And imagine how many carbs you're getting with your lentils. If you're on a diet, getting your protein from lentils is pretty much impossible. Also, plant proteins are not as digestible as animal protein, so you need to add another 10-15% to your lentils to make up for that.

TVP is awesome. I pad out my meat with it. It's a great way to cut down on your meat and really doesn't distract from the meatiness at all. Beans and lentils have a texture, flavour, and mouth feel that is quite overwhelming and is really inescapable if you're having any reasonable quantity of them.