Plant-Based Eggs Now At Whole Foods

Science just made being a vegan that much easier, as a new company is releasing a chicken-less egg made entirely of plants for baking.

Whole Foods in California is now selling an artificial egg replacement, the Daily Mail reports, made from plant parts and used in baking. The item, called Beyond Eggs, is a powder of sorts made from ground-up peas, sorghum, and other ingredients, NPR reports. According to NPR, tasters couldn't tell the difference between cookies made with real eggs and cookies baked with Beyond Eggs.

"Eggs are functionally incredible, they do everything from hold oil and water in mayo to making the muffin rise and holding scrambled eggs together," Josh Tetrick, the company's founder, told Daily Mail. So far, they've created "eggs" for baking, an eggless mayonnaise, and salad dressing.

"Our first attempts weren't great, we tried to make a muffin using a mix of plants," Tetrick said. "Ours tasted really gummy, and didn't have the 'bounce' we wanted. Our mayonnaise would not hold the oil and egg together, so had what looked like liquid syrup. Scrambled eggs were even worse — they just wouldn't congeal at all, and had a really bad aftertaste."

Currently, the baking eggs and mayonnaise are set for production, but the scrambled eggs replacement needs more work. "Eventually we'll get to one thing that will replace everything," Tetrick said, which might put plenty of hens out of work. Now we just have to find a solid butter substitute.