The No Meat Company (vegan sausage rolls with no palm oil)

The No Meat Company is the find you’ve been looking for: tasty vegan meats all without palm oil (even their sausage rolls). Despite the popularity these days of ‘vegan sausage rolls’, nearly all sale contain palm oil. But these don’t, so are helping to protect habitats of orangutans and other endangered creatures in Borneo and Indonesia.

What’s great is that these products are designed to be affordable. You can find them in Iceland and Food Warehouse along with online at Ocado. All products are cooked from frozen.

Avoid sausages for young children and choking hazards.

Keep these foods away from pets due to unsafe ingredients (salt, onion etc). Also don’t give leftover fatty foods to garden birds or wildfowl, as salt is toxic and fats can smear on feathers, affecting waterproofing and insulation). 

The cartons inside are plastic-free. For any other packaging, recycle at supermarket bag bins, if your kerbside does not recycle. 

As the government is sueing companies that call their products ‘meat’, this company has cleverly just labelled its products as ‘chicken-friendly’, ‘cow-friendly’ and ‘pig-friendly’ to avoid rebranding!

The range includes:

• The Vegan Sausage Rolls (palm-oil-free pastry) are seasoned with sage and onion. In jumbo size, slice them in mini-bites to share. Or eat a whole big one yourself!
• No Chick & Vegetable Pies have no palm oil in the pastry. These seasoned soya chunks with carrots and peas in gravy, are best served with vegan mashed potatoes, broccoli and vegan gravy. Or thick-cut chips and mushy peas.
• No Meat Mince is good in a spaghetti bolognese, lasagne, chilli non carne or cottage pie. Serve with garlic bread or a side green salad.
• No Meat Crispy Nuggets are good in a wrap with salad, or go traditional and serve with oven chips and peas! Or even in a sandwich with lettuce and tomato.
• No Chick Tikka with Rice (chicken-style pieces simmered in a spiced tomato sauce with fluffy basmati rice). Serve with warm garlic naan and a touch of coriander, and mango chutney.

Why do Gregg’s use palm oil in vegan sausage rolls?

Almost certainly due to it being cheap (despite being flown thousands of miles across the world to sell here). There are other alternatives (as proved with this brand).

And despite sometimes being a mouthy anti-vegan goof, Piers Morgan is right to chastise companies that promote vegan sausage rolls as being ‘animal-friendly’. Because if they contain palm oil, they are not. Greenpeace says there is no such thing as ‘sustainable palm oil’. It’s just a self-policed term used by industry, to get away with using inferior ingredients for more profit, at the expense of endangered species that are nearing extinction.

When buying baked goods, don’t look for the RSPO (Roundtable on Sustainable Palm Oil) logo. Look for the Palm Oil Free logo instead.

As well as being high in saturated fats, Gregg’s vegan sausage rolls also don’t apparently even taste very nice. They are basically made with Quorn protein and seasoned heavily, but go a funny texture when cold, due to the palm oil.

One French man wrote online ‘As I chewed and swallowed, I simply couldn’t understand how something could taste so bland, yet so revolting at the same time’.

Why choose vegan meats?

Most meat is from factory farms. And in a country of 67 million people, there is not enough land for everyone to eat free-range meat. If animals were not bred for the meat industry, fewer would be born. And remaining creatures could then live out their lives in peace (natural breeding would still occur, just not on the same as now).

Meat is also high in saturated fats, cholesterol and chemicals used to flavour them. Going plant-based  means you can enjoy these tasty meals, which are not just animal-kind but also far lower in fat and cholesterol-free. So you can eat more of them!

Why pigs are brilliant!

Pigs are such wonderful mothers, they sing to their piglets) are also very clean animals. They will build a nest and walk up to a mile to go to the toilet. They are so brainy, they are up there with dolphins and chimpanzees.

They have strong bonds and will sleep nose-to-nose with other pigs, and use their sensitive snouts to forage for food (as eyes are on the sides of their heads, they have poor depth perception though can see a 310 panoramic view).

Pigs can’t sweat, which is why they roll in mud.  Only domestic pigs have curly tails! And in the wild, pigs can live to be up to 20 years old