Where’s the Beef?

Do you remember the media frenzy over lab-grown meat? Why, several years later, has it not become a supermarket staple? Erin Somers investigates with wry humor as she throws herself, and her taste buds, into exploring why cultivated meat has yet to take over the world. You’ll devour this piece. The two of them ate with forks and knives, passing the plate, sawing off thoughtful bites. Chewing slowly. Afterward they rendered their verdicts. “I would say it is somewhere on the spectrum between a Boca Burger and McDonald’s,” Schonwald told a reporter from NBC. “The absence of fat makes a big difference. It has the texture, which I was not expecting. It was like an animal-protein cake.” Rützler noted the burger’s blandness to a reporter from Science. “There is room for improvement here,” she said. At the end of the event, roughly $150,000 worth of burger remained uneaten. But none of this stopped Post from predicting that meat cultivated in a lab would become a consumer product within the decade. More picks on meat Who’s Afraid of Spatchcocked Chicken? “Squeamishness around meat is embedded into the English language — and by extension, Western attitudes towards the realities of meat.” ‘We Have a Deep Hatred of Taking Food Seriously’: An Interview with Alicia Kennedy “The best way to convince people that they can give up meat or dairy, at least for a day or a week, is to feed them something good.” Our Animals, Ourselves “The socialist feminist case for animal liberation.” Where Are All the Vegetarian TV Shows? Plant-based tropes are everywhere — from almond-milk lattes to avocado-toast jokes — yet the Food Network remains a “burgers, beer, and bacon” destination.