 | |
 An "original chick'n" veggie patty | |
| Product type | Veggie burger |
|---|---|
| Owner | Kraft Heinz |
| Produced by | Kraft Foods |
| Country | U.S. |
| Introduced | 1979 |
| Website | bocaburger.com |
Boca Burger is a veggie burger produced by Kraft Heinz in Chicago, Illinois. Like all of Boca Foods' products, Boca Burgers serve as a meat alternative. [1] [2]
The Boca Foods Company began in 1979 with the vegetarian "Sun Burger" product, as one of the first frozen, plant-based burger replacement products. [1] Over the next decade, more burgers were introduced, as well as meatless versions of ground beef, chicken nuggets, various toppings on pizza, chili, lasagna, and sausages. Organic versions of some Boca products appeared in 2001.
Then Kraft Foods, the United States' largest packaged foods company, announced in early 2000 that it had reached agreement to purchase Boca Burger, Inc., a privately held manufacturer and marketer of soy-based meat alternatives. The announcement was made when Kraft Foods was represented by Gordon James and Clifford A. Wolff. The products are sold in the United States through retail grocery and club stores, natural foods stores and food service channels nationwide. Boca Burger, based in Chicago, Illinois, had 1999 revenues of about $40 million, almost double the previous year. [3] By 2002, sales had grown to $70 million per year. [3]
As of April 2020, Boca also offers meatless skillet meals. [4]
| Year | Award | Result |
|---|---|---|
| 2008 | PETA: The Golden Bun Awards | Won [5] |
A meat alternative or meat substitute, is a food product made from vegetarian or vegan ingredients, eaten as a replacement for meat. Meat alternatives typically approximate qualities of specific types of meat, such as mouthfeel, flavor, appearance, or chemical characteristics. Plant- and fungus-based substitutes are frequently made with soy, but may also be made from wheat gluten as in seitan, pea protein as in the Beyond Burger, or mycoprotein as in Quorn. Alternative protein foods can also be made by precision fermentation, where single cell organisms such as yeast produce specific proteins using a carbon source; as well as cultivated or laboratory grown, based on tissue engineering techniques. The ingredients of meat alternative include 50–80% water, 10–25% textured vegetable proteins, 4–20% non-textured proteins, 0–15% fat and oil, 3-10% flavors/spices, 1-5% binding agents and 0-0.5% coloring agents.
A veggie burger is a hamburger made with a patty that does not contain meat, or the patty of such a hamburger. The patty may be made from ingredients like beans, nuts, grains, seeds, or fungi such as mushrooms or mycoprotein.
Morningstar Farms is a division of Kellanova that produces vegan and vegetarian food. Many of their offerings are plant-based variations of traditionally meat products. Their products include meatless chicken nuggets, popcorn chicken, corn dogs, breakfast sausage, burgers, hot dogs, bacon, and pizza snack rolls with vegan cheese. Originally, Morningstar offered some, but not all vegan products. In 2019, Morningstar Farms announced all products would be vegan by 2021, but had not yet done so as of May 2024.
Lightlife Foods is a company that produces food for plant-based diets. In 2018, its worth was estimated at $80 million. It is best known for its plant-based veggie dog, Smart Dog, which launched in 1993. In 2019, the company launched a plant-based burger to compete with Impossible Foods and Beyond Meat. Lightlife Foods is a carbon-neutral company.
The Toronto Vegetarian Association (TVA), also known as VegTO, is a volunteer-driven, charitable organization based in Toronto, Ontario. Founded in 1945, its mission is to inspire people to choose a healthier, greener, more compassionate lifestyle through plant-based eating.
Tofurky is the brand name of an American vegan turkey replacement made from a blend of wheat protein and organic tofu. Tofurky brand was officially introduced in 1995.
Gardein is a line of meat-free foods produced by Conagra Brands. In 2003, the company was founded by Yves Potvin, who remained as the CEO of Gardein until 2016. In November 2014, Pinnacle Foods purchased Gardein for $154 million. Pinnacle was acquired by Conagra in 2018.
Vegetarian bacon, also referred to as veggie bacon, vegan bacon, vegan rashers, vacon, or facon, is a plant-based imitation of bacon.
Linda McCartney Foods is a British food brand specializing in vegetarian and vegan food. Available in the UK, as well as Norway, Ireland, Austria, Australia, South Africa and New Zealand, the range includes chilled and frozen meat analogues in the form of burgers, sausages, sausage rolls, meatballs, stir-fry dishes and pastas.
Veggie Grill is a fast-casual vegan restaurant chain that operates in California, Oregon, Washington, Illinois, Massachusetts and New York. After first being opened in Irvine, California, it already had 29 restaurants across the United States in February 2018.
Impossible Foods Inc. is a company that develops plant-based substitutes for meat products. The company's signature product, the Impossible Burger, was launched in July 2016 as a vegan alternative to beef hamburger.
McVegan is a veggie burger sold by the fast-food restaurant chain McDonald's. In 2017, McDonald partnered with the Swedish food company Orkla to create a plant-based patty inside a small steel kitchen in Malmö, where they began the creation of the product. In Germany, the chain's vegan burger is sold as the Big Vegan TS.
The Impossible Whopper is a veggie burger sold by Burger King. It is a variant of the Whopper, with a burger patty made from a meat alternative provided by Impossible Foods. First introduced in the United States in 2019, it was made available in Canada in 2021.
A vegan school meal or vegan school lunch or vegan school dinner or vegan hot lunch is a vegan option provided as a school meal. A small number of schools around the world serve vegan food or are vegan schools, serving exclusively vegan food.
Meatless Farm is a British company that produces vegan, plant-based meats which are made primarily from pea protein. It was founded in 2016 by the Danish entrepreneur, Morten Toft Bech.
The McPlant is a vegetarian burger sold by the fast-food chain McDonald's in several European countries. In 2021, McDonald's partnered with Beyond Meat, a Los Angeles–based producer of plant-based meat substitutes, to create the McPlant platform. It features a plant-based meat alternative burger patty made from plant ingredients such as potatoes, peas and rice.
Yves Veggie Cuisine is an alternative meat brand owned by Hain Celestial Group.
Kraft Foods current brands | ||
|---|---|---|
| Baking |  | |
| Beverages | ||
| Condiments | ||
| Convenience food | ||
| Dairy | ||
Soy (Glycine max) | |||||||||||||
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| General |  | ||||||||||||
| Soy-based dishes | |||||||||||||
| Plant milk | |||||||||||||
| Meat analogues | |||||||||||||
| Sauces and condiments |
| ||||||||||||
| Other foods | |||||||||||||
| Biochemicals |
| ||||||||||||
| Companies | |||||||||||||
| Other |
| ||||||||||||
