# Test tube beef



## taxlady (Feb 21, 2012)

£200,000 test-tube burger marks milestone in future meat-eating | Environment | The Guardian

Would you eat it?

If you were a vegetarian, would you eat it?


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## Andy M. (Feb 21, 2012)

taxlady said:


> £200,000 test-tube burger marks milestone in future meat-eating | Environment | The Guardian
> 
> Would you eat it?
> 
> If you were a vegetarian, would you eat it?




...not until the price drops a bit.


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## taxlady (Feb 21, 2012)

Andy M. said:


> ...not until the price drops a bit.


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## FrankZ (Feb 21, 2012)

You mean fast food beef isn't a test tube experiment already?


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## GLC (Feb 21, 2012)

Sure, I'd eat it. I mean I wouldn't gag at the thought of eating it. It's just beef muscle and fat. But beef flavor is produced by the actions of an extremely complex array of factors. But acceptable flavor is probably something that can be done, at least by the time the process is economically feasible. It's obviously well suited for emulating ground beef. But one of the ultimate goals of all such processes is to grow functional replicas of specific organs. No doubt one of the first steps beyond mystery meat will be a generic muscle. But that's a big step. It's one thing growing one tissue. It's another to create the mix or muscle fiber, connective tissue, and fat in beef muscle. 

I do, though, have doubts about whether it will do what they hope, cut down on beef raised for food. I would think it would be easier to fake beef by genetically modifying the more efficient swine or starting with pig meat and processing a beefy product. Plenty of meat products, particularly chicken, are constructed from parts. But I've not seen anything like manufactured whole chicken "breasts" to rival the real thing. They don't seem to think they can sell it, even to prisons. 

Now what I'd really like them to grow would be cheap scallops. Not like the pollock "crab" mean, but real scallops grown from scallop tissue. 

As to whether a vegetarian would eat it, that might depend on whether their motive for grazing was on account of the affect of meat on them or the affect of them eating meat on the animals. If it's about eating mean having bad effects, no. If it's about the effect on animals, why not? It should be no more objectionable than vegetable-based fake meat. (Which I find vaguely silly for a moral vegetarian. Won't eat the animal but will pretend to eat the animal and likes the meat experience.)


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## Caslon (Feb 21, 2012)

The report noted that a full portion of grown pork was eaten and he said he was less than impressed with it.


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## DampCharcoal (Feb 21, 2012)

Ugh, no. 

If it ever comes down to test tube beef being the only beef available, I'll buy a 47' Fountain Lightning and make high speed runs between Baton Rouge and an undisclosed location on the Yucatan Peninsula.

There I will conduct illicit transactions with a shady beef purveyor. I'll make MILLIONS! 

Did I take that too far?


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## Zhizara (Feb 21, 2012)

It looks like that pink slime they'd been adding to hamburgers at McDonalds.


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## taxlady (Feb 21, 2012)

Zhizara said:


> It looks like that pink slime they'd been adding to hamburgers at McDonalds.



 

But there won't be any noses in that.


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## Andy M. (Feb 21, 2012)

DampCharcoal said:


> Ugh, no.
> 
> If it ever comes down to test tube beef being the only beef available, I'll buy a 47' Fountain Lightning and make high speed runs between Baton Rouge and an undisclosed location on the Yucatan Peninsula.
> 
> ...




On the bright side, there probably isn't any gristle in test tube ground beef.


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## Zhizara (Feb 21, 2012)

Good point, Andy!


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## GLC (Feb 21, 2012)

The grown pork would probably be pretty sterile. If the difference between commercial farm-raised pork and pigs raised running loose in the oak forest is any indicator, pork grown without any influences but pure nutrients couldn't be expected to taste like much. Like bob veal but without even the influence of the mother's diet.


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## DampCharcoal (Feb 21, 2012)

Andy M. said:


> On the bright side, there probably isn't any gristle in test tube ground beef.


 
Actually, that possibility did cross my mind.


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## Steve Kroll (Feb 21, 2012)

taxlady said:


> Would you eat it?
> 
> If you were a vegetarian, would you eat it?


