Is lab-grown meat the future?

Hi there,

I don’t want to jinx it, but I think spring is here! It hit a high of 21 degrees over the bank holiday weekend here in London. And as is tradition in the UK, pasty bodies appeared in local parks for their first glimpse of sunshine in months and the smell of barbecue wafted through the air.

Mmm, charcoal and meat. Or not meat.

Being vegetarian or vegan is increasingly popular. Growing up, my grandparents were the only veggies I knew. Now, you can’t go to a barbecue without seeing aubergine and halloumi on the grill. And maybe a bit of fake meat.

Lab-grown meat is the next food frontier

Animal farming systems have been criticised for using large amounts of energy and water and contributing to climate change. Mass farming has led to poor treatment of animals. The obvious solution to these issues is to reduce our meat consumption.

When I was a kid, veggie burgers were bland and had a strange texture, made of soy or mysterious plant-based proteins. Since then, options have improved. And more recently, companies like Beyond Meat and Impossible Foods have launched plant-based burgers that imitate meat.

Meat is such a big part of western diets. Even with progress in the alternative meat space, it will be difficult for people to give up. And as close as meat substitutes get, meat evangelists will always claim that they aren’t the same.

But there’s an option that is the same. And even better - it’s environmentally friendly, and no animals are harmed.

Lab-grown meat is a solution that doesn’t require us to give up meat.

It’s still meat, but rather than the tissue being taken from a fully-formed animal, it’s created from animal cells grown in a lab.

But will people eat it?

We can create meat in the lab to help address the environmental and ethical concerns around meat production. But it’s a pointless endeavour if people don’t buy and eat it.

A 2017 survey on attitudes towards in vitro meat in the US found that 65% of respondents were willing to try it, but only 32% were willing to eat it regularly as a replacement for farmed meat. Men and those with liberal political views were more receptive to the idea. The main concerns were related to cost, taste, and the idea that lab-grown meat is unnatural.

Part of what makes it feel unnatural and unappealing are the terms ‘in vitro’ and ‘lab-grown’.

Framing this kind of product correctly will go a long way to facilitating consumer acceptance. A 2019 study investigated people’s attitudes and behavioural intentions toward different ways of naming lab-grown meat. The options given were: ‘clean meat’, ‘cultured meat’, ‘animal-free meat’, and ‘lab-grown meat’. Using the terms ‘clean meat’ and ‘animal-free meat’ resulted in more positive attitudes towards the concept. Another interesting option not considered in this study is ‘no-kill meat’.

The name is just the start. The product needs to effectively mimic the smell, texture, and taste of real meat.

The first taste tests of lab-grown meat in 2013 found that despite tasting like meat, the texture and fat content were not quite right. But we’ve come a long way since then - in a taste test of lab-grown chicken earlier this year, a professional taster and Master Chef judge wasn’t able to differentiate between the real and fake meat.

Singapore is currently the only country where lab-grown meat is currently available. In 2020, the Singapore Food Agency granted permission to US food company Eat Just to sell their cultured “chicken bites”.

It might be coming to our shelves soon. UK sustainable meat startup Ivy Farm Technologies is aiming to supply retailers with their lab-grown sausages by 2023. Will you give it a go?

How will it impact our health?

There isn’t much information on the impact that lab-grown meat might have on our health. For example, we know that meat consumption alters our gut microbiome. What effect will artificial meat have?

Because it’s grown in a lab, changes can be made to artificial meat to make it healthier. For example, adding extra micronutrients and adjusting fat levels (replacing saturated fats with healthier polyunsaturated fats).

---

Question of the week

Just like going straight from being sedentary to working out five times a week is a perfectionist fantasy, going from a meat-heavy diet to completely vegetarian overnight is unlikely to be an achievable goal.

Whether it’s exercise, nutrition, or something else, we tend to send ourselves up to fail. It’s easier and more conducive to success to focus on making continuous small changes over time.

With that, my question: how can you make today better than yesterday?

Link of the week

Listeners of the Avocado Proust podcast will already be aware of this one…

A teenage gorilla in Lincoln Park Zoo has developed a screen time addiction.

This is concerning on multiple levels. It shows how strong screen addiction is (he doesn’t even have access to a phone), and how it can impact our natural behaviours and development. The gorilla, called Amare, was recently attacked by another teenage gorilla. In the wild, this is normal behaviour by young male gorillas trying to figure out who is the alpha, so it shouldn’t have come as a surprise to him. But he was too busy looking at a visitor’s phone and wasn’t paying attention to the world around him. Sound familiar?

That’s all for now. Have a great rest of the week!