At the 2007 Natural Products Expo in Los Angeles, VegeUSA had a large booth with samples of their product. We sampled all their products and I liked a few even though I don't crave meat analogs and certainly don't crave any animal flesh.
Our local market, Windmill Farms, had these products on sale and I picked up a few packages. I made a cajun rice dish last night which calls for soysage. I substituted the vegan shrimp. It was interesting and fine in the dish. There is a firm texture to the product, somewhat how I remember shrimp to feel in your mouth.
I thought I'd look up the main ingredient after water, Curdlan Gum. Chemistry-wise, "Curdlan gum is a microbial fermentation extracellular polymer prepared commercially from a mutant strain of Alcaligenes faecalis var. myxogenes." If you then look up Alcaligenes faecalis, it's a mutant of soil bacteria and produced some inhibitory activity against Sarcoma and carcinoma in a cancer study in 1978.
Still, I think I'll stick to whole foods that I can pronounce and not the highly-processed glucans. Many studies have also linked the vegetarian and vegan diets to health benefits. [smile]
