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Speaker 1: Pushkin. Dan Pashman, host of the Sportful podcast, Jacob Goldstein,

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Speaker 1: host of the podcast What's Your Problem. I am here

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Speaker 1: in your kitchen in the Sportful test kitchen. Welcome. So

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Speaker 1: we're old friends. We've collaborated back when you were a

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Speaker 1: planet money and you're more like business tech economics reporter

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Speaker 1: guy and I'm more nerdy food guy. Yes, and we

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Speaker 1: found a story that is the crossover podcast event of

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Speaker 1: twenty twenty three, right, and the story is this, so

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Speaker 1: we'll go with that short. Come on, yeah, this is

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Speaker 1: the Sportful. It's not for food ease, it's for eaters.

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Speaker 1: I'm Dan Pashman. Each week on our show, we obsessed

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Speaker 1: about food to learn more about people. And I'm coming

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Speaker 1: to you from my kitchen with my friend Jacob Goldstein,

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Speaker 1: host of the podcast What's Your Problem? The show where

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Speaker 1: entrepreneurs and engineers talk about how they're gonna say change

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Speaker 1: the world. The show where entrepreneurs talking about how they're

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Speaker 1: gonna change the word about say solve if your problems,

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Speaker 1: you gotta work. I'm memorizing your own tagline, kind of

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Speaker 1: anti tagline. At this point, like people know what the

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Speaker 1: show is. They pushed play yes, Yes, Today, Jacob, we're

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Speaker 1: gonna talk about the past, present, and future of alternatives

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Speaker 1: to meet Meat from animals is clearly a problem in

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Speaker 1: the world right now right. It's a huge driver of

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Speaker 1: climate change, a huge driver of land loss, of biodiversity decline.

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Speaker 1: And so this is a real high stakes problem in

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Speaker 1: the world, and people are spending billions of dollars to

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Speaker 1: try and come up with new technologies to give us

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Speaker 1: meat without animals. And I know a lot has been

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Speaker 1: said about this, but I really feel like we have interesting, new,

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Speaker 1: big stuff to say here. That's right, things have changed

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Speaker 1: in the past year. Some of the things that looked

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Speaker 1: very promising are struggling. Some of the things that felt

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Speaker 1: like pipe dreams are becoming more real. So we're gonna

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Speaker 1: get into all of that. The moment that sort of

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Speaker 1: sets the stage for our story. Really, hippie is essentially right,

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Speaker 1: Hippie vegetarian is right. And there is this chef who

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Speaker 1: is who is kind of hippie adjacent. His name's Paul Winner,

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Speaker 1: and in the seventies, he has this restaurant in Portland, Oregon.

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Speaker 1: It's called the Garden House, and he wants to figure

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Speaker 1: out what to do with his leftover food at the

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Speaker 1: end of the day, and you know, he's got rice

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Speaker 1: peel off. He's got to sort of random veggies, and

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Speaker 1: he tries a few things, and he comes up with

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Speaker 1: basically making it into a patty and cooking it and

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Speaker 1: putting it between two buns, and he calls it the

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Speaker 1: garden Burger. This garden burger that he invents in his

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Speaker 1: restaurant becomes the garden burger. That was the go to

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Speaker 1: veggie burger in the eighties and definitely in the nineties.

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Speaker 1: But it wasn't a high end thing. It was almost

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Speaker 1: the kind of thing where like when a bowling alley

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Speaker 1: wanted to offer something vegetarian, they would have the garden Burger,

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Speaker 1: or a chain restaurant or like a one level above

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Speaker 1: a diner type place. Yeah, and you could also buy

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Speaker 1: to the store. And you can't get the garden burger anymore.

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Speaker 1: That just last year. Actually it got phased out. But

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Speaker 1: I think you got sort of the closest thing, right.

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Speaker 1: That's right. Let me step over here to my freezer

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Speaker 1: and I have Morning Star Farms garden veggie burgers frozen.

