Almond, coconut, rice, soy … none of these! The new milk is made of peas. Yes, pea milk is already regarded as a promise among the veggie drinks. So what do you think of that?
It all started when the entrepreneur Adam Lowry sold his ecological cleaning products company and instead of retiring, he decided to enter a new niche. The problem he addressed: the unsustainability of the milk chain. Milk production has a high carbon footprint and the vegetable alternatives have gained more and more adherents even among non-vegans.
The businessman invested in dry pea as raw material for the drink. He began Ripple, his startup, to produce pea milk which, he said, is slightly creamy, sweet and don’t taste like peas. (Milk is only the liquid generated by females of mammals. Due to similarity to milk, vegetable drinks are referred with the same usual name).
It took 1 year to get to the final formula of the product and the technology they used is being patented by the startup. One of the main advantage of pea milk is its protein content, which is higher than that of other vegetable drinks. It also has potassium, vitamin D and calcium and unsaturated fats. In addition, pea milk production consumes 76% less water than the same amount of soy milk.
Vegetable drinks sales grew 11% last year while milk’s have fallen 9% and is estimated to fall 20% further until 2020. Despite the ecological claim, it is important to say that Ripple peas are cultivated in France while the drink is made in the United States so the carbon footprint increases and this is a negative point. There is still the advantage that peas do not emit methane as the cows. The company argues that they are searching for a supplier of the same quality in their own country.
If you got carried away with the novelty, the Dutch starup Peas of Cake also uses the ingredient. They produce gluten-free cakes made, of course, of peas!
Are you willing to try?
References: FastCompany, U.S News, The Guardian
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