Eat Your Peas Now as Big Food Binges on Plant Proteins: Retail

Deep inside the General Mills Inc. research lab in Golden Valley, Minnesota, food technician Faith Perry mixes up the company’s new Larabar with a special ingredient that’s several thousand years old.

Tins arranged along one wall of the lab contain every ingredient you could squeeze in a snack, from rolled oats to marshmallows. The one that gives the Larabar a new moniker -- the ALT, for alternative protein -- is the yellow pea powder that Perry adds to a mound of nuts, dates and brown rice syrup. It’s a recipe that took two years to concoct.