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Speaker 1: What's cooking up while we're talking about it. Yeah, let's

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Speaker 1: do it. So let's just say before we even put

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Speaker 1: it in, the veggie burger starts out brown. It looks

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Speaker 1: to me, actually, it looks kind of like a like

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Speaker 1: a hash brown. It's gotta that's got a brownish, almost

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Speaker 1: like Cure Aid potato type vibe. Unlike meat, right, Like,

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Speaker 1: it's not. It's not really supposed to be like meat. Right.

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Speaker 1: It's supposed to be a thing you can eat between

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Speaker 1: a bun when your friends are eating meat. So, so

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Speaker 1: now we're gonna put the veggie burger into the pan.

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Speaker 1: Let's see what kind of sound it makes. Oh, there's

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Speaker 1: a little bit of sizzle, but not much. Yeah, I

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Speaker 1: think I think the sizzle is just like because it's

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Speaker 1: maybe a little icy from the freezer. So what happens

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Speaker 1: to Paul Winner and his restaurant in Portland in the eighties.

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Speaker 1: He winds up closing the restaurant, but the gardenburger turns

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Speaker 1: into this product. He turns the gardenburger into this thing

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Speaker 1: you can buy at the grocery store that restaurants buy

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Speaker 1: to have a sort of token option for vegetarians. You know,

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Speaker 1: it fills a need in the nineties if you want

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Speaker 1: to get something for vegetarians at the barbecue. You pick

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Speaker 1: up a pack of Gardenburgers. It's the go to veggie

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Speaker 1: burger of the era. Right, It's functional. That's a great

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Speaker 1: word for it. And that's why Gardenburger gets so big.

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Speaker 1: It's doing a job in society. And this company blew up.

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Speaker 1: It did great in the nineties. The Gardenburgers a big deal.

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Speaker 1: The company actually has an IPO, it goes public, they

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Speaker 1: sell stock. This chef who ran a vegetarian restaurant in

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Speaker 1: Portland is like a multi millionaire from it. And maybe

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Speaker 1: peak Gardenburger comes in the late nineties. It's huge. The

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Speaker 1: stock is doing well. They advertise on the Seinfeld Finale Wow,

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Speaker 1: which is like, you don't get more nineties than that.

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Speaker 1: That's like Super Bowl ad level. Yeah, oh no, I

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Speaker 1: want something and yo, Gardenburger the burger and the squeals

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Speaker 1: would be like, so they were big time and Samuel L.

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Speaker 1: Jackson generating their kind of strange Seinfeld ad. Yeah. So

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Speaker 1: the instructions say that we should heat burgers over medium

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Speaker 1: for seven to eight minutes, turning burgers over frequently throughout

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Speaker 1: heating time. So I got my spachelor ready, I'm going

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Speaker 1: to turn the burgers periodically, and while we hang out

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Speaker 1: here and cook, Jacob, why don't you continue your story?

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Speaker 1: So now it's the two thousands, and the Gardenburger isn't

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Speaker 1: the only mediocre veggie burger game in town anymore. There's

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Speaker 1: enough competition that you can't just get by on being

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Speaker 1: the one anymore. And Gardenburger eventually goes bankrupt in two

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Speaker 1: thousand and five, and if I remember correctly, Kelloggs purchased

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Speaker 1: garden Burger and they kept selling these patties forty years,

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Speaker 1: like they just discontinued them last year. But Kelloggs also

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Speaker 1: owns morning Star, which is the company that makes this

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Speaker 1: Garden Burger adjacent patty that we have in the skillet

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Speaker 1: right now. And it looks like it's done, actually should

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Speaker 1: we Yeah? Yeah, we have ketchup, we have mustard, and

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Speaker 1: then I have my burger sauce, which is basically shake

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Speaker 1: shack sauce. I'm in your hands, all right, let's do

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Speaker 1: the shack sauce. Then no, they don't. They don't give

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Speaker 1: out the recipe for the shack sauce. But I don't

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Speaker 1: know if you know the recipe developed with Kenjie Lobo

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Speaker 1: salt you will not take for hamburg No, and just

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Speaker 1: kind of likes that. Being said, eating this does take

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Speaker 1: me back. It's had a little more of a more

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Speaker 1: of a pepper taste than I remember, but just that

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Speaker 1: sort of that texture, that kind of crispy edges and

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Speaker 1: mushy interior. It still scratches a nostalgia itch for me.

