Trying Soylent didn’t go well | Hacker News Reader

Trying Soylent didn’t go well

everywhereist.com

66 pointscemerick89 comments

Hmm, well, I think the problem is right there in the first part of the article. If you have a diet where you wake up and eat cookie dough and pie, you are most likely not making choices that put enough dietary fiber into your diet.

Those who don't eat enough fiber, then suddenly start consuming a healthy amount usually experience the kind of gastrointestinal distress she experienced. That's pretty much what fiber is SUPPOSED to do. The bacteria in your gut all of the sudden have a smorgasbord of stuff to break down and it releases a ton of gas as part of the process.

Not judging her, she can have all the cookie dough and pie she wants. But don't blame the food you are eating when something with a little fiber blows up your digestive track.

How is a diet of ramen and corndog much better than that? That is, I'm supposing the founders take the damn thing.

It isn't, and exactly why the founder decided to make Soylent in the first place. She oversimplifies the story of how Soylent came about, but its alright as this clearly isn't meant to be a serious critique of the stuff. Half the article is poop gifs lol.

Not to mention the founder DID have some gastrointestinal distress when he started (not to mention one batch that lacked a certain vitamin which caused him to get into some serious health trouble briefly).

There is quite a difference between fibre making going to the toilet easier, and explosive diarrhoea.

Not if it's a drastic, sudden increase. A secondary side effect of that much fiber quickly is it temporarily causes you to not absorb various minerals as you normally would. And if minerals aren't absorbed, then out they go, rather quickly. I'd post references to support it, but a quick google of sudden fiber introduction and distress will quickly show multiple results to that effect. I'll leave that up to you.

Nevermind, here's a simple one right from UCLA's dining entity: http://www.dining.ucla.edu/housing_site/dining/SNAC_pdf/Fact...

We have a line of products here in Netherlands from a company now called JimmyJoy (formerly Joylent... and the name change was probably inevitable).

I've consumed dozens of their shakes, with banana being my favorite. 700kcal, 45g protein, and about 33% of the usual daily recommended vitamins and minerals. Oh, and vegan.

I can highly recommend them.

Their "twennybars" are good too. Perfect for hiking or generally being on the go all day, if a little expensive.

Did not use Joylent for a while, didn't realize they renamed. I think I should give it a try again. First experiences where good, but it interfered with my diet plans later. Actually Joylent tasted really good.

Past Joylent customer here as well. Tried out their shakes instead of lunch at work for ~2 months; I was generally happy and I agree the shakes taste well (though the banana one doesn't smell well when you clean the shaker).

I also didn't realize they changed the name; thanks for the info.

My understanding of Dutch culinary customs is that they eat mostly food that is "kant en klaar", either precooked or neatly organized to be quickly prepared (fixed portions). Even meat tends to come with a bag of spices and a manual.

Edit: I'm not saying it's a bad thing, just seemed to me like this reduces time spent in the kitchen quite well (part of the idea behind Soylent/Joylent and w/e). The Dutch don't cook more than they need, also (with the implication that if you happen to arrive at dinner time, don't expect an invitation). :P

I have no idea where you got your understanding from. At my parents we mostly ate "potato, vegetables and meat", pasta or rice. In my student house we didn't cook potato so often (too much effort for a large group of people).

Maybe you are referring to meal kits, which contain a (dry) staple such as rice or tortilla wraps with spices. In that case you are still required to buy the meat and veggies seperately.

The high population density makes precut food viable almost everywhere. I didn't get the impression that everyone bought prepared stuff though.

I wouldn't say it's a Dutch culinary custom, but the main supermarket in The Netherlands, Albert Heijn (35% market share), does focus heavily on prepared packages with vegetables and indeed even "kant en klaar" (ready to go) meals.

For example: https://www.ah.nl/zoeken?rq=groentemix&searchType=product

Or: https://www.ah.nl/zoeken?rq=maaltijdsalade&searchType=produc...

