An honest review of Huel

I’ve been asked a lot for my opinion on Huel. On their website it’s described as “Fast, nutritious, complete food. Designed by expert nutritionists as a convenient way to get all the daily nutrients you need”. But is it?

I’d never tried it, so recently when I was walking back from a heavy weights session and had no dinner plans, I picked some up. Here’s what happened:

4.44pm: As I enter Sainsbury’s on Leith Walk, the first thing I see is shelves of Huel in the fridge facing the entrance. “Canny product placement” I thought, “Maybe I’ll try it”. I was hungry and it promised a 100% nutritionally complete meal.

4: 49pm: Paid my £3.50 at the self-service till, “a cheap meal” I thought “I can’t wait to try it” I didn’t need to cook, no dishes to wash, in fact I could even drink it walking home. But I restrained, even though I was hungry.

5:07pm: Got home and did below selfie (that’s my hungry face), started typing this blog post eager to try this promising new drink. Here goes…

5:08pm: It made a satisfying sound as I opened it, as it if were a fresh drink. Initial odour was overwhelmingly vanilla. I like how tall and thin the bottle is, very aspirational. A lot of time and money was obviously spent on product development and packaging. Even the extra large bottle neck for easy glugging (you’ll drink it quicker) is part of it’s unique design.

5:09pm: First sip straight from the bottle, much less thick than I thought it would be, and not a bad initial texture. I was expecting something milky, but it’s made of water and pea protein. So that’s how it’s vegan. Of course, it says ‘plant-based’ on the front. How now.

It got an A on the Nutri-score on the label too, which means it’s theoretically the healthiest thing you can buy to eat. hmmm. But it has artificial sweetener in - how is that healthy I wonder?

5:22pm: Most people would have drunk the bottle by now as the flavour is hyper-palatable. However, as I’d paused to Google Nutri-scores and consider the nutritionals, I could taste the metallic artificial sweetener taste coming through. It made me stop and consider, I wonder what it looks like? So I poured some in a glass.

5:24pm: It’s BEIGE! And kind of sticky to the side of the glass. No wonder it’s hidden in an easy to drink container, it looks pretty ick. I wonder how many consumers actually pour Huel into a glass? Not many I bet.

By now I was losing my appetite, especially when I saw how many ingredients it contained. This definitely qualifies as UPF (Ultra Processed Food), with 18 ingredients including gellan gum and triglyceride powder - Medium Chain Triglycerides (on Huel website “MCTs are used as a source of fat in semi-elemental feeds for patients who have digestive issues or problems breaking down the more structurally complicated nutrients that we find in regular diets.”).

But what the heck is gellan gum? OMG! According to the wisdom of the internet “gellan gum is produced by the bacterium Sphingomonas elodea through a fermentation process. The bacterium was discovered in 1978 in a natural pond in Pennsylvania.”

5:31pm: OK so now I’ve totally lost my appetite, but the husband is keen to try it, so I’ll save the last bit and he can offer his personal opinion. In the meantime, here’s the label, with a bamboozling amount of information on there, I think to convince the customer of it’s worth.

5:53pm: The weird artificial flavour has lingered in my mouth, so I sip on Pure Leith mint tea. My tummy is rumbling as it was expecting food. Better get something real to eat. I’ve just drunk nearly 400 calories, theoretically I shouldn’t be hungry. I appreciate that if you eat more processed foods, and just glug it all down, you probably don’t notice the taste or texture. I guess it depends what you’re accustomed to. My preferred option is a homemade smoothie: really simple to make, delicious and looks palatable too, here are some of my favourite recipes.

7:35pm: The simple act of chewing food releases a digestive enzyme called amylase, that helps you breakdown carbs. By glugging a solution, you’re not getting any of that jaw action. Our jaw muscles need exercise too. My stomach got confused by Huel and by the evening I had wind and mild tummy cramps. I did some more research and it’s advised to drink Huel with lots of water. I think that must be because it has three types of powdered fibre in it, that needs water to hydrate and bulk out in the gut. A bit like a sophisticated SlimFast shake.

Originally Huel was launched at the ‘tech bro’ market - coders and programmers who didn’t want to take a break from coding to make food. It’s obviously a successful business model and you can now find it in supermarkets and with an extended online offering. Granted, this is much quicker than buying ingredients and making a meal. I guess it depends on how you feel about food. Do you enjoy it, or is it just fuel?

It may be a handy meal replacement, but I recommend eating actual food even if you’re on the go. Nuts, seeds, fruit and oatcakes are all very portable and affordable. However, if you’d really like to pay £3.50 for a factory-produced drink with vitamins, please do make your own mind up…

Have an opinion? Let me know!

PS - Just found two BBC news stories about Huel misleading the public with health claims. Sooo interesting:
https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/business-64637704
https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/articles/cly4wvlg14ko

PPS - Husband crinkled his nose and declared it tasted of chemicals and guar gum. So there you go.