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Speaker 1: I gotta say not for me. I'd rather like eat

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Speaker 1: Cheetos or something if I want nostalgia food. Garden Burger

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Speaker 1: and the similar burgers. They are veggie Burger one point zero,

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Speaker 1: the sort of basic puck you can eat like a

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Speaker 1: burger if you don't eat meat. And so around twenty

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Speaker 1: ten we get the start of this really different new

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Speaker 1: era in veggie burgers. You know, the old one was hippies, vegetarians, natural.

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Speaker 1: The new one is Silicon Valley high tech like engineered

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Speaker 1: in a lab. And there are two companies in particular

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Speaker 1: that get founded in Silicon Valley. You know what they are.

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Speaker 1: Say the names I'm gonna go with Beyond Meat and

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Speaker 1: Impossible Foods very good. And I have to say I

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Speaker 1: have been a big customer of these companies. My wife

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Speaker 1: doesn't eat meat, my daughter doesn't eat meat, and our

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Speaker 1: definite preference in our house is for Impossible, And I

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Speaker 1: can say I haven't tried both. I agree that I

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Speaker 1: like the impossible better. So partly because of that, I

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Speaker 1: talked with Pat Brown, the founder of Impossible. He does

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Speaker 1: not come from a food background. He was not a chef.

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Speaker 1: He was a Stanford biochemist who spend his career studying

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Speaker 1: the genome. And then one day, as one does, Pat

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Speaker 1: Brown thinks to himself, let me think about what are

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Speaker 1: the biggest problems in the world that I might work on,

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Speaker 1: And he decides not to start a podcast, but rather

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Speaker 1: it decides that the biggest problems in the world are

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Speaker 1: climate change and the decline in biodiversity, and he decides

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Speaker 1: that the way to fight those for him personally, is

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Speaker 1: to start a company that can make fake meat that's

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Speaker 1: as good as real meat without using animals. And so

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Speaker 1: his goal in starting this company and starting Impossible is

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Speaker 1: to entirely replace real meat with fake meat. This industry

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Speaker 1: is supported by people who love meat, okay, and for

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Speaker 1: us to compete them out of existence, we have to

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Speaker 1: give them exactly what they want and do it better

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Speaker 1: than the animal I love vegetarians and vegans as much

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Speaker 1: as the next guy. But we don't accomplish anything by

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Speaker 1: making better meat for vegans, and that's a completely different

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Speaker 1: project and it requires technology and science. Right, So he's

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Speaker 1: thinking about meat as a scientist, and in particular, he

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Speaker 1: thinks about all the amazing things that happen when you

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Speaker 1: cook meat. One of the striking characteristics of meat in

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Speaker 1: general is that it behaves like an active chemical system.

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Speaker 1: It starts out with one flavor profile, which is relatively

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Speaker 1: not very strong, mostly bloody kind of and when you

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Speaker 1: cook it, in a matter of minutes, it completely transforms,

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Speaker 1: and in the process it produces this explosion of aromas

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Speaker 1: that weren't there at the beginning. That's why a barbecue

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Speaker 1: smells so good, exactly exactly, and you will notice that

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Speaker 1: you don't you don't get any similar behavior if you

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Speaker 1: barbecue broccoli. You also don't get similar behavior when you

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Speaker 1: cook a garden burger, right right, It doesn't transform. It

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Speaker 1: looks at the end basically like it looks at the beginning.

