Nourish Ingredients launches Tastilux, an animal-free fat for plant-based meats

Animal-free fat startup Nourish Ingredients unveiled its debut product, Tastilux, at SXSW Sydney on Wednesday, taking aim at some of the primary concerns in the plant-based protein sector, particularly regarding taste, nutritional content and consumer adoption.

Over the last few years we’ve seen a significant uptick in the availability, and quality, of plant-based meats. Locally we’ve also seen investment into the sector, with cultured meat startup Vow landing $73.4 million in Series A in November 2022 and Nourish Ingredients itself securing $45 million a month earlier.

But there’s still a long way to go when it comes to parity with traditional meat products, both in terms of price and flavour. This latter point in particular is where Nourish is stepping in, arguing that fat is a critical component for enhancing the flavour of alternative meats and making them more attractive to a whole range of customers.

Nourish Ingredients’ strategy involves a detailed understanding of the fats that contribute to the flavour in animal products and identifying suitable plant-based alternatives.

In the case of Tastilux, it is able to mimic the taste, smell and cooking behaviour of animal meat through the use of Australian fungal strains that can produce fats similar to those found in meats.

It then combines this with the use of precision fermentation to create the end product. This is in collaboration with Cauldron, an Orange-based startup that specialises in precision fermentation and received $10.5 million in seed funding earlier this year.

And collaboration is the name of the game for Nourish Ingredients. As a business-to-business startup, it’s not consumer-facing. And while Nourish did confirm with SmartCompany that is considering becoming so in the future, it is currently focused on partners in the plant-based meat space.

Deep diving on fat and how to mimic it

Image: Tegan Jones

This is important, because as Nourish Ingredients CEO James Petrie admits, this type of science doesn’t come cheap. So it’s important to narrow down exactly what fats you actually need.

“People say the flavour is in the fat. But what does that actually mean? What fats are really important for the flavour?” Petrie said in an interview with SmartCompany.

“Reducing stuff by precision fermentation is expensive. You look at how many carbon atoms are in a molecule of sugar and there’s roughly a dozen. You then look at how many carbon atoms are in a fat and it’s three or four dozen. So automatically, you’re in a one-to-four ratio between the two.

“This means that you can only afford to produce the potent molecules — the ones which make a difference. Everything else, in our view, should come from plants because they’re so efficient.”

Petrie says Nourish Ingredients first looked at all kinds of animal products — from meat to dairy — to determine what it was that was providing the taste element. In the case of meat, the question was: what is it that gives it a roasty, animalic experience? And what fats were responsible for that?

“We did this molecular dissection to really do a deep dive into the fats. What we found is that most of them are plantlike and a reflection of what the animal is eating, which is usually grasses and forage,” Petrie explains.

“So off the bat we try and discard that 90% and say we don’t want to build these by precision fermentation. But there’s that 10% remaining which is really animalistic and quite different.

“In the case of fish, that is the long chain omega three fatty acids — EPA and DHA. There are meat analogues to those and there are dairy analogues. And so identifying what those fatty acids are, and what those fat molecules are and how they are really different was where we began.”

This is where the fungal strains come in, because they build those fats in a cheap, sustainable and natural way.

“We have this solution now where instead of going to the end result — a cooked peace of meat — and trying to recreate that taste or flavour via chemical synthesis, we’ve gone back to the beginning of the process and added in this animal-type fat at the beginning,” Petrie says.

According to Petrie, there is only about a 1% inclusion rate of this in the final food product, but a little goes a long way.

“When you cook it and take it naturally through that process, the Maillard reaction occurs; you get the browning of that ‘meat’, you get that characterisation. And if that is done in the presence of these animal-like fats, you naturally get this huge rich mixture of taste and aroma.”

Nourish Ingredients launches Tastilux at SXSW Sydney

Digging in. Image: Tegan Jones

The potential of Tastilux was showcased during a plant-based chicken demonstration at a SXSW Sydney event on Wednesday, which revealed its capacity to significantly enhance the culinary experience offered by plant-based foods.

I was fortunate enough to try it for myself earlier in the day in the form of a faux chicken skewer and drumstick — complete with a calcium-based bone that was also edible. Yes, I did try that too. The process included watching the cooking process on a hibachi grill, which was fascinating.

While you can still tell the difference between it and the real thing, it’s the closest I have ever seen alternative meats come to it.

The calcium-based, edible ‘bones’. Image: Tegan Jones

From the sizzle on the grill to the taste, it was genuinely delicious. The product was even able to mimic the chicken skin on a drumstick incredibly well. But the real difference for me was in the texture and mouthfeel. The fat did make a difference. You could not only taste it, but it achieved the same coating in your mouth that traditional fat does.

The debut of Tastilux represents an important step forward in the plant-based food industry. Yet, it’s essential to note that its success will hinge on various factors, including its ability to seamlessly integrate into existing food production systems.

Nourish also agrees that consumer acceptance outside the vegetarian and vegan communities is essential.

“I think consumers should not have to be guilted into eating food. They should want to do it because it tastes bloody good, and we have the technology to achieve that,” Petrie says.