Soylent meal replacement set to hit market; not made of Humans
Meal replacement drinks are nothing new. Jevity, Nutren are used primarily by hospitals and store shelves are full of supplemental drinks such as Ensure and MuscleMilk, but Soylent is something different in the sense that its creator, 24-year-old engineer Rob Rhinehart, wants it to test our perceptions of the sustainability of food. What are we truly putting into our bodies? To put it simply, bad stuff, that much is true. Soylent is full of good stuff.
A vegan source of protein, and an assortment of carbohydrates, amino acids, proteins and dozens of other vitamins, Soylent is not exactly lacking in the nutrition department. The drink (which is currently in Beta testing) has already gathered over $1 million in pre-orders, and there will be a party in August for the official launch. That rounds out to around 140,000 shipments, pretty impressive for an initial product run. And to be perfectly clear, the name is tongue-in-cheek and not related to Soylent Green, the fictional supplement made of people.
Of course, since the product has yet to even hit the market there has not been any long term testing on the effects of drinking Soylent as a sole meal replacement. Yet, the product is full of things already approved by the FDA, so the worst thing that one could imagine happening is the effects of an all liquid diet on the digestive system. And as Rhinehart told Techcrunch, "No one really worried about me when I had an awful diet of Doritos and fast food. But now that I’ve invented something that’s good for you, everyone is worried about me killing myself."
He has a pretty good point. Aside from the dietitians and medical professionals on his advisory board, Rhinehart is regularly updating his blog with his health statistics such as blood sugar levels, platelet counts and even his sleep schedule. Basically, he is doing all kinds of testing and showing the proof that what he has developed is a viable and marketable option for healthy meal replacement.
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