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Speaker 1: And so Pat Brown knows that he needs to capture

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Speaker 1: that magic transformation that happens when you cook meat. And Patchman,

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Speaker 1: I know you bought a couple of impossible burgers also

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Speaker 1: for us. Maybe we should start cooking those here. Yeah,

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Speaker 1: let's do it, right, you want to crack these open, Jacob, Yeah,

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Speaker 1: we've got two impossible burgers here. And just to compare

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Speaker 1: them to the garden burger, right, like the garden burger

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Speaker 1: look brown like a piece of bread. These look red

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Speaker 1: with little flecks of white, like ground beef. And it

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Speaker 1: was also interesting to me, you know, these are all

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Speaker 1: the little details the garden veggie burger. You keep it

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Speaker 1: in the freezer. The instructions say keep frozen until cooking.

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Speaker 1: The Impossible Burger label says, treat this just like meat.

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Speaker 1: If you're gonna cook it, defrost at first. In practice,

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Speaker 1: if the end result is good. In theory, it shouldn't

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Speaker 1: really make a difference how it starts. But it made

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Speaker 1: me feel like, oh, treat it like meat. It made

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Speaker 1: it feel that much more like meat to me. That's

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Speaker 1: a real sizzle. And you can see that the bottom

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Speaker 1: of the burger, the part touching the pan is browning

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Speaker 1: and change in color as it would for any normal burger. Right,

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Speaker 1: so so it goes in red burger color. And yeah,

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Speaker 1: it looks not exactly like a burger, but a lot

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Speaker 1: like a burger. So, just to go back to the

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Speaker 1: story of Pat Brown, he wants to capture that that

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Speaker 1: incredible smell and color and texture change that you get

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Speaker 1: when you cook meat. And he thinks about this molecule

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Speaker 1: called right. Hem is a naturally occurring molecule. There's a

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Speaker 1: ton of it in meat. We also have it. Right,

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Speaker 1: You may have heard of hemoglobin in our blood. That's

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Speaker 1: hematologist is a blood doctor, very good, and hem is

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Speaker 1: in all animals. It's a big part of what makes

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Speaker 1: meat taste like meat. So Pat Brown's going to find

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Speaker 1: a way to get hem into his burgers without animals.

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Speaker 1: There's a version of hem in soy, right, soy leg hemoglobin.

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Speaker 1: It's a version of hem that occurs naturally in the

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Speaker 1: roots of soybeans. It's very molecularly similar to the way

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Speaker 1: heme occurs in meat. They decide to genetically engineer yeat

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Speaker 1: cells to produce soy leg hemoglobin. So this genetically engineered

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Speaker 1: version of soy leg hemoglobin works and it becomes essentially

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Speaker 1: the secret sauce in impossible meat. Should I prep these up? Yeah,

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Speaker 1: let's each buns, so you cut it in half. For

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Speaker 1: us to split and it is what you call this

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Speaker 1: medium rare medium is a little line of pink in

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Speaker 1: the middle. That's right, Okay, let's see it. The fact

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Speaker 1: that this thing reacts like meat from the second you

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Speaker 1: take it out of the fridge, and that you can

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Speaker 1: cook it medium rare, and that it's even reminiscent of

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Speaker 1: a burger is pretty amazing. That being said, you still

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Speaker 1: wouldn't fool me in a taste test. And can you,

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Speaker 1: as a professional describer of food, like talk about why

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Speaker 1: you still like the burger better. So the things that

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Speaker 1: this does have. It has a little bit of a

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Speaker 1: crispy edge like you get in a good burger. It

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Speaker 1: has it has the texture down very well. It has

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Speaker 1: a meatingness, but it's still a tenderness like you would

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Speaker 1: get with a good burger. It's still missing that hardcore

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Speaker 1: beef note. It's it's it's like a band without a

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Speaker 1: bass player. I like it, so not bad, but the

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Speaker 1: bet you kind of miss something. You miss something that's

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Speaker 1: there's like a deep guttural that isn't quite there. So

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Speaker 1: let's go back to the story sort of on that note.

