I would order Soylent right now if I could. So I'm pretty excited to find out about these. I had no idea they existed. FWIW, my diet now is like 95% red meat, with some cheese occasionally added in.
What are the downsides of these compared to Soylent? I mean, what's the motivation for Soylent if these already exist?
I guess the difference is that this guy is making the recipe available so you can tweak it to your requirements.
Ensure or other prepackaged products are a predefined set ratio, which may not be optimal for all consumers.
For example, highly active people will probably require a higher ratio of carbohydrates than less active people. Similarly, some people will be genetically predisposed to have higher/lower uptake of some nutrients/vitamins.
Ultimately, for any one person to succeed with a Soylent style approach, they will need to monitor their blood levels of a range of elements and compounds.
To my mind, developing a rapid, cheap, broad spectrum blood analysis to allow people to monitor their diet (soylent or not) is what should be focused on.
What are the downsides of these compared to Soylent? I mean, what's the motivation for Soylent if these already exist?