DENVER, CO—A local banana advocacy group gathered at the state capitol this week to convince lawmakers that restaurants across Colorado should be required to provide customers with a variety of banana-based meat alternatives.
Arguing that bananas are the “new white meat,” the advocacy group claimed enacting this requirement into law would ensure health-conscious bananatarians, meat-starved vegetarians, and fruit-curious carnivores all have satisfying meat alternatives to choose from when dining out.
“Extensive polling has shown demand for banana-based meat substitutes will skyrocket within the next two years,” said a junior member of the advocacy group. “We believe this is an encouraging trend, as bananas have been proven to be a rich source of protein. Even more so than pork. The problem is we don’t trust restauranteurs will embrace this shift in demand as quickly as they should. And we must ask ourselves: is that fair?”
“No, it isn’t fair,” said a barista from Denver, who claims the lack of banana offerings on restaurant menus has hampered her ability to enjoy a meal out. “Restaurants are happy to accommodate vegetarians and people who can’t digest milk, but asking them to provide options for bananatarians is like pulling teeth.”
The owner of a busy pizza shop in Colorado Springs took the opposite stance. He said his restaurant has no intentions of modifying its menu to satisfy bananatarians. He believes pandering to the demands of a miniscule percentage of customers is bad for business. “What state lawmakers don’t appreciate is the absurdity of the expectations we’ll face under these new regulations,” he said. “And they don’t understand what that means for the added costs we’ll be forced to pass on to our customers.”
But a sandwich shop owner from Boulder, who supports the measure, says the opposition is overacting. “In our kitchen, we’ve been making banana-based deli meats and sausages for years. It’s neither complicated nor
expensive, and it’s the ethically right thing to do.”
That’s exactly the mindset the banana advocacy group hopes to foster through their proposed legislation.
“Which we can stop calling proposed,” said a senior member of the group. “It’s basically a done deal.”