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Speaker 1: So Pat Brown is making the impossible burger that people

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Speaker 1: at Beyond are making the Beyond Burger, and they come

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Speaker 1: out in the teens, in the two thousand teens, and

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Speaker 1: then their big moment, the real sort of rocket ship

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Speaker 1: blast off, turns out to be the pandemic. It turns

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Speaker 1: out to be twenty twenty. I talked about this with

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Speaker 1: Laura Riley, she covers the business of food for the

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Speaker 1: Washington Post. A lot of us, you know, let's say

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Speaker 1: March of twenty twenty through the end of that year,

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Speaker 1: a lot of us had a lot of time on

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Speaker 1: our hands. We were panic eating frequently, and we were

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Speaker 1: looking for new things to do, so a lot of

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Speaker 1: us at least dabbled in the whole kind of alt

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Speaker 1: meat space. Also, the Impossible Whopper. The Impossible Burger comes

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Speaker 1: out at Burger King just before the pandemic in twenty nineteen,

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Speaker 1: and during the pandemic that wound up being big for

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Speaker 1: my family. Obviously we weren't going out to restaurants, but

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Speaker 1: drive throughs were still open. Not everybody in my family

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Speaker 1: each meet, and I have to say that is my

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Speaker 1: favorite version of the Impossible Burger is the Impossible Whopper.

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Speaker 1: It was pretty successful. I mean, it wasn't a smash.

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Speaker 1: But what every fast food restaurant wants to do, and

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Speaker 1: they've tried all different things over the year's salads, etc.

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Speaker 1: They want to remove veto power. So you have a

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Speaker 1: family of four and mom says, I don't feel like

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Speaker 1: a burger. So you know, that's what you're always trying

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Speaker 1: to do. You want to have enough menu items that

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Speaker 1: you can appeal, you can find something for that person

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Speaker 1: who would veto it. You know what's interesting about that

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Speaker 1: is that's actually the same motivation as the garden burger.

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Speaker 1: We have one person who we can't please with the

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Speaker 1: regular menu, so we're going to have this thing in

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Speaker 1: the freezer. And it is also not the dream of

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Speaker 1: Pat Brownet impossible foods, not the dream of beyond right again,

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Speaker 1: not quite there yet, but it's good enough right that

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Speaker 1: in twenty twenty it's new. That is like the big

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Speaker 1: boom for fake meat both you know, the impossible whopper

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Speaker 1: people are buying at grocery store. Everything's great. It feels

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Speaker 1: like we're in this new era of fake meat until

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Speaker 1: we get to twenty twenty two, which is when everything changes.

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Speaker 1: This last year is when really the kind of air

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Speaker 1: starts coming out of the fake meat bubble, and you

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Speaker 1: see this in a lot of different ways. One place

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Speaker 1: you see it is the most important fast food restaurant, McDonald's,

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Speaker 1: which in early twenty twenty two comes out with its

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Speaker 1: mcplant burger, which is a collaboration with Beyond. They were

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Speaker 1: massively late to the game, and they debuted it in

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Speaker 1: the San Francisco Bay area, the Mcplant, and also in

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Speaker 1: Dallas Fort Worth. So they roll out the mcplant in

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Speaker 1: early twenty twenty two, and what happens. It bombs and

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Speaker 1: they basically they cancel the mcplant. So okay, So the

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Speaker 1: failure of the mcplant, that's like piece of bad news

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Speaker 1: number one in twenty twenty two for this new era

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Speaker 1: of fake meat. But there's more bad news. One thing

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Speaker 1: that happens is just the growth really stop. Right. This

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Speaker 1: sector had been growing, growing, growing at the beginning of

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Speaker 1: the pandemic, and now it's not growing anymore. Essentially, one

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Speaker 1: theory of why that happened is that people tried it.