The real upside with these is that most package are actually have a good ingredient balance; not compromising on the quality to make them sell better. Even the prepared bread you can find in the To Go shop on stations aren't filled with mayonnaise and sugar and mostly use whole wheat bread. Unlike the competitors in that space, which mostly sell cheap unhealthy products.

If you're in Europe I suggest you try Joylent. Great many flavors, nice texture, and comparably cheap. I am not on it now but I used it to replace one meal per day for weeks at a time with no adverse effects.

But yeah, I've also heared many Soylent-Horror-Stories.

I hear they renamed Joylent to Jimmy Joy. I have never tried it, but know someone at work who says good things about it. My own meal replacement drink of choice is Keto Chow.

To make it a sample-size of two, I can also confirm that I did not have any adverse effects, it just tastes funny.

Make it sample-size of three. Used it instead of lunch for two months. No adverse effects, and I liked the taste.

I live in Spain. We have good food at cheap prices and restaurants everywhere. I see absolutely no reason to try overly processed crap like that.

Yeah, I guess that's the thing, it's pretty easy to find good food no matter where you live in Europe. Except maybe UK.

Joylent/JimmyJoy shakes cost 1.83€ per shake. They provide 45g of protein per shake, 33% of daily vitamins and minerals, and 700kcal. They take about 2 minutes to make, and another 2-3 to consume.

I challenge you to find the same benefits any other way.

Not OP. My meals in Spain cost 1€ on average and it takes me around 5 minutes on average to prepare.

Example: Premade spanish tortilla with olive oil, for 1.75€ in Mercadona, 798 kcal[0]. Just heat in the microwave for a minute. (spaniards say premade spanish tortilla is awful but I think the Mercadona one, while not as good as home made, is pretty good)

[0] https://www.mercadona.es/detall_producte.php?id=80772

I'm not keen on Soylent either, but I think you're forgetting about the micro nutrients. Macro nutrients are rather easy to get on the cheap, but micro nutrients can be somewhat of a hassle.

Fresh produce is very cheap here, as well as premade dishes from local produce. What you say may be true in the US but not in Spain, at least for non-vegans.

Your suggested quick food is 5.3g of protein. I'm sure it's more enjoyable to eat than my shake, but it doesn't give me the protein that I want. It's also not something I can take as a little bag of powder and "just add water" to anywhere.

So as the hot chick on the Lil Dicky video says, "apples to oranges".

5.3g per 100g of product, that is 5.3%. It says the serving is 100g but I eat 200-300g for a full meal.

For the whole 600g of product (which is the caloric equivalent of two soylent servings) you have 32g. If you want a higher protein-to-calories ratio, just boil eggs which are even cheaper. In 10-15 minutes one can boil eggs once a week for the whole week.

edit: Before complaining about cholesterol, please watch this (or read the text version linked in the description, with sources) https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5S6-v37nOtY I recommend the rest of the channel as well.

JimmyJoy shakes are not Soylent shakes.

175g of JimmyJoy = 45g protein. That's hard to beat, especially considering all the other things you get with it.

I had no intention of complaining about cholesterol.

26% protein, mostly of wheat, which doesn't have a balanced amount of essential amino acids. Also 51% carbs and 10% fat. I wouldn't want that, way too many carbs. Fat is the best energy source for the human body, for so many reasons I wouldn't stop talking about them.

But anyway, split roasted chicken[0] has the same proportion of protein (26%, but the serving is bigger at 65g). It comes with 4 individual bags of 250g of chicken for ~4.65€ (1.16€ each) and one can just heat a bag in the microwave. And it's very well seasoned and delicious.

[0] https://www.mercadona.es/detall_producte.php?id=80874

Chicken breast, some bread and some fruits? Yeah it takes more to cook, but why would you stress over eating? I actually like to enjoy my food in peace with enough time.

