Mayo Is the Medium for Tackling Food’s Biggest Problems

In the quest to build a better, more sustainable food system, who would’ve thought reimagining run-of-the-mill mayo would emerge at the forefront of reinventing the food we eat?

Coming in mid-May to an alt-grocery store near you: Fabanaise, the vegan mayo from Sir Kensington’s, makers of such socially conscious condiments as non-GMO, no-high-fructose-corn-syrup ketchup and what the company claims is the only classic mayo on the market made with certified-humane, free-range eggs.

What makes Fabanaise truly newsworthy, however, is not that it eschews the eggs—there are plenty of vegan mayos on the market that do that. It’s what Sir Kensington’s has found to replace them: aquafaba, which translates roughly as “bean water,” which you might better know as that glop that you’ve long summarily poured down the drain after you open a can of beans.

Hard-core vegans are likely familiar with aquafaba—just check out The Official Aquafaba Website. But other folks may be surprised that at the right consistency, aquafaba contains a mix of “starches, proteins, and other soluble plant solids” that make for an uncanny substitution for egg whites. The Vegan Society even offers a list of its top 13 aquafaba recipes, from simple meringues to buttercream frosting.

It would take a heckuva lot of cans of beans to collect enough bean juice to make a vegan mayo that’s set to be sold nationwide. But by partnering with Ithaca Hummus in upstate New York, Sir Kensington’s found an abundant supply of the stuff that otherwise was going to waste. In a press release touting the unveiling of Fabanaise, the company claims it is “the first and only brand to utilize this previously discarded ingredient commercially.”

“We are thrilled to introduce a truly innovative, delicious condiment in a category that rarely sees groundbreaking invention,” Mark Ramadan, Sir Kensington’s cofounder and CEO, said in the release.

Well, that might be overstating the case. Just look at Hampton Creek and the wild success of its flagship product, Just Mayo. The Silicon Valley start-up has been waging its own personal campaign to revolutionize the food system by ridding it of eggs, the production of which generally wreaks environmental havoc—e.g., enormous amounts of chicken waste—while making life for egg-laying hens downright miserable.

After a bumpy year of fending off lawsuits from big food maker Unilever and the threat of federal action by the Food and Drug Administration, Hampton Creek has emerged seemingly unscathed, announcing in March that it’s set to launch more than three dozen egg-free products, ranging from creamy vegan salad dressing to cookie dough, this year.

But by turning to what has long been a thrown-out by-product of the bean business, Sir Kensington’s can rightfully make a claim to genuine innovation. Not only does Fabanaise allow consumers to slather their sandwiches sans the guilt vis-à-vis the egg industry, but it goes a step further in salvaging an edible ingredient that would otherwise go to waste. That’s happy eating, indeed.