While previous generations of plant-based burgers tasted nothing like the meats they sought to imitate and were often punctuated with protuberant beans and mealy soy, more recent, higher-tech efforts like Impossible Foods and Beyond Burger have come closer to the mark.

Many restaurants and grocery stores now offer plant-based burgers, meatballs, bacon, chicken nuggets, hot dogs, sausages and many other meat-like products that offer an increasingly convincing simulacrum of familiar flavors that promoters say are better for health and the environment.