No and no.


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## PattY1 (Feb 21, 2012)

No.


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## PrincessFiona60 (Feb 21, 2012)

Soylent Green is People!!!!!


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## Greg Who Cooks (Feb 21, 2012)

GLC said:


> Sure, I'd eat it. I mean I wouldn't gag at the thought of eating it. It's just beef muscle and fat. But beef flavor is produced by the actions of an extremely complex array of factors. But acceptable flavor is probably something that can be done, at least by the time the process is economically feasible. It's obviously well suited for emulating ground beef. But one of the ultimate goals of all such processes is to grow functional replicas of specific organs. No doubt one of the first steps beyond mystery meat will be a generic muscle. But that's a big step. It's one thing growing one tissue. It's another to create the mix or muscle fiber, connective tissue, and fat in beef muscle.


And adding to what you say, muscle is not just a genetic formula. The muscle has to go through an exercise regime, or otherwise there would be no difference between range beef or range chicken and the normal products.

You can't create a formula like this. It wo't work unless you duplicate all the exercise conditioning that forms the muscles that become our steaks.


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## Somebunny (Feb 21, 2012)

DampCharcoal said:
			
		

> Ugh, no.
> 
> If it ever comes down to test tube beef being the only beef available, I'll buy a 47' Fountain Lightning and make high speed runs between Baton Rouge and an undisclosed location on the Yucatan Peninsula.
> 
> ...



Charcoal, you might not make"millions"!  Have you ever eaten Mexican beef?  Some if it is pretty darn tough! I think this is because the "grass" is missing in grass fed beef,  not alot of grass in some parts of Mexico, lol!   But then again....it might be better than "test tube beef"!


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## Caslon (Feb 22, 2012)

PrincessFiona60 said:


> Soylent Green is People!!!!!



People in that movie ate it to survive, I don't think anyone in that movie said it was tasty. Maybe this future world will have to grow meat with little taste (some virus that kills off most animals). 

It'll be a time in our future maybe. But after that period... we'll all have food replicators like in Star Trek the Next Generation that can replicate your long dead moms favorite recipe to a tee.  They will have gotten growing meat and all other meal ingredients to perfection.

I see this as the first step towards a Soylent Green type necessity, ending up with Star Treks Next Generation food replicator perfection.

Science will be the cause and the cure to all our problems.


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## Zhizara (Feb 22, 2012)

I agree, Caslon.  Technology will find a way.


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## PrincessFiona60 (Feb 22, 2012)

Caslon said:


> People in that movie ate it to survive, I don't think anyone in that movie said it was tasty. Maybe this future world will have to grow meat with little taste (some virus that kills off most animals).
> 
> It'll be a time in our future maybe. But after that period... we'll all have food replicators like in Star Trek the Next Generation that can replicate your long dead moms favorite recipe to a tee.  They will have gotten growing meat and all other meal ingredients to perfection.
> 
> ...



My post was made in jest at what is being called "Test Tube Beef."  Not considered for serious discussion.

The masses in that story were told they were eating an algae based food...the Govt in that Universe, decided to use a more plentiful supply of food.

I'd have to see the credentials of any test tube beef...I read too much science fiction.


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## GLC (Feb 22, 2012)

Caslon said:


> It'll be a time in our future maybe. But after that period... we'll all have food replicators like in Star Trek the Next Generation that can replicate your long dead moms favorite recipe to a tee.



But the programmer can't know what mom's hash tasted like, any more than the Nutrimatic Drinks Dispenser on the _S.S. Heart of Gold_ could know what tea tasted like and so produced a drink almost, but not quite, entirely unlike tea.


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## taxlady (Feb 22, 2012)

GLC said:


> But the programmer can't know what mom's hash tasted like, any more than the Nutrimatic Drinks Dispenser on the _S.S. Heart of Gold_ could know what tea tasted like and so produced a drink almost, but not quite, entirely unlike tea.



 another fan of _The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy_.

Yup, you would have to have some real food and make the dish so the replicator would have something to replicate.


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## Claire (Feb 23, 2012)

This just seems a little too gross for me.


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