Brussels: European Union legislators have thrown desperate Brexiteers a bone and outraged environmentalists by launching an attack on veggie burgers.

Members of the European Parliament’s agriculture committee voted this week for a new law to ban the use of words such as “burger”, “hamburger”, “steak”, “escalope” or “sausage” on food packaging, promotion or marketing if the food concerned is “primarily made up of proteins of vegetable origin”.

The vote took place on Monday, April 1, but appears not to have been an April Fool’s prank. Instead it’s part of an EU push to make sure consumers are not misled.

The enemy: veggie beet and carrot burgers. Credit:Sarsmis

“We felt that steak should be kept as real steak,” a French MEP said – worried by the rise of so-called “vegan steaks”.