Spit it out - which one did Soylent fail?
Sidenote: I don't drink Soylent and have no idea if it fails the fat content. I'm in the "Soylent is not healthful" camp, if it matters.
The alternative to this being athletes. We had to carbo-load the night before a game/race/etc -- but not on the regular.
I think those caps are meant to nudge people in the direction of getting their nutrients from non-processed food sources. It's somewhat more reliable to maintain a healthy intake of nutrients by eating food versus supplementation. [1]
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[0] https://beta.theglobeandmail.com/life/health-and-fitness/som...
[1] https://www.health.harvard.edu/staying-healthy/should-you-ge...
In addition, the blue zone study (largest epidemiological study ever conducted on human health) concluded that diets rich in whole grains, starchy root vegetables, legumes, fruits, nuts and seeds proved to result in the lowest instances of diet related diseases (heart attach, stroke, diabetes, alzheimers) and was found to increase longevity.
"From this There is abundant evidence that increased levels of plasma lipids, predominantly free fatty acids (FFAs) and triglycerides, are causally involved in IR" (insulin resistance)
Sources: http://diabetes.diabetesjournals.org/content/52/1/138
I know we're all avant guard around here, but until fairly recently it wasn't accepted knowledge that fat wasn't as bad for you as first thought. It's understandable that regulations would take time to adjust.
But that's a key point of Soylent marketing - a sole source of nutrition is something that comes up in every discussion of Soylent on HN.
In addition to this, fat calories are more “filling” than carbohydrate calories. Something useful for a meal replacement (assuming unsaturated/“healthy” fats)
I hope Soylent sticks to their guns with the best knowledge available, and I hope interested/concerned Canadians push for reform here.
With what we know now, a cap on fat is ridiculous. The cap should be on carbs.
"When a meal replacement is represented as a replacement for all daily meals, the maximum amount of energy from fat is reduced to 30 percent, of which no more than 10 percent may be from saturated fat. For complete composition requirements, refer to B.24.200 of the FDR."
So it's actually 47% vs 30%, plus probably the additional composition requirements.
Though it seems slightly open to interpretation whether "all" here means "replaces every meal" or "could replace any type of meal breakfast/lunch/dinner" etc. I'm guessing the former.
There are many diets suiting many different lifestyles in Canada, from the traditional Inuit meat & fat heavy diet to many 'fad' diets extolled in magazines. It seems strange to me why it's legal to advocate a diet in media but illegal to label a product as such.
You can do that, but you then need to meet the regulatory hurdles.
Or you can market it for the way it's actually used by the vast majority of people - a meal replacement.
Is that not what regulatory compliance is about? I wonder what Soylent thinks regulatory compliance is for.
http://laws.justice.gc.ca/eng/regulations/c.r.c.,_c._870/pag...
I'm a vegetarian, not vegan, but I was pretty angry when they disappeared from our shelves. There was also some scuttlebutt that Field Roast was reported to the CFIA by a competitor.
As a left leaning Canadian. But don't tell me what to eat. On the other hand, please keep poisonous or otherwise dangerous foods off of our grocery store shelves. It's a fine line to walk.
I'm a thorough meat eater, but I also eat loads of Morningstar Farms Original Chik Patties because they fall in a pretty optimal place for me in the price/nutrition/convenience/taste coordinate system. They don't taste like chicken though.
Same was when lots of their consumers wanted a non-edulcorated version (it was very sweet some versions ago) and then there was no communication on their side.
I still buy it, because it's convenient, but they could improve their communication.
Random aside: Once every week or two is considered "regular" consumption to you?
Isn't this product supposed to be the end-all and be-all of meal replacements? What has curtailed your consumption?
I don't know why so many people think this is the case and then hate on the product.
Taking too much of any one thing is bad for you. People were doing only-soylent as an experiment. But for the most part 90% of the time I've read people only using it for a single meal each day, or on days they dont have time to cook, and eating regular food otherwise. Which sounds entirely reasonable to me, especially given how often people substituted those moments with junk food.
