Meet the Baltimore Couple Behind the Plant-Based Bacon Praised by ‘Shark Tank’

Eight years ago, Marvin Montague was battling chronic health issues when he decided to become a vegan.

“I was not trying to heal myself as much as I was on a personal spiritual journey,” he says.

But after going vegan, he found that his childhood asthma had suddenly disappeared and an ongoing heart issue had also improved.

“Once I saw the power of going vegan,” he says, “I decided to stick with it.”

Marvin, along with his then-girlfriend and now-wife, Aleah Rae Montague, wanted to get the word out about the health benefits of a plant-based diet.

“Initially, I thought I’d start a vegan restaurant in my neighborhood,” he says. “A lot of people in the Black community suffer from heart disease and diabetes and I wanted to help others follow a healthy lifestyle.”

But while working on the menu for his would-be restaurant, he had a change of heart. “I was creating all these products I felt could help not just my community but the world,” he says, “so I decided to switch to a grocery-based product.”

As he developed his product, Marvin turned to the natural world. “One of the biggest questions I asked myself was what did we eat before fire and tools?” he says. “And I looked to nature for answers.”

The result was a bacon substitute he dubbed Shroomacon, which has only five ingredients, including mushrooms, olive oil, smoke flavor, salt, and pepper.

When Aleah Rae’s roommate at the time (“a self-professed bacon-holic,” she recounts) said it tasted like the real thing, “we knew we were onto something,” she says.

By 2021, the couple was selling their product at area farmers markets under the name of their new LLC Meat the Mushroom.

A common refrain was, “Y’all need to go on Shark Tank,” says Aleah Rae. They applied to go on the hit ABC show several times—and this January they had their moment.

“Mr. Wonderful said, ‘We’ve had a lot of plant-based things on the show and they all taste like crap, but this tastes good!’” recounts Aleah Rae. And while Lori Greiner and Mr. Wonderful (Kevin O’ Leary) offered them a deal, ultimately the deal didn’t close. But that has not kept their product from turning into a success story.

To date, Shroomacon is in over 150 grocery stores around the country, with other planned products like “bacon” bits soon on the way.

“The plant-based trend is here to stay,” says Marvin.

Adds Aleah Rae, “We are happy to be on the right side of things as we move away from overly processed plant products with ingredients you can actually pronounce.”