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Speaker 1: It was a novelty and like kind of like you,

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Speaker 1: It sounds like they were like, yeah, it's pretty good,

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Speaker 1: I would eat it, but I don't like it enough

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Speaker 1: to keep buying it. But I actually think the most

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Speaker 1: important thing that hurt fake meat last year was inflation.

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Speaker 1: Food inflation was particularly high, and fake meat crucially being

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Speaker 1: problem they haven't solved yet. Not only is it not

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Speaker 1: quite as good as real meat, it's way more expensive,

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Speaker 1: and people are feeling acutely higher prices at the grocery store.

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Speaker 1: It's like, no, I'm not going to pay more for

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Speaker 1: this thing that's not quite as good. Laura Riley the

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Speaker 1: Washington Post reporter. She says, we do need another sort

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Speaker 1: of technological leap forward, and the same way that there

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Speaker 1: was a leap from the garden burger to the impossible burger,

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Speaker 1: we need the next one of those. We need the

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Speaker 1: next technological leap. What it's been launched so far is

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Speaker 1: mostly patties or nuggets. What we need next in order

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Speaker 1: to kind of grow the category is we need things

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Speaker 1: that are really thought of more as ingredients, you know

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Speaker 1: what I mean? Like that I'm making I'm having friends

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Speaker 1: over tonight and two of them are vegged. So I'm

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Speaker 1: going to make a stir fry with this plant based

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Speaker 1: sliced chicken. The bowlless, skinless chicken breast is beloved by

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Speaker 1: home cooks. We need to get to whole pieces of meat. Yeah, exactly,

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Speaker 1: we need meat. We're coming up, Jacob. We're gonna hear

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Speaker 1: about people growing meat right now, and we'll hear from

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Speaker 1: my friend Sean Rama's farm who went out to California

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Speaker 1: and tasted lab grown meat. Culture. You love to go

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Speaker 1: to California. He's still got that edge, the no kid's edge.

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Speaker 1: And now a delicious word from our sponsors. Welcome back

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Speaker 1: to the sport Full. I'm Dan Pashman, and if you

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Speaker 1: missed last week's show, you missed a big one. I

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Speaker 1: announce that I've teamed up with Spollini once again and

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Speaker 1: we have produced two new pasta shapes that are on

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Speaker 1: sale right now. For these two shapes, I went deep

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Speaker 1: into the pasta shape archives looking for obscure shapes that

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Speaker 1: I wanted to share with the world. But before I

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Speaker 1: could do that, I had to convince some of my

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Speaker 1: toughest critics my family. All right, first ever tasted this

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Speaker 1: new pasta shape, Quatratini. It's perfect in all three categories,

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Speaker 1: like no offense to Cascatelly. I love it. I had

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Speaker 1: a hope it didn't take away from Cascatelli sales, because

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Speaker 1: I mean, do you think it has. It has all

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Speaker 1: three right precability, sausability to think ability. There's think that's

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Speaker 1: room in the world's fro more than one great pasta shape.

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Speaker 1: Listen to last week's episode. Here the story of these

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Speaker 1: shapes and buy them now only through Sfolini's website. That's

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Speaker 1: also where you'll see a link to buy these new

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Speaker 1: casketelly clutch purses limited edition by a designer named Julie Malow.

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Speaker 1: They're really cool and they're just for Valentine's Day. There's

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Speaker 1: only a couple of hundred of them. You can get

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Speaker 1: all these things at s Folini dot com. That's sfogli

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Speaker 1: Ni dot com. All right, I'm back in my kitchen

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Speaker 1: with my friend and collaborator for this episode, Jacob Goldstein,

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Speaker 1: host of the podcast What's Your Problem, and we're talking

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Speaker 1: about the past, present, and future of alternatives. To meet

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Speaker 1: now for the next and final stop on our journey, Jacob,

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Speaker 1: I've been looking into cultured meat. Okay. This is where

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Speaker 1: you take cells from a real animal, you take them

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Speaker 1: into a lab, and you grow meat using those cells.

