For an Impossible Burger, heme is the decisive element adding the taste, texture and smell of ‘meat’. Other than that, the burger merely substitutes animal fats and proteins for vegetable ones such as wheat, coconut oil and potatoes. While the resulting meal isn’t a real burger in the sense that one made from synthetic meat is, the ambition is to eventually create burgers – as well as other foods – indistinguishable from their carnal counterparts. And while synthetic meat might be price competitive in a generation, products from companies like Impossible Foods are already available, with the company now producing 1 million pounds of ground ‘plant meat’ each month. So far investors have thrown almost \$275 million at Impossible Foods, but when you consider the size of the global meat market is more than \$1 trillion – and growing rapidly despite the constraints of our planet – that seems a prudent investment.
More than Meat
Whether its culturing meat or genetically modifying yeast to create new ingredients, the ambitions of cellular agriculture aren’t limited to creating meat without animals. Indeed, the principles are more easily adopted with other foods such as milk, egg whites and even wine.
At present milk appears to be the easiest one of all, and given it is such an important ingredient in a range of animal products – from cream to butter, yoghurt and cheese – an efective substitute would have a massive impact. What’s more, hundreds of millions of people are lactose intolerant or prefer not to consume dairy for ethical reasons, making milk an obvious place to start for anyone wishing to be involved in cellular agriculture. Sure, there are plenty of nut and soy milks out there, but none of them taste the same and, more importantly, they can’t keep pace with rising global demand.
Food Without Animals
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