Say goodbye to your tubs of I Can’t Believe It’s Not Butter — there’s a new, vegan butter substitute on the rise and it’s about to shake up the dairy and margarine industries.
The product is Faba Butter, and it has one goal — to be a true butter replacer in terms of taste, texture, and functionality while reducing the environmental damage that margarine and butter production do to the ecosystem.
The vegan butter is manufactured by Fora Foods and encourages customers to shift from dairy butter to the sustainably produced Faba Butter, Foodbeast reports.
Production of regular butter uses high rates of water, land and produces methane emissions that are a major contributor to climate change, according to the Environmental Protection Agency. Margarine production uses high amounts of palm oil, which is a major contributor to rainforest deforestation, according to the Rainforest Action Network.
Faba Butter was born when Fora Foods co-founders Aidan Altman and Andrew McClure wanted to replace the harmful dairy and margarine products with a more sustainable, though equal in quality, substitute. Instead of palm oil, Faba Butter is made with coconut oil and a key ingredient called Aquafaba.
Aquafaba is the water left over after boiling legumes, such as chickpeas, and contains “the proteins, the starches, and other soluble solids that all travel from the chickpea seed from cooking to the cooking water,” McClure told Foodbeast.
The Aquafaba is used as a thickener and binding agent in the butter, and McClure says it is the reason their plant-based substitute has a “dairy-like mouthfeel.” To achieve the perfect taste, the duo worked with New York culinary giants, including the executive chef from Saxon & Parole.
Eager to get your hands on this? You’re going to have to wait a bit longer — Fora Foods launched as a company in January and the Faba Butter will be sent out to restaurants first. A Kickstarter will be launched March 1 to help get the vegan butter to retailers, and the expected price for a pound is $6.
If all goes well, Faba Butter can help put a dent in the quantity of environmentally harmful production.