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Speaker 1: So in theory, if it works, it will be real meat,

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Speaker 1: but you won't have raised or killed an animal to

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Speaker 1: get it. Now, The underlying technology here is not so new, okay.

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Speaker 1: The idea of growing cells in a lab has been

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Speaker 1: around for many decades. I mean, this is how they

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Speaker 1: made the polio vaccine. What's new is using this technology

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Speaker 1: to create something you might eat. Okay. Now, the first

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Speaker 1: success with this was when a Dutch professor made a

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Speaker 1: lab grown burger. That was in twenty thirteen, ten years ago, okay,

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Speaker 1: ten years out in this new kind of era. Now,

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Speaker 1: just in the last few months, it's got a lot

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Speaker 1: more real, especially here in the US, because in November,

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Speaker 1: the FDA declared cultured chicken from one company, Upside Foods,

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Speaker 1: to be safe for human consumption. That's a major milestone. Now,

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Speaker 1: it's still not going to be in stores quite yet.

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Speaker 1: It's got to get past the USDA, and even when

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Speaker 1: that happens, it's going to be you know, expensive, and

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Speaker 1: in just a few places. So it's still early days.

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Speaker 1: But I mean, we talked about this in the Sportfull

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Speaker 1: a few years ago, and my impression then was like,

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Speaker 1: this is space age stuff. So the fact that it

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Speaker 1: could be coming to any kind of stores soon seems

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Speaker 1: like a major development to me. I mean, I know,

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Speaker 1: sort of On the business tech side, there has been

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Speaker 1: a ton of a venture capital investment into fake me

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Speaker 1: not just beyond and impossible, but to these kind of

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Speaker 1: next generation sell culture fake meat, although I would say Jacob,

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Speaker 1: I would not call it fake meat. It might not

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Speaker 1: be a whole animal, but I think it's meat. And

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Speaker 1: one company working on making cultured chicken and beef is

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Speaker 1: called eat Just. They aren't have a product in grocery

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Speaker 1: stories you may have seen called just egg. It's a

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Speaker 1: plant based egg, and now they're getting in to grow

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Speaker 1: in their own meat. To be clear, this is not

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Speaker 1: the company that got the FDA approval, but they are

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Speaker 1: one of the big players in this space. Their headquarters

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Speaker 1: are in Alameda, California, just across the bridge from San Francisco.

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Speaker 1: I wasn't able to visit, but my old friend Sean

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Speaker 1: Ramas Farm, host of the excellent Daily News podcast Today,

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Speaker 1: explained he went there and saw it himself. Here's how

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Speaker 1: he describes the setup at each just there's all these tubes.

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Speaker 1: There's very serious scientists hard at work. There's like big

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Speaker 1: chambers and fridges and steel this and that, and rows

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Speaker 1: and rows of lab equipment. It looks like, you know,

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Speaker 1: there's like a billion COVID tests going on at once,

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Speaker 1: with like little droplets of this going into little droplets

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Speaker 1: of that. I don't know that COVID test is the

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Speaker 1: metaphor I want for my cultured meat. I think he's saying.

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Speaker 1: You know, there's that generic newsreel footage that we've seen

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Speaker 1: on TV ten thousand times now anytime they talk about

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Speaker 1: COVID and tests. You see those people in the coats

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Speaker 1: with the droplets, and that's what it looks science. So

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Speaker 1: after all these droplets that Sean described, the cells go

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Speaker 1: into a bioreactor that speeds up their growth. And the bioreactors,

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Speaker 1: as they're described to me, there like giant steel cylinders.

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Speaker 1: They look like a brewery. You've ever been all those

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Speaker 1: restaurants is also a brewery. You see the big steel tanks.

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Speaker 1: It's like that. So to find out what happens next

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Speaker 1: in those bioreactors, I talk to a scientist who works there.