I prefer spending 50min eating a 10 euro menu and relaxing out of office. Or eating the meal I have prepared in my house.

Perhaps Soylent/Joylent/etc is good when you're in a hurry but I wouldn't like to base my general diet on them

I'm pretty sure that Jimmy Joy (Joylent) is still better-balanced food than what you prepare in a house or buy in a restaurant.

Fine, I prefer something not perfectly balanced and enjoying it than some prefectly balanced with micronutrients measured to the microgram and being just a shake.

Mediterranian diet has no bad problems

But to each their own

A lunch meal at a restaurant with friends/coworkers is just so much more civilized - and satisfying - than eating some melee out of a plastic container.

And the Mediterranean countries are just masters in this area (thank you Spain/France/Italy!)

I don't think anyone suggested that it's an either-or proposition.

When you need something fast, or you need something fast AND you want a good amount of protein, these shakes are great.

I'd certainly rather have a nice several course meal with friends; but if I have little time, these shakes are a great solution.

This was my comment

> Perhaps Soylent/Joylent/etc is good when you're in a hurry but I wouldn't like to base my general diet on them

it was followed by this

> I'm pretty sure that Jimmy Joy (Joylent) is still better-balanced food than what you prepare in a house or buy in a restaurant.

I'm pretty sure joylent lost me a job once. I was there consulting but they were making good noises about an extension.

Then I tried a week on joylent. I emitted smells I have only previously come across in a hospital. The putrid reak of a gut in very great distress.

It goes away in a few days, said the internet. So I kept faith and held on for a week, then a second.

One morning I came in to find my desk had been moved to the break area. 'we noticed that your are ill so we thought it was better all round if you weren't here with the team'

I dropped joylent after that, and my bowels went back to normal. But the damage was done (indeed I had to bin some of my trousers as the damage seemed embedded in them).

So I say, joylent, okay, but only if you work from home and don't cohabit.

Too bad about the problems you had with your colon. But guts are complex systems, and it sounds like yours was not prepared for the stuff in those shakes.

Fortunately I've not experienced what you experienced... and I'm on my 40th bag or so (3 shakes per bag).

Where are you based? I'm moving to Madrid with my fam soon and looking to making some friends in the "community".

Barcelona. Pretty sure there will be meetup groups for your interests in Madrid.

I sometimes don't want good food, I just want to get it over with. Ideally with "it" being more sensible than a buttery croissant.

Good food is something I spend time on and with, mostly in the evening.

If you rely on "menu del día" for lunch, you are probably doing a poor dietary choice. I know very few restaurants that offer a healthy lunch menu.

What do you consider unhealthy?

Until some years ago, the "menu del dia" was basically french fries with something fried.

At least in Barcelona, now I can find equilibrated menus

I see. French fries are not very good, yeah. Unless I'm traveling I tend to avoid restaurants in Spain because there's a lot of food that is easy to make at home. And because restaurants tend to be expensive in comparison.

If you're in Europe, I suggest you eat actual food.

Huel is also great of you are in Europe and are interested in meal replacement powders.

This post actually had me doubled over in laughter.

Perhaps the most appropriate use of multiple consecutive stuff coming out of tube GIFs the internet has ever seen.

And then she went back for more!

It reminded me of this internet joke: http://future-is-here.com/chilli.htm

Ingredients are typically listed from highest percentage down.

I see: Filtered Water, Soy Protein Isolate, ...

Soy Protein

I can take a guess where the problem lies.

YMMV, but when I try something like this, I for one stick to Whey-based products. Soy doesn't agree with everyone.

I had / am having a different experience. I wish the author did a bit more research and had laid out some more facts; a guy in the comments says it pretty much perfectly:

> Of all the articles that have talked about soylent, both positively and negatively, this is one of the least informative. Because, guess what? You didn't actually give soylent a try. You just saw an opportunity to make fun of a product that you don't agree with. Anyone who actually wants to learn something about soylent would gain nothing from reading this.

