Ten years ago, in my early vegetarian days and when I traveled the globe for work, I ate Quorn products when in the U.K. I loved them. Years later I saw the products in the frozen foods aisle in U.S. markets but the products use egg whites and therefore are not vegan.

A few months ago the folks at Quorn USA asked me to review their newest product – they developed a vegan burger! They sent me a package (of 4) and in return asked for a review in which I share my honest opinion.

Though the package encourages baking, I opted for frying them in 1 teaspoon of avocado oil. It smelled like bacon in the house. Seriously, my husband was in the basement doing laundry and the scent brought him up to the kitchen.

This little burger “fried” up in six minutes. Since Quorn is born in the UK I thought it appropriate to serve the burgers up on toasted English muffins (okay, it was the only bread product I had on hand), with lettuce, onion, tomato and Vegenaise.

I posted the picture of my burger to Facebook and a friend sent me this link: Vegan Bloggers Reviewing Quorn. You’re going to need to read the link to understand my following comments. Go ahead, I’ll wait…

…To be honest, I didn’t know if my friend was scolding me or educating me when he sent me the link. I’ll go with educating me as he is the one who kept questioning my Facebook status updates using Earth Balance because, as I learned from him, Earth Balance uses palm oil and the palm oil business is killing orangutans.

Okay, back to Mark Sutton’s scolding of irresponsible vegans who review products. His concern is that vegans review products without reading labels. Um, yeah, you’re right. I got a big box of So Delicious goodies a few weeks ago and I didn’t read the label.

But, I’m glad my friend sent me the link to Mark’s vegan blogger review critique because I learned about Mycoprotein, which is the main ingredient in Quorn burgers.

From Quorn’s own site:

*Note that the referral to egg product above is the added egg white in most Quorn products, but not the new vegan burger.

From non-Quorn sites you can read about mycoprotein on Wired Magazine: A Mushrooming Quorn Controversy and on Livestrong: What Are the Benefits of Mycoprotein?

Mark Sutton asked

Did any of the vegan bloggers giving Quorn a “positive” review mention these things? Unfortunately, no. Not even as an “FYI” or advisory.

Yes, thanks to my friend Evan, I did.

And I still thought the burger was awesome. And my omnivore husband ate a Quorn burger Wednesday night, instead of eating an animal.

But, listen, I’m not one of those awesome vegans. I’m the one who eats oil, salt, sugar, an occasional vegan marshmallow sandwich, and, yes, I dip into some vegan junk food every now and then.

Readers, I know many of you have enjoyed the Quorn vegan burger. Did you know you were eating mycoprotein? Did you care?

For those of you who have not eaten one, does mycoprotein scare you off?