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Plant-based meat vs. chicken: Which do we get more protein from? www.medicalnewstoday.com |Written by Annie Lennon on June 23, 2022 — Fact checked by Alexandra Sanfins, Ph.D.
Researchers compared protein absorption between plantbased meat and chicken meats.
Plant-based vs. chicken
For the study, the researchers created a plant-based ‘chicken’ Protein absorption was higher for chicken meat than for meat from soybean concentrate and wheat gluten. The final plant-based meat. product had a protein content of 24.2%. The researchers concluded that the nutritional value of The plant-based meat was then cooked alongside chicken plant-based meats could be improved by modifying formu- meat, ground to simulate the chewing process, and passed lation and production conditions. through a 2.36 mm sieve to avoid sample size-induced effects on digestion for the two samples. In recent years, plant-based meats have become more common as a way to ‘enjoy the taste of meat’ without hurting The resulting ‘meat clumps’ then underwent various in vitro animals or the environment. tests to model protein absorption during digestion. Although plant-based meats’ low fat and cholesterol levels may help reduce obesity and cardiovascular disease risk, studies show that they may be less digestible than animal-derived meats.
From these tests, the researchers found that the water solubility of plant-based meats gradually increased during in vitro digestion, reaching around 8% after gastric digestion and then 14% at the end of intestinal digestion.
Knowing more about how plant-based proteins are digested They found, however, that chicken peptides were consistentcould help assess their feasibility as a main source of dietary ly more water-soluble than plant-based peptides. protein. Furthermore, they noted that of the 110 peptides identified Recently, researchers compared protein absorption from in the plant-based meat, around 50% remained after the diplant-based meat with chicken meat. They found that plant- gestion process. based protein was absorbed less during an in-vitro digestion process than protein from chicken. Meanwhile, of the over 500 peptides identified in chicken meat, only 15% remained after digestion. This, they wrote, The study was published in the Journal of Agricultural and suggested that peptides in chicken are more readily-abFood Chemistry. sorbed than those from plant-based sources. TT 158 | June 28th - July 4th| 2022
