The key ingredient in Eat Just’s plant-based egg alternative, mung bean protein, has received approval from the European Commission. The decision ‘opens the door’ to distribution across the bloc, according to Eat Just CEO Josh Tetrick.

Mung bean (_Vigna radiata_​) protein is now an authorised novel food in Europe. It can be used in protein analogues or substitutes for standard products, such as meat, fish, or egg.

The authorisation comes just over two years after US-headquartered Eat Just, Inc. submitted its application for approval of the protein – the key ingredient in its plant-based egg substitute JUST Egg – in March 2020, and less than six months after the European Food Safety Authority’s positive opinion​ of the novel food.

In October last year, the EU agency’s scientific opinion judged protein powder extracted from seeds of the mung bean plant to be ‘not nutritionally disadvantageous’ and safe under the proposed conditions and use levels.