Patent Publication Number: US-2002009528-A1

Title: Vegetable meat

Description:
Tecnical Field The invention concerns a high nutritional value food in alternative to animal meat.  
       Background Art  
       [0001] Vegetable meat is composed of natural products based on gluten, cereal flour and legume flour.  
       [0002] This mixture enables a high percentage of protein to be used, which is concentrated in the gluten, minerals (especially iron), vitamins and the food fibres of cereals and legumes.  
       [0003] Its structure enable it to be used as food to be consumed cold to the flavour of mortadella, ham, bresaola, guanciale etc., or hot as steak, stew, mince, hamburger, sausage, pizzaiola, etc.  
       [0004] Other vegetable food, with high nutritional value, know by the writer, are Seitan and Soya by products like soya steak and soya stew.  
       [0005] The latters are not finished like vegetable meat, because either they lack of same amino acids or of food fibres.  
       [0006] Moreover, they are unable to produce all types of meat mentioned above (mortadetla, etc. . . . ) . 
     
    
    
     Disclosure of Invention  
     [0007] The invention thus concerns a process for production of vegetable meat as set out in the claims.  
     [0008] Haw vegetable meat is made: A percentage of gluten from 45% to 99.9% is mixed with a percentage of one or more cereal flours from 0.1% to 55%, or with a percentage of one or more legume flours from 0.1% to 55%, or with a percentage of one or more cereal and legume flours together from 0.1% to 55%.  
     [0009] This mixture is seasoned with various spices and after being kneaded and worked with water or vegetable broth, afterwards the pieces of required size are prepared and boiled for about two hours.  
     [0010] The list of cereals used for cereal flours is: hard grain, soft grain, buckwheat, kamut grain, oats, barley, pearl barley, naize, rye, spelt, rice.  
     [0011] The list of legumes used for legume flours is: chickpea, pea, broad bean, lenil, bean soya bean, chickling.  
     [0012] The kind of cereal or legume flours, which is used, can be wholemeal, fine, extra fine, bran.  
     [0013] The quality of gluten, cereal and legume flours used can be biological or non-biological. Vegetable meat comes in the form of a piece of meat such as a cylindrical shaped filet with rounded ends.  
     [0014] Its weight may be 0.5 kg., 1 kg., 2 kg., 3 kg., etc. . . . , in order to obtain this cylindrical shape, synthetic casings for salami or other forcemeat products may be used.  
     [0015] The list of seasonings used is: garlic, fennel seeds, rosemary, pistachio, paprika, black pepper, chili, salt, basil, parsley, extra pure olive oil, yeast extact, etc. . . . The amount of water or vegetable broth for the flour dough is between 0.8 litres to 1 litre for every kilogramme of flour mixture.  
     [0016] The various kinds of vegetable meat named above (steak, stew, hamburger, mortadella, ham, etc. . . . ) are obtained by playing around with the percentages of gluten and of cereal and legume flours which have been used, also with the different types of cereal and legume flowers (wholemeal, fine, extra fine, bran ), and as well as with the ditterent types of spices used. The advantages of vegetablew meat are: 1) It give anyone not eating meat (vegetarians), anyone who cannot eat it because of colesterol, uric acids, or digestive problems, the chance to have complete alternative to animal meat (due to its nutritional value as well as to the range of different kinds of vegetable meat). 2) It can be kept in a fridge in a vacuum-sealed package for 30 days and frozen for 12 months.  
     Best Mode for Carrying Out the Invention  
     [0017] Let us give an example of how to come up with one kind of vegetable meat: “Steak”.  
     [0018] The following flours are mixed: gluten 700 grammes, wholemeal chickpea 200 grammes, wholemeal oats 70 grammes, wholemeal spelt 30 grammes, with 1 litre of vegetable broth and seasoned with salt, pepper, rosemary, extra olive oil.  
     [0019] the mixture is kneaded until everything is blended and is left to stand for twenty minutes, then the cylindrical shaped pieces of meat are prepared using synthetic casing for salami and it is boiled for one hour and forty five minutes.  
     Industrial Applicability  
     [0020] It is extremely suitable for being produced with a modern industrial system, in fact by using the latest flour mixers and modem boilers for cooking and with an automatic system for vacuum-sealed packing, the product can be made in extremely large quantities.