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Lab-Grown Steak

Posted by Hemos on from the will-jamie-eat-it dept.

swight1701 writes "New Scientist has an article about several researches who are trying to perfect growing seafood, chicken and beef in the lab without the animal. NASA started the program by wanting to provide burgers for Mars astronauts, and researchers hope to look to McDonalds, et al as funding sources in the future. The biggest problems being nutrient delivery to thick meat and exercise for the sedentary slabs. Processed meats seem to be something that may be a reality soon, while your animal friendly filet mignon may take a little while."

5 of 634 comments (clear)

  1. What about quality by parnasus · · Score: 5, Interesting

    Just as farm-raised meat has a different taste quality than game meat, I wonder what the flavor of lab meat would be?

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    --If you code for the exceptions, the rules fall into place
    1. Re:What about quality by evalhalla · · Score: 5, Interesting

      Probably just different.

      I guess that they're going either to make some almost tasteless meat that you're going to eat with lots of sausage, or extra spiced meat that doesn't need anything before it can be eaten, maybe not even cooking.

      I suppose they could give also a "fake game meat" taste, and I also suppose that most people won't care, and that's the sad thing

  2. hmm... I wonder if it will be kosher... by nacks1 · · Score: 4, Interesting

    Seriously, I wonder if my jewish friends will be able to partake of the grown meat. I mean, it does not have cloven hooves or chew cud when it was grown in a vat.

    Any Rabbi's out there want to give this a shot?

  3. Reminds me of the scene in "The Fly" by binaryDigit · · Score: 5, Interesting

    ... where Jeff Goldblum sends the steak through the transporter. He has Geena Davis take a taste of the "molecularly re-engineered" steak vs the "real" steak. She has an immediate negative reaction and her complaint is that is tastes like something that is trying to be a steak (not her exact words, but the gist of the whole scene). This is how I imagine this meat being.

    This is also similar to some of those vegetarian "meats" available. One hamburger product I tried reminded me a lot of that scene. It tasted more like a burger than any other veggie burger I tried, but was perhaps a bit too close without being perfect. The end result was that it was more "disturbing" to eat because though it sorta tasted like meat, it had a weird "there is something not right here" kind of taste to it.

    Of course they'll realize (too late of course) that given the right combinations of other foods/chemicals that the meat will continue to grow while in the gut. This will at first be disturbing as burger gluttons everywhere start exploding, but then people will realize that you only have to eat one burger, and given a good protein shake, you can "replenish" it any time you want :)

  4. Expensive pant load! by paiute · · Score: 5, Interesting

    My first reaction is: why? Why not just be a vegetarian? Hell, millions of Indians are, and they seem to be doing okay, building supercomputers and hand-held computing devices like gangbusters. We need less saturated fat, not an uberexpensive supply of it.

    My second reaction is that astronauts should be eating no meat, anyway. Those of you who remember how the diaper smell went from interestingly aromatic to puke-inducing as soon as the baby started to eat meat will want your space station comrades to stick with the rice and lentils and a side of naan.

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