As a non-vegetarian, one has to wonder whether pale vegan imitations of “real” food taste just as good.

Take the concept of vegan cheese. This week at Safeway, I saw a buy-one-get-one-free deal for – let’s keep it blame-free and call it Healthy Slices – a brand of vegan soy cheeses sliced  and ready for sandwich-making.

I’ve heard mixed reviews about the product: “apocalyptic” and “only good when melted” were examples… fair enough. I thought I’d save some money and buy the vegan pepper jack cheese while getting one free (Mistake 1). Today I tried it (Mistake 2)-

While the cheese is perfectly fine at first sight, ok at first bite, it goes downhill from there. Why? The vegan cheese is sweet in a way that’s indescribable. Like, soy sweet. And I happen to have 24 slices of these things… and they’re perishable = not returnable.

Now, I don’t dislike all vegan food; I harvest cravings for unhealthy portions of crispy tofu noodles now and then. But until I find a good recipe in which to incorporate melted soy cheese, I’m out of luck. I’m sticking to my Lucerne pepper jack for $5.

Moral: Beware the invisble hand of grocery deals. Remember that price likely indicates a commodity worth producing, so some things go on sale for a reason.

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