Because that's how it's positioned in the market?
Like, literally what they claim it's for, and supposedly the reason they went into business?
Heck, Rhinehart once claimed "I have not set foot in a grocery store in years. Nevermore will I bumble through endless confusing aisles like a pack-donkey searching for feed while the smell of rotting flesh fills my nostrils and fluorescent lights sear my eyeballs and sappy love songs torture my ears."
Soylent also fails due to a lack of health-promoting phytonutrients. Between this and the lack of fiber, it is really a poor choice. You really need to get one solid, plant based meal a day for proper health. A better on-the-go alternative to soylent is a mixture of nuts and high phytonutrient dried fruit like blueberries/cherries (without added sugar). Tempeh also works well on the go and it is extremely healthy.
I'm always interested in improving my health, so I'll definitely try it again, perhaps more scientifically this time. That said, I don't want to struggle through the annoying symptoms if it turns out that fiber doesn't do anything.
For references, there are plenty. Specifically want to look for material related to short chain fatty acids, particularly butyrate, and their role in modulating the immune system, and as histone deacetylase inhibitors. Here are a few reviews to get you started:
https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC4259177/ http://www.nature.com/ijo/journal/v39/n9/full/ijo201584a.htm...
Additionally, I should note that blue zone diets are all high in fermentable carbohydrates, and increased concentrations of short chain fatty acids have been observed in the stool of centenarian populations:
http://www.mdpi.com/2072-6643/8/9/564/htm
Which supports evidence in model organisms such as yeast and fruit flies that butyrate (a short chain fatty acid) extends average lifespan:
Please ignore if this comment is too offtopic for this thread.
One of thousands of sources on the health impacts:
A quick Google search will disprove that commonly held myth. Sugar is bad, but HFCS is worse. Scientists didn't bother researching it for years, but once they did, they learned that despite obvious similarities chemically, the body processes it differently.
My breakfast is often Siggi's 4% skyr (thick yogurt): http://siggisdairy.com/product/plain-whole-milk-24oz/
Plus Organic valley heavy cream: https://www.organicvalley.coop/products/cream/
Ususally about 300g + 100g, then sometimes some granola (oats, almonds, sometimes honey), for body.
Soylent is:
* 37g carb
* 21g fats
* 20g protein
What I'm eating is much healthier by my estimation:
* 16g carb
* 49g fats
* 35g protein
(Before granola, which you can use to moderate the carbs if you want.)
It is not hard to mix two things together, sometimes three. If you really want to custom flavor it, buy a jam (I suggest Mymoune rose petal jam, from Lebanon, but there are millions of flavors when you pick your own jam!)
What is so good about soylent? Why not just mix skyr and heavy cream if that's the kind of meal you want?
Why eat a strange synthetic meal from a company that has trouble with rats and mold when you could eat a couple simple whole foods? What problem is Soylent solving, exactly?
And aren't you worried about the unfavorable omega 3:6 ratio in this stuff? Just going off the ingredients they list, I can't find any literature they give on the ratio. (If you're not up to speed, the latest: http://openheart.bmj.com/content/openhrt/3/2/e000385.full.pd... )
(Diet Note: I'm 5'10 and 146 lbs male, 12-13% body fat. In my diet I aim for ~60-70% calories from fat, but don't always hit it.)
Requires refrigeration, not shelf stable, contains lactose, which not everyone can tolerate, contains cholesterol, less convenient than bottles, not vegan, for those who it matters to, and more expensive than the equivalent amount of Soylent to top it all off. And that's without even trying particularly hard to think of reasons.
And, for the record, I don't even drink Soylent anymore.
