Everything Under The Sun: Creating Vegetable-Based Egg Substitute Products

Monday, January 9, 2017

Creating Vegetable-Based Egg Substitute Products

The Vegg vegan egg yolk.

Sometimes all it takes is a bit of invention to make a food product that will appeal to a specialized group of eaters. Pennsylvanian Rocky Sheapherd used to love eggs, especially the flavor. But a little bit of information made its way into his life, like finding out how chickens are treated on factory farms and then the health effects of consuming all that cholesterol. That ended Rocky's love of both eggs and meat products. He converted over to a vegan lifestyle.

But he still liked the flavor of eggs. Now, what was he to do about that? The challenge was create something that had the flavor and texture of egg yolks, but only use complete.100% vegetable products. Oh, and the other thing would be that the egg replacement should only cost as much as an egg. Rocky tried many different formulas until he found just the right one. That led to the introduction of the product and the company, THE VEGG, starting out with only one product, the vegg, the vegetable-based egg yolk substitute.

Mr. Sheapherd discusses the company's philosophy, "The Vegg's vision is a world without factory farming. I focus on chickens by creating egg replacements that simulate the taste, flavor and functionality of real eggs, all at about the same cost as real eggs."

Now, a few years since it first started, The Vegg makes more products. including The Vegg Scramble; the updated version of the original The Vegg Scramble, The Vegg Not Your Parents' Tofu Scramble; The Vegg Baking Mix; The Vegg Vegan Egg Yolk; The Vegg Egg Replacer; The Vegg Original French Toast Mix; The Vegg New/Improved French Toast Mix; and The Vegg Instant Tofu. The online store allows customers interested in these types of products to buy them, and also offers a cookbook for the yolk substitute.

Some of the crew on the MV Jules Verne hold The Vegg products. The Vegg has supplied Sea Shepherd ships for the past few years.

Currently, Rocky and The Vegg are taking a risk to re-brand some of his product in new, more attractive, packaging. He's looking to make a run of The Vegg Vegan Scrambled Egg, with the help of the design and advertising capabilities of a NYC agency. The hope is that, with the new packaging, he'll be able to start getting product on the shelves of major grocery chains.