To share my experience: It's been quite the opposite. She complains about the bowel movements, but honestly after I started drinking Soylent exclusively my bowel movements are more healthy and are at a more healthy pace.

I don't think I'm too lazy to heat up a corn dog or some ramen noodles, but I do have issues eating healthy, and those quick meals don't have a whole lot of nutritional value. Soylent solves this problem for me.

But what if this was just… entertainment? Check out the about page of her blog — http://www.everywhereist.com/about/ — this isn't a foodie's journal cataloguing the world of all things edible, this is a copywriter that took up blogging while traveling. She found something to write about, and wrote about it. (In a style that was funny while not being cringe-inducing, which I find rare these days.)

Side note, though — awesome to hear that Soylent works for you. Because, as you said, this _is_ the story I've heard most of the time. I don't like in an area where I'd ever stumble into someone that even knows what Soylent is, so a flip side to these stories is always good to know.

Fair enough; this is the apparently kind of storytelling I don't enjoy. I misinterpreted and assumed that this was supposed to be informative, and not entertaining.

I have the same reaction to Soylent...minus the witty commentary. Just the suffering.

I have two thoughts about this submission. First, this is a funny and well written blog entry about someone trying Soylent. Second, Hacker News is not the right place for this.

This is humor and viewpoint. HN wants, or at least pretends to want, analysis and figures. Maybe if they stripped all the CSS from the site and made the blog look like it was made by a dysfunctional highschooler in the 90's it would get a bit more respect.

Oh I'm getting nearly as much amusement out of reading the comments that solely focus on soylent as a product as I got out of reading the (excellent, imho, but not very objective) post.

> The point is, I derive a lot of joy from food because I’m not a sociopath.

I don't derive joy from food. Guess I must be a sociopath. Fuck you too.

To be fair, a negative experience probably leaves you writing a negative review, and it sounds like she had a pretty rubbish experience.

So, fair enough.

> The point is, I derive a lot of joy from food because I’m not a sociopath.

etc.

Oh come. This is just trolling for page views. If you engage, you're just feeding the troll. Don't bother.

It is a mystery why people in tech thought that "meal replacement liquid" was a fundamentally new product. It's not

http://www.hollandandbarrett.com/shop/weight-management/meal... https://www.tesco.com/groceries/product/browse/default.aspx?...

Perhaps, a victory of marketing over experience and existing knowledge of nutrition?

What was "new" about Soylent and subequent imitators is that it's marketed as a meal replacement product for "normal" people.

Earlier meal replacement products were either marketed for weight-loss purposes or medical purposes, mostly as supplements for people who, for various reasons, can't consume their full daily recommended intake of calories and nutrients. They were typically to be found in pharmacies and health-food stores.

Not sure what your purpose is in rallying against this, anyway. Soylent has been around for a while now. It's no longer a new product.

> Not sure what your purpose is in rallying against this, anyway

Just one question - why would tech people be best placed to do this, not you know, nutritionists who have successfully, established products in an adjacent niche?

As GP said, the difference is marketing. This was marketed to "normal" people, which works best when created by a "normal" person.

Of course, now that "normal" people are aware that liquid meal replacements are a thing, there are other options.

I wonder if Soylent would have been even more successful if instead of trying to "develop" a food from scratch with software engineer skills, they had instead simply rebadged or varied an existing NutriSlim-type product.

In Soylent's specific case it looks like they saw an unaddressed opportunity in the tech environment around them, then expanded from there. They took a marketing approach (it's about "science and efficiency") which that crowd responds to. Nutrition and food marketers weren't a part of that world and likely didn't have the chance to see the opportunity.

My wife has some stomach issues that we think are related to allergies (to what? the elimination diet gave us some suspects, but no convictions). After reading this, I think I'm going to stop suggesting she try Soylent as an alternative option.

Probably stress :(

Replacing a normal diet with a soy based liquid diet isn't going to go so well.