> Pasteurized Whole Milk, Pasteurized Cream, Live Active Cultures
Over:
> Filtered water, soy protein isolate, maltodextrin, high oleic sunflower oil, isomaltulose, canola oil, rice starch, oat fiber, isomaltooligosaccharide, soy lecithin, potassium chloride, calcium phosphate, magnesium phosphate, natural & artificial flavors, dipotassium phosphate, salt, choline chloride, gellan gum, sodium ascorbate, dl-alpha-tocopheryl acetate, ferrous gluconate, zinc sulfate, d-calcium pantothenate, niacinamide, sucralose, thiamine hydrochloride, copper gluconate, manganese sulfate, pyridoxine hydrochloride, vitamin a palmitate, riboflavin, chromium chloride, biotin, folic acid, sodium molybdate, sodium selenite, phytonadione, potassium iodide, vitamin b12, vitamin d. contains: soy
I guess it is less convenient.
> more expensive than the equivalent amount of Soylent to top it all off
Somehow I don't think penny pinchers are Soylent's target audience, but maybe I'm wrong.
I quite assure you that if I listed all of the compounds of "Pasteurized Whole Milk, Pasteurized Cream, Live Active Cultures, Cream" using standard chemistry nomenclature, the list would look far more intimidating to the average layperson.
I'm not convinced your alternative is actually more healthful, nor do I believe it contains the vitamins or minerals you'd need for it to act as a reasonable meal replacement. From a macro perspective at least, I don't see anything particularly wrong with Soylent's product.
You didn't know, or you don't think they should be? The jury is still out on dietary cholesterol, and there are plenty of people, some on this very forum, who consider it a health hazard.
I'm aware of recent research suggesting it isn't all that bad, but there's no telling if that's going to be reversed as well in a couple of years.
Feel free to lowercase it yourself. HN readers will appreciate it!
-- Just seems like empty one-upmanship on the internet.
I wonder if the bioavailability is even good in Soylent. I know some of these nutrients are much more bioavailable in animal sources than plant sources (though I can't recall which), so the vegan-friendly label on Soylent is a mark against it, if health is your goal.
It is one thing, making a drink and selling it, and another marketing it like that. It was very painful from the start listening how 2 guys with no background SOLVED NUTRITION. And their choice of ingredients is bad in my opinion. Main ones are soy and sunflower oil. Really, find me at least one balanced nutritionist who would recommend sunflower oil in large quantities (hint : omega 3:6:9). Soy has it`s problems too. Then they mix some vitamins and minerals in, but you skip on all of the micronutrients and anything else from real food that is not in Soylent. Also very low fiber. Then your digestion will have problems too eating liquid only for long term. Etc, etc.
If you need occasional meal replacement, there are dozens of well-established companies which make one, with much better quality and price in both liquid or powder form.
Can you name one? In all of these threads, the Soylent boosters assert that there aren't any competitors that come near being a genuine meal replacement that aren't much more expensive. I haven't seen any Soylent detractors name a specific product that's better yet.
That's not how the crowd funding went - it was a product suitable for everyone, that would put you in perfect health.
The Canadians are saying Soylent can't be sold as a sole source of nutrition - how is this useful to Soylent? Every soylent thread has people saying the differentiating factor for Soylent is that it can be used as a sole source of nutrition.
That sucks I been using soylent for months now.
If obtained from medical suppliers, they'll probably be healthier and have better quality control too.
I'm having problems understanding why would anyone want to consume something like that.
I also will make shakes, but sometimes soylent is just easier.
Its not like no one had ever done meal-replacement foods before Soylent came along. Its not new, its not cheaper, its not as well regulated, its not as flavorful.
Seriously, why would you buy Soylent (which has had numerous beta 'failures') over a something like Ensure/
If a cheaper competitor emerges that doesn't taste like a milk shake, I'd switch to that. But so far no one has offered a reasonable alternative.
One 8 oz bottle of Ensure has 220 calories and 33g of carbs, 15g of which is just sugar. You might as well just have a coke and some protein powder.
