For lovers of plant-based eating, it’s always worth keeping an eye on the shelves at Sprout’s Market, they always have some great discounts across entire lines of interesting labels. Which is exactly how I cam across the Hungry Planet brand. Eschewing the popular pea protein trend, the products relies on TVP; eight frozen meatballs come to a resealable bag.
Cooking: Bake, microwave or pan fry. I also ran a couple through the air fryer (see the hoagie roll below for those results).
Taste and texture: The texture is naturally variable based on how you cook these – pan fried with sauce (see below) they up as quite mushy and mealy. The Thai flavor profile is intriguing on the package but doesn’t really translate to the final tasting. There’s strong lemongrass and lime leaf notes, but absolutely no spice, or sharpness. You could be kind and call them, ‘inspired by Thai cuisine’ perhaps.
Overall: A fairly mediocre product. The overly mushy texture is quite off-putting. I didn’t try to microwave them but expect the results would fare little better. The muted flavors makes this a confusing product for me, any South East Asian dish, replete in robust spice and flavor would completely dominate these.
Hungry Planet Pork Meatballs nutrition and cooking
-
Overall
Are Hungry Planet Pork Meatballs any good?
These are a fairly limited product with a mushy texture. The flavors are muted and lack the bright spark of Thai cuisine.
Hi, I’m Stuart, nice to meet you! I’m the founder, writer and wrangler at Gastronomic SLC – Utah’s biggest and oldest online food magazine; I’m also a former restaurant critic of more than five years, working for the Salt Lake Tribune. I’ve worked extensively with multiple local publications from Visit Salt Lake to Salt Lake Magazine, not least helped to consult on national TV shows.
I’m a multiple-award winning journalist and have covered the Utah dining scene for the better part of fifteen years. I’m largely fueled by a critical obsession with rice, alliteration and the use of big words I don’t understand. I started Shop Smart to catalogue my adventures in the grocery store and kitchen. Follow along on Instagram too!