Tim Hortons
Right now Beyond Meat is a hot foodie ticket! It is everywhere and people have asked me as a former-vegetarian now meat-eater what I think of it so I went on a foodie mission. I had to go to the pain clinic at a hospital and I was there like an hour early so I decided to try Tim Hortons’s Beyond Meat Breakfast Sausage Sandwich.
The hardest part was ordering it. They kept asking me do I want cheese, egg… for those who are vegan I guess. I kept saying, “I want everything!” which they did not understand. I did finally end up with the complete breakfast sandwich after several attempts to assure them I wanted the whole breakfast enchilada.
OK… It looked like a real sausage patty to me.
Wow! Was it ever tasty! So much so that there almost seemed to be a little heat because my nose started running. Not in a bad way, it just surprised me. This breakfast sandwich was delicious.
It held me through my very useless appointment that was torturous to sit through and just wasted my time. At least I got a product test in that day!
A&W
Then I had another appointment and remembered that A&W also had their own version of the same sandwich.
I was peckish so I decided to go in and order one to compare with the one I had at Tims.
I ordered the English Muffin Beyond Meat Sausage & Egger sandwich.
OK, patty looks very similar, egg looks more real but where is the cheese?
I turned it around and… There it is! And wow, this looked so good. I thought it was going to blow my mind. Instead. I was bored. I did not taste that beautiful spice. There was no sniffling that happened from a warm of spices. What the heck? I almost did not even finish this sandwich, it was so disappointing. I honestly hated it.
Beyond Meat
I will say that the patty overall is an excellent attempt to recreate the flavour and texture of a sausage and be GMOs, soy or gluten-free. I have no doubt that for the vegetarians out there that want a “safe” meat-free option when they are out that they will like this product. As a meat eater, as much as I enjoyed the one at Tim Hortons, I would never get it again because as good as it was, real meat for me just tastes better.
Update: You can find information about the products from Beyond Meat’s site but it was not intuitive to find. Thanks to my friend Kelly I found out that in the sausage link the ingredients are:
“Water, Pea Protein Isolate, Refined Coconut Oil, Sunflower Oil, Natural Flavor, Contains 2% or less of: Rice Protein, Faba Bean Protein, Potato Starch, Salt, Fruit Juice (For Color), Vegetable Juice (For Color), Apple Fiber, Methylcellulose, Citrus Extract (To Protect Quality), Calcium Alginate Casing.”
I give the Beyond Meat breakfast sandwich at Tim Hortons four out of five wooden spoons and the one at A&W one wooden spoons. I still can not believe what a different in quality and taste using, apparently, the same patty. They tasted like completely different entities.
Suzie, that’s a really good point that you should be able to find out what exactly it is made of! I’m glad you found one that you enjoyed.
Thanks Jamie! I thought so too! Apparently you can find out via A&W and Tim Hortons websites but it should be on the product’s site too.
I really liked this review, thank you for sharing!
Thank you for reading and commenting Michelle!!! My pleasure.
I haven’t tried this yet either at Tim Horton’s or A&W — now I’m curious to see if I find a big taste difference too!
I had an A&W one shortly after they came out and really enjoyed it (and I do prefer their ‘real’ egg over the omelet patty). I think they use different ‘sausage’ patties…possibly the same ‘meat’ but different spicing as the A&W list is different from the one you posted I read somewhere that A&W did lots of product testing/tweaking for their version, so I doubt they use ‘off the shelf’ ones at either place (which is likely the case for the actual meat versions too) sothe market ingredients on the ‘base’ one from Beyond Meat wouldn’t be totally accurate for either. There was a spice in the A&W one I really liked but just couldn’t place…so I’ll have to try it again and maybe compare it to their meat sausage which I don’t think I’ve ever had. A&W has fantastic nutrition/allergy info on their site which I really appreciate as there are things I shouldn’t eat that aren’t “allergens”. They’re completely transparent on ingredients: https://web.aw.ca/en/our-menu/breakfast/beyond-meat-sausage-egger. Tim’s OTOH, only lists nutritional information and official allergens, which is no help to folks like me, so I’ll just have to chance it if I want one: https://www.timhortons.com/ca/en/menu/beyond-meat.php
Yes, I have since heard that they have been tweaked by both companies. And you’re right, both companies have information about the patties. Thank you so much for your comment! I hope you don’t have a negative reaction to Tim’s!