Koji Creativity
As a microbiologist, Kimberlie Le has always been fascinated by the things we cannot see. Working at UC Berkley’s Alternative Meat Research Lab, she began exploring the landscape of alternative proteins and soon realised she had stumbled upon a fungi that not enough people were talking about: koji. To change this she joined forces with Joshua Nixon, cofounder and fellow biologist to create Prime Roots, a California-based startup focussed on making no compromise meat and seafood alternatives. In this episode we talk more about Kim’s background in research and what makes koji a great ingredient, as well as the company’s product development journey, and the importance of cultivating a consumer community.
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Image: Prime Roots cofounders Kimberlie Le (right) and Joshua Nixon (left)
Kim’s background in microbiology means that fungi and bacteria are not new concepts and are in fact chartered territory.
Kim: ‘I’ve always been fascinated by the things that we cannot see. So fungi, microbes, they all kind of fall into that.’
It’s this background that led her to work at UC Berkley’s Alternative Meat Research Lab where she was part of a team exploring the alternative protein landscape looking at everything from cell-based to plant-based options and technologies. This also included de-risking the industry by looking at what was feasible, the timeframe predicted for technologies to get to market, and cost analysis.
Kim: ‘We ended up with an in-the-middle approach of growing koji and fungi.’
Soon enough what started as Kim and her cofounder Josh growing koji in their homes then began to develop into something larger, with the pair experimenting making the fungi into foods. They then joined IndieBio where they got the full resources to begin building what would go on to become their future of food company: Prime Roots.
Kim: ‘Josh and I are both entrepreneurs at heart, from a young age, so it’s something we wanted to do.’
But what was this mysterious ingredient that the pair were pioneering into the meat alternative industry?
Koji, although not quite a mainstream ingredient, is a Japanese fungi that’s been consumed for thousands of years and is already found in a lot of foods we know such as soy sauce and miso.
Kim: ‘One of the beautiful things about Koji, especially in the way that we grow it, is that it grows these beautiful white fibres that under a microscope are identical in shape and size to animal muscle fibres.’
‘It’s extremely high in protein and fibre, so we can theoretically make ‘meat’ that has more protein than actual meat from an animal.’
It’s exactly this texture, nutritional profile and added umami taste that led Kim to choose to use it as the basis for her meat and seafood alternatives, with the company releasing their bacon earlier last year.
The success of the launch Kim believes is the fact that the company prioritises engaging with consumers, and using that to lead their decision-making and product development processes. Before the launch of their first product this meant doing polls and asking for direct requests about what buyers would like to see on the shelves.
Kim: ‘It was through talking to our consumers and taking this upside-down approach to product development that we officially launched our first product, our bacon - which was a hit.’
‘To this day we do a tonne of product testing and crowdsourcing.’
More recently in their journey, Kim and her team have launched a line of ready-to-eat meals where people can try a wider variety of koji-based proteins and begin to envision how they would use Prime Roots products. When it comes to production and process, everything is done in-house, with the company being inspired by traditional fermentation technologies.
Kim: ‘We’re repurposing a traditional ingredient, putting our unique spin on it, and using it for something that it’s really well-suited for - making delicious meat and seafood alternatives.’
Looking back on her 4 year journey, Kim also reflected on some of the moments she’s been proudest of so far.
Kim: 'The first 2-3 years were spent focussing on the R&D, growing the koji, learning everything about koji and prototyping different meat products.’
‘I have a whole wall of all of the milestones and memories we have had. I think shipping product has been very fulfilling. Walking into a Whole Foods and seeing something that you grew and put into a product and now somebody is purchasing is extremely fulfilling.’
When talking about the more challenging parts of the journey, Kim considered Prime Roots to be quite lucky.
Kim: ‘I never thought that it wouldn’t have the impact it would, or that it wasn’t going to be well accepted because I think at every point we pre-planned, pre-thought of all the things that could go wrong.’
That being said, she went on to talk about how COVID was a difficult time period.
Kim: ‘We had released our bacon 2 weeks before COVID really blew up and things started to shut down. We had done a pre-sale, we hadn’t made the product yet and we were working on scaling.’
‘With COVID there were pretty strict lockdowns and measures in place in California, which threw a wrench in things and meant we had to figure out how to transition people to remote, how to retrofit things and make them safe.’
Thankfully Kim and the rest of the team at Prime Roots have prioritised fostering community, which meant that even during bouts of difficulty they had plenty of support to keep them moving forward and help along the way. It also helped contribute to the brand’s success, and continues to be a core piece of advice Kim shares for anyone looking to embark on an entrepreneurial journey of their own.
Kim: 'I think the most important thing has been making community a focus. When we were doing R&D we were very purposeful in finding people who were interested in what we were doing, that wanted to support us - even without a product to try or buy.’
‘It’s less about what channel you’re going to find people and more about being purposeful in the efforts that you’re doing and really asking yourself why and what does this provide for a future community member.’
If you’d like to join the Prime Roots community you can head to their website (and even apply to be a product tester / ambassador).
They also have a Facebook group with over 1k members called ‘I can’t believe it’s NOT MEAT!’ which you can find here.