popular plant-based protein sources by themselves are not a complete protein, and neither are oats. Some plant proteins like soy and peas are complete proteins. Recently pistachios earned the designation of complete protein.
But most plant proteins are incomplete proteins – although some can be complementary in amino acid profiles – like chickpeas and almonds together – and can provide adequate amounts to make a complete protein. Therefore, it is entirely possible to obtain an adequate amount of protein from an exclusively plant-based diet (for adults), but what to eat is not necessarily intuitive and requires a varied diet.
Water considerations
Water is farming’s most valuable resource and is a hot topic in California where most of the country’s food is grown. We literally cannot feed the world if California runs out of water, and we are in a severe drought. Raising animals for food is thought to be more resource intensive than growing plant proteins. When it comes to water, this isn’t necessarily the case when you consider the quality of proteins.
Check out the droplets in the graph below to compare gallons of water to make 1 gram of protein. Then, look at their PDCAAS ranking.
Food manufacturers and brands will have to answer to the protein quality and sustainability question sooner rather than later. Ripple brand (pea milk) has published their water impact and is marketing their product as “the same protein as dairy”. Smart.
How does your protein innovation stack up?
All my best,
Jennifer
NEWS
Droughts over the last 20 years- Animated map. Check out California 2017, 2019. Where'd the water go? - Visual Capitalist
If you're in almonds don't watch this YouTube - HBO Bill Maher
E-grocer Imperfect Foods recently announced a $95 million round of financing that will help build it's private brand portfolio - StoreBrands
Farmers struggle to break into booming carbon credit market - Reuters
Olam to buy private label spice maker Olde Thompson for $950M - Food Dive
I'd love to hear from you - get in touch at jennifer@3rdandbroadway.com