Nothing of what Soylent Green does is new, companies like Fresenius, Nestle, Abbot and whatnot have been manufacturing balanced liquid nutrition for medical needs for decades.
I'm far more surprised these established players in the enteral nutrition market haven't started their own push for something like this, trying to sell their medical products as convenience lifestyle products. I guess they wouldn't want to cannibalize their own profits from the medical sales by offering a more affordable non-medical lifestyle alternative.
As somebody who works with this kind of stuff, parenteral and enteral nutrition, I think there's a real market here. But I'd vastly prefer offerings from established companies, rather than some random guys buying bulk ingredients on Amazon and mixing them up in moldy warehouses.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=6zAFA-hamZ0
:)
> random guys buying bulk ingredients on Amazon and mixing them up in moldy warehouses
Is this based on something, because I highly doubt they are sourcing ingredients from amazon, this is needlessly inflammatory. And moldy warehouses, do you really have so little to say about Soylent you have to make things up?
The tube feeds [0] are pretty much exactly that. Those Fresenius ones are not flavored but other manufacturers, like HiPP/Abbot, even have flavored tube feed, as some tube patients like having the flavor come up when they have to burp.
A step closer are the "nutritional supplements", which is a weird name for it in German we call it "Trinknahrung" which literally translates to "liquid nutrition". These are usually flavored and come in a variety of forms, like powder or even puddings.
I've "eaten" the stuff sometimes for diet or after tooth operations, it's pretty okayish when cold, like a milkshake. The biggest issue is that you have to be really careful about how fast you drink it until your digestive system adapted to the high-calorie contents, as drinking too much too fast will also make it come out too fast, so to speak.
(I can’t drink most diet and protein shakes because they’re so aggressively sweetened that they set off the sensory issues.)
I wouldn't recommend it.
IMO Soylent tastes gross, too. Kind of like soggy cereal.
As someone that doesn't really take pleasure in eating on my own, cooking, cleaning, and even eating is a chore that I'll skip if I'm busy or stressed.
Soylent lets me easily grab something that won't have too strong of a taste and isn't as bad for me as skipping a meal, or eating half a bag of goldfish.
There are striking differences in the macronutrient ratios and in the prices. Soylent (Huel, etc) are much closer to the USDA recommended macro ratios, and have much less sugar. Only Ensure Original is less expensive than Soylent, all the other Ensure products (there are several) are much more expensive per calorie.
[0] http://futurefood.hellobox.co/soylent-is-not-ensure-and-why/...
No, by your numbers, Ensure (pretty much all of the various versions) are closer than any others the center of the USDA ranges.
> Only Ensure Original is less expensive than Soylent
Your own analysis shows all of the Ensure products except High Protein as less expensive than Soylent 2.0, and only Ensure Plus (not Original) is cheaper than Soylent 1.8.
Have you ever eaten anything unhealthy in a pinch? I'm sure Soylent is better than Cheetos in that situation.
Go to the frozen section of the grocery store to see all sorts of, imo, weirder shit that people eat regularly and feed their kids.
Edit: I’m not judging myself, just reporting. I think it probably does the job for people who want it, and doesn’t harm the rest of us.
Thank you for taking the time to reply.
The issue as I see it is that the definition of what would be considered reasonable today is not in line with the CFIA's. I don't see the intent of the regulations as unsound.
Also, I suspect these regulations have more backing than what you are assuming. They may not be correct, but they are good enough for people survive indefinitely on which is a solid track record.
PS: Used soylent for months 1.x and 2.0, swapped to Meal squares.
But only for products marketed as meal replacements. Soylent is not only advertised as a meal replacement, but as a sole source of nutrition.
These are moving towards products with medical use, so obviously there's going to be some regulation.
Also, I can go into any grocery store and buy all kinds of snacks, candy and soda which really are 100% garbage "food", so I'm not sure why anyone would think that regulating the percentage of fat would matter in term of health.
But it's not just Canada... Canada is in-line with WHO reccomendations
