- People eat meat replicas
for the same reason that people use dildos.
Looks the same,
feels the same,
fills a hole but no one gets hurt.
(upbeat music)
- Hi, my name is Jordan
and I'm here to try other vegans chicken.
- I've been vegan for about two years.
- Eight years now.
- Four and a half years now.
To be honest,
it was because of my mum.
So my mum and my sister have been vegan for 10 years.
And she asked me to try it for one month
and yeah,
cooking's great.
So I didn't I didn't miss it.
- When it comes to meat alternatives.
I think if it helps people go vegan,
why not?
- I can still get the same enjoyment
as I used to from eating,
you know burgers,
chicken without having to harm any animals.
- I don't think there's one greatest alternative.
There's lots of different,
delicious ways of doing it.
You can use seitan,
soy, pea,
mushrooms, tofu.
- I think they're a great thing.
And I think they're gonna help more people transition
to a plant-based diet.
So yeah I'm ready to try the wings.
(upbeat music)
- The je ne sais quoi of my dish is the layers,
the unbeatable layers.
It looks like chicken.
It smells like chicken.
This recipe is based
on school night vegans fried chicken recipe,
which I have made once before.
So, the only difference is I'm using butter beans instead
of chickpeas to give it a whiter flesh.
So yeah,
we'll see how it goes.
- Oh, wow.
Okay.
- I don't know what this is,
but it was good though.
I like the skin,
the coating looks quite nice.
- This one looks really interesting.
It's very thick,
really crispy on the outside which is good.
It's got some flaked sea salt in there,
which is a nice touch.
- This is not breaking up correctly.
I feel like this is quite like basic
for like vegan chicken.
Like when you're starting off,
this is probably what you make, so.
- Okay, it just smells like fried batter.
- See, this is what I mean.
When you say you know,
you only have bready sort of bready chicken.
This is kind of what this reminds me of.
Let me try it though.
I mean not look until I try it.
Um, I really like
the actual crumbing of it.
- It's okay.
It's okay.
- You can tell they put seasonings and stuff in
the actual coating of the chicken.
- This has got a lot of great layers in it.
- Yeah, the actual chicken itself is not great.
You can't break it.
It's just like a big dough ball.
They need to perfect their chicken recipe, basically.
- I can't tell what the sauce is.
Let me try.
- It tastes like a,
is there like a?
I dunno, like a para?
I don't know what it is actually.
- I don't actually think this sauce adds much.
- I can basically eat the breading.
Yeah. I'm not a fan of the chicken inside.
- I think this person did a good job.
I'd probably give this one a seven.
- Just for the coating,
I'm gonna be nice.
I'll give it like a five.
But the actual chicken itself is not great at all.
They can sort out their chicken
and I think they'll be onto a winner here.
- I think my chicken's gonna do quite well.
I mean,
I've had some taste testers
at home and they all loved it, so.
Hey, I'm gonna be making vegan chicken wings today,
and I'm gonna be using tofu as my meat alternative.
Now my secret to getting
that chicken texture is to freeze
and defrost the tofu,
repeat that process a second time
and what you're left with is tofu
that has a very similar structure to chicken.
- Cool.
- It looks like chicken Goujons.
- [Man] What's chicken Goujon?
- You don't know chicken Goujon?
Oh its' very soft.
- Texture wise it looks like chicken,
look like chicken nuggets.
- Oh it's tofu.
Is it?
Yeah.
It's very rare that I've had
a tofu dish that has been like banging.
- They smell good I have to be honest,
but let me try them.
- I don't like being mean.
- They're pretty good,
for chicken nugget they're pretty good.
Even the texture inside looks quite Chickeny
if that's a word,
I reckon Soya.
- Try the sauce.
The sauce is nice.
- Taste is great,
the sauce is really nice as well.
They're,
they're good chicken nuggets so yeah,
I'd definitely buy these.
- It's very sort of claggy spongy.
I don't love it.
I'm sorry.
- Probably give these like,
like a like a seven, seven,
definitely.
Yeah you know cause they're nice.
They're really good.
I finished 'em.
- I can only really score this
a five out of 10.
And I think I'm being generous.
- For a start,
you actually get them
on a sugar cane bone.
So it's like you're actually picking up
a real chicken wing and eating it.
When you bite into it,
you actually feel like you're eating
a real chicken wing, so.
(crickets chirping)
- Oh wow.
Oh, my God.
It smells so good.
- So it looks like there are two different types here,
which is interesting.
Nicely garnished.
- It looks like a chicken drumstick.
Yeah, they've got that pretty bang on.
I'm gonna,
oh wow this is a seitan chicken.
Yeah, I don't think it's got
as many layers as mine.
- I'm excited to try this actually.
They've even got the fake bone.
- So that's a good little touch of realism.
Yeah, the texture looks really good.
Pulls apart,
I think this is Seitan.
Can I try it?
Um,
spicy.
- Hm, the texture is very chicken like I have
to say.
It looks like they've used Seitan,
big fan of that.
- That one may have liked burned off my taste buds
'cause I didn't think the barbecue one will be that spicy,
but let's try it.
Um, okay.
It has the give of chicken
to be able to get stuck in your teeth, so
- Texture wise again,
pretty good.
Although quite chewy.
I like the fact that there's
a lot of sauce on this, so.
- It's slightly over seasoned.
I think they're trying to play it safe and be like,
I'm just gonna throw loads of seasoning
at it to make sure it has a flavor.
- The thing that's most surprising is
how realistic it is
if I'm being completely honest.
I've always kind of wanted
to know how to make chicken that looks like this.
I've only had chicken wings like this at restaurants.
- Overall, I'm gonna give this chicken
a eight out of 10.
I'm generous.
- Hm, I think I'm gonna give this a solid eight.
Yeah, I'm really impressed that someone was able
to make this at home.
- It was expected anyway, so,
so yeah I'm gonna go home,
tell all the team that we won.
But as I said,
we, we,
we kind of knew we were gonna win anyway,
so yeah.
- Okay.
I guess I better get back
in the kitchen and work on my recipe.
- Oh, well.
That's okay.
I came here to have fun and try some amazing vegan chicken
and I think I did just that.
So it's all good.
It's all good.
(upbeat music)