Costco MorningStar Farms Veggie Original Sausage Patties - Review
Are these MorningStar Farms Veggie Sausage Patties from Costco a morning star or just another food that becomes a chore to eat?
Item Description
Costco sells a 32 count MorningStar Farms Veggie Original Sausage Patties for $14.49. They are found in the frozen food section near the other breakfast items. I purchased these when they were on sale for $10.59. I paid $0.33 per veggie patty, while they normally sell for $0.45 each.
Costco also sells a plant-based breakfast sandwich.
I guess these are essentially an older version of impossible burger or beyond the meat, that doesn’t try to pass it off as a meat clone. The box clearly states these are veggie patties and I don’t think their goal was to imitate real sausage as closely as possible.
The interesting thing is, the box doesn’t give a lot of information about what these patties actually are and what they are made of. What you see in the above image is essentially what all sides of the box look like. They show the product, they clearly state it’s a veggie patty, and they do show some benefits compared to pork sausage, but they don’t really explain much more about the patties themselves. I have the box in front of me as I type this, and I have eaten a few of the patties, but I still have no clue what I actually ate.
MorningStar Farms does show some of the benefits of a veggie sausage patty compared to a cooked pork sausage and it’s pretty compelling. These original veggie sausage patties have 79% less fat than cooked pork sausage, have 9 grams of protein, and are only 80 calories each. The nutritional information is pretty impressive and I will go a little more in depth on it in the next section.
Nutritional Information & Ingredients
Typically in my Costco reviews, I’ll save the ingredients and nutritional information for last, but since we are talking about a vegan breakfast sausage, it does seem appropriate to mention the nutritional information earlier in the post.
The ingredients listed on the package are: water, wheat gluten, soy protein concentrate, vegetable oil, soy flour, and soy protein isolate. There are also a bunch of ingredients that are 2% or less of the product that I won’t list. I don’t know how they turned the aforementioned ingredients into a vegan sausage patty, and maybe I don’t want to know, but somehow they did it.
For nutritional facts, these Costco veggie sausage patties are actually extremely healthy for you calorie wise. There are only 80 calories per veggie sausage with 3g of fat, 5g of carbs, and 9g of protein. This is a great protein to fat and carbs ratio.
The one claim that really did stand out to me was that these veggie sausage patties have 79% less fat than cooked pork sausage. I wonder what the significance is of using the word cooked. Does the amount of fat change between uncooked and cooked pork? Wouldn’t it be assumed that it would be compared to a cooked product and not a raw product? Not really sure what to make of that, it was just something that was interesting to me.
Review
The reason I had to go over the nutritional information so early on in my review is because making the determination if this is a healthy product or not will significantly impact the review. Should I judge this product just as I would any other breakfast product or do I take into consideration that it is a veggie patty and that it is intended to be a relatively healthy food?
I sat on this question for a while and I couldn’t come up with an answer that would be fair to MorningStar Farms as well as the other breakfast items at Costco. I really have no choice but to speak on the veggie patties from both perspectives.
To describe the patties, they are a little on the smaller side. They are about two inches wide and half an inch thick. The color of the veggie patties is also a little darker than I anticipated they would be. The picture on the box looks like your typical sausage color that is a medium brown, while in their frozen state I would consider them to be a dark brown. There also seems to be a handful of visible white or yellow nugget pieces within each sausage patty.
They do provide 3 different heating options which I will mention in the section below, but I decided to air fry these for my breakfast. The air fryer heats up in just a few minutes and is quick and convenient. I cooked mine at 375° for 10 minutes, flipping halfway through.
The finished product looked ok. I would expect a regular sausage patty to glisten with oil when I pull it out of the air fryer, but the MorningStar Farms vegetable patty was unappealing and didn’t show much sign of life.
When I took my first bite of the veggie patty I was immediately reminded of the impossible burger patty that I recently ate. The crust was firm but also rubbery, while the inside texture was softer. This must be some sort of soy veggie patty thing because my mind immediately went to the impossible burger, and it’s not a texture that I can place anywhere else.
Now if I am eating this for its health benefits or as a vegetarian then the taste is palatable at best. It does have a hint of that distinct sausage taste that you are probably familiar with, but was also rather dry. The texture was unique and in no way would I call it a sausage patty. Aside from the slight sausage taste, the flavors were lacking. But again, if I’m eating it for health reasons, it’s not completely inedible nor is it enjoyable.
When compared to traditional breakfast foods in terms of taste, the MorningStar Farms sausage patties don’t stand a chance. I’m pretty certain I would almost eat any other breakfast food that Costco offers. I wouldn’t call it a sausage patty, but instead I think it’s something closer to futuristic glop that is served in a dystopian society. It’s some sort of food concoction and does provide calories, but isn’t satisfying in any way whatsoever.
I do like that this product is at least healthy for you in regards to macros and calories. Other than that, these vegetable sausage patties don’t provide much benefit, and for a non-vegetarian like myself, I can’t imagine that I would purchase these again.
Heating Instructions
There are three heating options listed on the packaging. They are heating in the skillet, in the microwave, or in the oven. I chose to use my air fryer instead when heating these patties to save some time. In a future cook, I will give these a shot on the skillet and see if they turn out any better.
Final Thoughts
I personally didn’t care for these at all. It’s going to be a struggle to finish the remaining 25 patties or so that I have in my freezer. If you are a vegetarian or dieting, these may satisfy the sausage craving, but they didn’t do much for me. Costco sells quality sausage patties at about the same price that I would take any day over these.
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Greg Larkin is the founder and managing editor of Costco Food Database, the premiere site for honest takes on all things Costco food. A self-proclaimed Costco super-fan since childhood, Greg turned his obsession in a mission to properly rate and review all of Costco’s delicious buys. When he’s not busy navigating Costco aisles, you can find Greg smoking Kirkland Signature meats, meal prepping, or perfecting his homemade jerky recipes.
Costco may have discontinued these. Two months has passed and our local store doesn’t have them. Too, Costco.com doesn’t have them. Costco business delivery does, but they don’t deliver to our area.
Morningstar sausage patties.