Plant-Based Filet Mignon Steaks Are Coming for Your Cookouts

Burger patties are shaking in their plant-based blood.

A person seasons Juicy Marbles' filet mignon steaks.
Courtesy of Juicy Marbles
Courtesy of Juicy Marbles

We’re calling it. Spring and summer of 2021 will bring more cookouts than any other time in recent memory. After spending more than a year mostly indoors and separated from friends and family, people are primed to socialize again, while still cognisant of doing what it takes to stamp out this pandemic once and for all: keeping fêtes outdoors and maintaining physical distancing. DIY outdoor dining is the ideal solution, right under our noses like so much charcoal grill smoke.

Those who adhere to a plant-based diet, however, have by now had plenty of opportunities to try the myriad burgers, beverages, and breakfast items on the market. We’re hungry for something new, something different, something... premium.

Right on cue, straight out of Ljubljana, the Slovenian city famed for its sculpture arts, come plant-based filet mignon steaks. Using its patent-pending, simultaneously past/future sounding Meat-o-matic Reverse Grinder 9000, “fancy plant meats” company Juicy Marbles has “created the first line of raw, plant-based steaks, starting with the most premium cut of them all, ultra-tender Filet Mignon,” according to a press release.

"The biggest challenge was getting the right fiber alignment and intramuscular fat structure—the marbling,” Juicy Marbles co-founder Luka Sincek said in the statement. “The most expensive steaks in the world are known for their lush marbling. It takes a lot of energy and a rare breed of cow to attain that. With plant meat, we control it and, thus, over time, can scale up our steak production and bring down the price. Eventually, we'll be able to make the most premium meats attainable for everyone.”

You can order Juicy Marbles filets to the contiguous United States now, and they’re as spendy as you’d expect any fine cut to be—if not more. A 600-gram portion, which the company says can feed up to four, (but, like life, it depends on how you slice it!) is priced at $147.58. It appeared that shipping would be free on orders over $83.24 at press time.

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