The quest to make vegan salmon that tastes – and flakes – like the real thing | Canada Voices

The first thing visitors see when they walk into New School Foods’ Toronto headquarters is a wall covered in framed photographs of fish fillets.

To be more precise, it’s 26 images of dinner-sized portions of salmon – each one a prototype created in the high-tech lab at the back of the building, part of the company’s quest to make a plant-based protein that looks, smells, cooks, tastes and flakes like the real McCoy.

“We will never stop trying to make it better,” says Chris Bryson, New School Foods’ founder, addressing a crowd of investors, journalists, government types and curious foodies at a recent open house celebrating the company’s new 28,000-square-foot manufacturing facility in Toronto’s west end. “We’re not just making fish differently – we’re making the future of food, on Canadian soil, with Canadian talent, using Canadian ingenuity.”

Past the photo wall, we meet New School’s team of young scientists, who encourage guests to squish, sniff and examine the faux fish up close. They explain the meaty portion is made primarily from seaweed extract, with muscle fibres formed using potato protein. The fishy flavour and aroma come from algae oil. The pink hue? That’s thanks to paprika and tomato.

There’s no soy or gluten, and it delivers the same amount of Omega-3 and Omega-6 fatty acids, iron and vitamin B12 as real salmon. But the kicker? It’s free of mercury and microplastics commonly found in wild fish, whose stocks are rapidly dwindling from overfishing. Developed with help from Toronto Metropolitan University, this plant-based salmon is being pitched as a cleaner, safer alternative – for consumers and the planet.

Then comes the real test: the taste.

At three food stations, chefs from popular Toronto restaurants prepare the salmon their way. Stefano’s, a plant-based Italian diner, serves a “Filet O’ Fish” burger with tartar sauce and pickles on a Blackbird Baking Co. bun. Animal Liberation Kitchen offers roasted salmon with creamed spinach and lemon. And the award-winning And/Ore dishes up a seared salmon fillet with pommes dauphinoise, vegan caviar, garlic aioli and pickled shallots. (The chefs were paid for their time, but all have served New School salmon to customers in their restaurants and are fans of the product.)

Lineups are long. Many guests come back for seconds. The consensus? New School Foods has nailed it.

Missy Hui, chef-owner of And/Ore, says she’s worked with many mock meats, but this one stands alone. “Chris and his team have been consulting with us during development, so we’ve been able to provide feedback. The versatility is what makes it stand out – it caramelizes, the texture changes when it’s cooked and because it comes raw – not breaded like many other plant-based fish products – it’s flexible,” she says. “I can sear, sous-vide, bake or grill it just like an ordinary piece of fish.

“In my restaurant, we offer this as a swap for vegans or vegetarians who want to try something different. People who love seafood have loved it – and they often ask where they can buy it.”

The answer? You can’t. Not yet.

New School Foods’ salmon products – a burger and a fillet – aren’t available in grocery stores. And that’s deliberate. Bryson says the product had to pass the “chef test” before he’d even consider pitching it to retailers (although they have lined up two large distributors, Bondi Produce and Gordon Food Service).

“Too many plant-based companies have rushed to market with products that were good, but not good enough,” he says, noting that many recent launches generated early hype, only to see supermarket sales slump. The reasons? High prices, unclear ingredients and disappointing flavour or texture. Plus, the industry has been tainted from the backlash against ultraprocessed foods.

Bryson knows he has an uphill battle to change public perception. He’s good with that, trusting if chefs give his products stamps of approval, consumers will too. “They’re a critical piece of the puzzle. If it doesn’t work for them, why would home cooks care?”

So far, New School’s salmon fillets have landed in 30 restaurants across Ontario and Quebec, including Gia, One (at the Hazelton Hotel) and Vinoteca Pompette in Toronto; Tuck Shop and Sushi Momo in Montreal; national chains such as Il Fornello; and Jackson-Triggs Winery in Niagara-on-the-Lake. The company also caught the attention of Inter Ikea, which joined a recent US$6-million funding round, part of the Swedish retail giant’s plan to make 50 per cent of its restaurant meals plant-based by 2025.

Making faux salmon, with a good mouth feel and fibrous texture, it turns out, is one of the toughest feats in food tech. “If you think about the macro structure, you’ve got these pink or orange zones, and then white lines that effectively melt when you cook salmon, which creates the flaky texture. Then those flakes need to break down into fibres. It’s a multipart, complex structure,” says Bryson.

“You name a problem – we’ve had it. Sometimes the texture was too soft, then too firm. Or the flavour would be too overpowering, then not strong enough. If you fixed the texture, you messed up the flavour. It’s like a Rubik’s Cube.”

But that complexity was part of the appeal. “We knew if we could replicate the toughest product then we could recreate any whole-cut protein.”

Other Canadian startups stepping up to the challenge include Victoria-based Save da Sea, Port Coquitlam’s TMRW Foods, Toronto’s Seed to Surf, Montreal’s BY2048 and Vancouver’s Konscious Foods, which recently received $5-million in funding from the provincial government to help mitigate threats to the B.C. salmon trade.

New School’s competitive edge lies in its proprietary directional freezing technology and patented scaffolding process. That same tech is now being used to develop other products, including plant-based beef steaks and bone-in ribs (yes, the bone is made of wood), which guests at the event also got to sample.

This writer’s take? The salmon is convincing. The red meat? Not quite there yet. Bryson took the criticism like a champ.

“We want to hear criticism. That’s how we get better,” says the entrepreneur, who previously sold his grocery e-commerce startup, Unata, to Instacart. “Our salmon evolved through continuous feedback from chefs. We’ll do the same with our red meat.”

There’s no timeline for the rib and steak launch. “Could be a couple months, could be a year,” Bryson says. “We just keep going back and making it better. When restaurants are willing to put it on their menus, we’ll know we’ve done something right.”

That “back to the drawing board” mentality has won over chefs like Theo Lerikos, executive chef and owner of Montreal’s Tuck Shop, who’s been serving New School’s salmon for three months. Like Hui, he’s a fan of its versatility.

“I typically pan-sear it, caramelize the crust on one side, then finish it in the oven,” he says. “For vegan diners, we do a white wine sauce with nutritional yeast for depth and flavour. Or I’ll serve it my favourite way – with a beurre blanc, or olive oil, lemon, capers and parsley.”

For Lerikos, the plant-based salmon is a great alternative to offer vegan or vegetarian customers “instead of another cauliflower or mushroom steak, or pasta.”

New School’s long-term goal is to license its technology to other food brands, becoming a 100-per-cent Canadian alternative to U.S. giants such as Impossible Foods and Beyond Meat. Bryson sees his company’s patented processing system – operating under its new umbrella company, NS/TX – as a platform others can build on.

“Our biggest challenge is getting the next wave of consumers to try the category,” he says. “There’s understandable skepticism about plant-based meat, but that’s why we focus on taste and texture. When people try it, they’re usually surprised – and often delighted.”

“If the world keeps eating like it does, we’re going to leave a very unlivable planet for the next generation,” he adds. “I’m not saying we can solve all the world’s problems. But I think everyone here genuinely wants to make a difference.”