Soy mimics estrogen and long term overconsumption can contribute to endocrine issues that are hard to diagnose and poorly understood.

Soylent isn't made of soy, it only has Soy Protein Isolate in it.

Soy protein is a potential problem. See: https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/m/pubmed/17885008/

I think Soylent is stupid, but I stopped reading after I saw the article was front-loaded with a review of Soylent's marketing image and some bland musing related to the way modern labeling is scary because of it's inaccessibility.

I'm sure if I followed her as an author - rather than for the subject matter - I'd feel differently. But I didn't go into this blog looking to read someone talk about whatever while being quirky and making it about themselves. So I just found her personality really grating.

Soylent takes its name from a 1960s sci-fi thriller starring Charlton Heston (the website maintains they actually got the idea from the book on which the film is based. Sure, guys. Sure.) In the movie, there’s a massive food shortage, and Soylent is the food replacement that everyone eats

And the story behind Soylent™ is basically just s/food shortage/time shortage/, no?

Or what else is the point?

That's really strange; says far more about the author that they don't believe someone could possibly have read a book before seeing (or not have seen) a derivative film.

I think she is pointing out that the makers of soylent say they don't have the time to prepare ramen, but they had the time to read the book instead of watching the film.

I think you're reading too far into it. This doesn't seem like a super serious blog. It's just taking the low hanging fruit and making jokes out of them.

The first time she consumed it, it was too much at once. The second time she took her time drinking the bottle.

Sometimes when you take in a load of nutrients, and you are not hungry to death or something, your stomach decides to reject the food because it is more than it can handle.

This also happens when you go through rapid temperature changes or when you lose your appetite.

I have been using Soylent for a month now and have no problem. Although I'm using the powder one you have to mix with water not the bottled one which contain caffeine and is made to replace your breakfast + coffee.

Anyway sorry you had such bad experience, living in then toilet is never great :/

There's multiple kinds of the bottled Soylent, including non-caffeinated ones that are meant to be closer to the powder + water mix. The pictures indicate that she's drinking those.

> not the bottled one which contain caffeine and is made to replace your breakfast + coffee

Actually, the base 2.0 (bottled) Soylent doesn't contain caffeine and is intended to replace any meal of the day. What you are referring to is Coffiest, which is only one variety.

They added two more caffeinated varieties.

I guess you should not eat candy received from strangers and a one solution to all problems product from a salesman. Hope this stops people from destroying their bodies because of chronic diarrhoea.

Did anyone else notice that the ingredients in soylent are almost exactly the same as the ingredients in baby food, except without the dehydrated milk?

That was hilarious. I say while drinking my chocolate soylent.

I haven't had any ill effects since v2.

radically changing your diet to a controversial product can lead to unfavourable consequences, who'd've thunk ?

Very funny and a great writing style.

We are trying to launch a similar product here in my country. The negative publicity that Soylent has generated for itself, hasn't helped our nerves one bit as we come closer to the launch.

Unlike US, Bars and drinks are not in fashion here. We have decided to launch in form of Lollipops. Our team is having a hard time coming up with a motto, but we'll get over it.

Any advice from the wise HN folks on how to handle the first batches of users ( we'll be giving out the first few hundred lollipops for free on condition that users click a selfie with the lollipop every day and tag us on FB/Twitter ), in case things go wrong!!

How does a meal-replacement lollipop work? How many calories does each lollipop contain?

Well ... you'll be amazed at the R&D we did to make it work. It took us almost five years to get to where we are today.

We'll be releasing detailed documentation of the manufacturing process/In-Lab testing. Our team wanted to open-source the whole design, but we're not there yet. Maybe in a few month's time after the launch.

This is a troll, right? The url in your profile doesn't even resolve.

Sorry, but that is not the name, will update my profile.

We came up with that codename once Soylent started on Kickstarter, but that's only a kind of inhouse joke.

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