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What do you think of imitation and lab-grown meats? (lemmy.ml)

submitted 2 weeks ago by monovergent@lemmy.ml to c/asklemmy@lemmy.ml

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Recently tried an Impossible burger and nuggets and thought that if nobody told me it wasn't meat, I'd have thought the patty was made out of a weird kind of meat, rather than make a connection with the taste and texture of plants. Honestly, I might not complain if that was the only kind of "meat" I could have for the rest of my life.

Well, maybe I'd miss bacon.

I've yet to find the opportunity to try lab-grown meat, but I for sure would like to try it out and don't see much wrong with it as long as it's sustainable, reasonably priced, and doesn't have anything you wouldn't expect in a normal piece of meat.

Also, with imitation and lab-grown options, I'd no longer have to deal with the disgust factor of handling raw meat (esp. the juices) or biting into gristle. I'll happily devour a hot dog, but something about an unexpected bit of cartilage gives me a lingering sense of revulsion.

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[–] MrJameGumb@lemmy.world 2 points 2 weeks ago (1 children)

I've had a few miracle burgers. It wasn't bad, but it wasn't great either. It just kind of tasted like a mediocre fast food hamburger. I don't eat burgers that often anymore so when I do have one I want it to be really good so I probably won't get another one unless there's some great innovation in plant based meat in the future.

I suppose it accomplishes its goal in that it does taste like a hamburger, just not a particularly great one

I kinda feel like the name is part of the problem there. If someone says they're serving me something called a "miracle" burger the expectation created is that it will taste exceptionally good, or at least better than average

[–] WoodScientist@lemmy.world 3 points 2 weeks ago

Yeah, this is one of those areas that capitalism really screws us over.

The natural and most obvious use for these lab-grown and imitation meats are for filler meats. Think a ground beef replacement. Something that would be added to a casserole, a burrito, or any other dish where meat is present, but not the primary focus of a dish.

But it costs money to develop lab-grown meats. And to pay that investment back, for-profit companies have to target the luxury market first. It's like how Tesla started with building an expensive sports car. Then they used the profits from that to build a cheaper next generation car, and so on. That's what the lab grown meat companies have had to do. The ideal market for products like these would be things like chicken nuggets or the meat inside hot pockets. But those are also the cheapest form of meat sold, and they need to target the upper end of the market to have any hope of profitability.