It notes the big issue:
But Memphis Meats and its competitors face quite a few hurdles in bringing cell-based meats to market. For starters, the cost of production needs to come down. Back in 2018, Wired reported that a pound of Memphis Meats takes $2,400 to produce, in part because of the expensive growth mediums — or feed — needed to culture cells.
"Our costs have continued to come down significantly over the last three years," Valeti told us in an email Wednesday. "We have a clear path to bringing a cost competitive product to market as we scale our production and that's part of what our latest funding round will help us to unlock," Valeti said. He said the company will continue to work on developing low-cost feed for the cells, which is one significant piece of the puzzle.
And also notes the second issue - the one of texture:
I got the chance to sample Memphis Meats' chicken, which was pan-sautéed with some oil and served with greens. It tasted pretty close to chicken breast produced the traditional way — but without as much textural variation among bits of muscle, fat and connective tissue.I think we can all agree that vegetable protein imitation chicken (or beef) also has the soft texture issue; but in terms of copying flavour, they are also getting pretty close. (I have taken to eating Rebel Whoppers from Hungry Jacks as my default fast food burger. I had one last night in fact. I am quite satisfied with it.) But the difference is, of course, it's massively cheaper and quicker to make than growing cells in an expensive medium.
So if both ways of making imitation meat leads to a soft-ish product that has similar flavour of real meat, why use the incredibly expensive and complicated way of making such a product??
The fact that billionaires are encouraging this product just indicates to me that billionaires can make wrong calls on things outside of their expertise, just like any of us can.
The future in fake meat is going to be in better vegetable protein imitation meats, and (eventually, I suspect) in microbial sourced protein as the base for imitation meats.
5 comments:
It has to be good enough to drink red wine with. A tall order
I did have a great pub steak last Saturday night, Homer, even though I feel increasingly sorry for cows. And, once again, I will note that a large part of the enjoyment of steak is in the texture, which I have a great deal of trouble imagining cell based constructions copying closely.
If we went back to a small business model then most animals could be killed in the paddock and initial butchering onsite. Much less stress for animals. But its too early to give them animal rights. We need them nutritionally and we need them for soil development. We need them for a mode of farming that produces energy rather than consumes energy. These Frankenstein measures are a brain drain and a misallocation of resources. Once we are all fabulously wealthy through reformed banking, and our soils are black and twelve feet deep everywhere, then perhaps we can revisit these ethical questions. We must have some sort of understanding for our limitations here.
Lab grown leather might have greater potential.
I don't know, Mayan: growing a thin sheet of skin cells is one thing, but growing a thick, well connected sheet probably has the same connectivity issue (so to speak) that making a lab grown steak would have.
I have seen stuff called "vegan leather" made from mushroom skin, which I can't imagine have a very long life!
Still, I like imagine sending Jason Soon a vegan leather wallet made of the stuff just to annoy him...
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