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Speaker 1: So my name is Vitor Sento. I am the senior

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Speaker 1: director of cello Agriculture at Good Meat, which is a

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Speaker 1: subcb area of heat just so Vitoor Santo trained as

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Speaker 1: a tissue engineer. In past jobs, he worked on using

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Speaker 1: cell cultures to regenerate human bone and cartilage. So he

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Speaker 1: was in biotech and pharmaceuticals. Now he's growing meat. So

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Speaker 1: once the cells are in the bioreactor, we feed them

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Speaker 1: a solution, so it's in a liquid farm and it's

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Speaker 1: a combination of different nutrients. So think of proteins, I

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Speaker 1: you know, acids, vitamins, fats like miracle grow. But for meat,

423
00:24:19,716 --> 00:24:22,156
Speaker 1: pretty much think of what you would what you would

424
00:24:22,156 --> 00:24:24,796
Speaker 1: feed the chicken, like the soliditade of a chicken, but

425
00:24:24,916 --> 00:24:28,036
Speaker 1: you just turn that into a into a cultural broth.

426
00:24:28,396 --> 00:24:30,636
Speaker 1: When the sales come out of that bioreactor, they're not

427
00:24:30,676 --> 00:24:33,876
Speaker 1: done yet. A lot of times people expect you to

428
00:24:33,956 --> 00:24:37,036
Speaker 1: see a full steak or a chicken breast coming out

429
00:24:37,036 --> 00:24:40,156
Speaker 1: of the bioreactor, but that's not really what happens. What

430
00:24:40,276 --> 00:24:43,556
Speaker 1: do you see is more like think of a slurry

431
00:24:43,676 --> 00:24:48,116
Speaker 1: or a concentrator which doesn't have yet a lot of structure.

432
00:24:48,756 --> 00:24:50,796
Speaker 1: So not that they ask, but my tip to them

433
00:24:50,796 --> 00:24:53,716
Speaker 1: would be stop using the words slurry to describe any

434
00:24:53,716 --> 00:24:56,916
Speaker 1: part of your process. Slurry, we don't want to bioreactor. Basically,

435
00:24:56,996 --> 00:24:59,716
Speaker 1: don't let a scientist talk to it. Just show me

436
00:24:59,836 --> 00:25:03,316
Speaker 1: the chicken. Yeah, like, I don't want to eat meat

437
00:25:03,356 --> 00:25:05,876
Speaker 1: that at any point was a slurry. But so so

438
00:25:05,916 --> 00:25:08,236
Speaker 1: they get the slurry and they need to make it

439
00:25:08,276 --> 00:25:10,116
Speaker 1: into a chicken breast, and to do that they need

440
00:25:10,116 --> 00:25:12,196
Speaker 1: to add what they call scaffolding. All right, This is

441
00:25:12,356 --> 00:25:15,676
Speaker 1: plant protein extract that is formed into a three D

442
00:25:15,916 --> 00:25:18,036
Speaker 1: model of a piece of meat that the cells can

443
00:25:18,076 --> 00:25:20,516
Speaker 1: then attach themselves to in order to get the shape

444
00:25:20,556 --> 00:25:23,436
Speaker 1: and texture of a chicken breast. Now, I know it

445
00:25:23,476 --> 00:25:25,996
Speaker 1: sounds very sci fi, but Beator says, it's not as

446
00:25:26,036 --> 00:25:28,156
Speaker 1: far out as you may think. And what we're doing

447
00:25:28,236 --> 00:25:30,996
Speaker 1: that by our reactors, to be honest, is just mimicking

448
00:25:31,036 --> 00:25:33,796
Speaker 1: the natural process. We're just feeding. Instead, let's say, of

449
00:25:33,876 --> 00:25:37,436
Speaker 1: having cells growing in tissues and organs and having blood

450
00:25:37,516 --> 00:25:41,476
Speaker 1: circulating through them in the animal body, we're mimicking them,

451
00:25:41,476 --> 00:25:43,876
Speaker 1: but inside of a stainless steel by a reactor with

452
00:25:44,476 --> 00:25:47,516
Speaker 1: this mixture of nutrients. Now, as we've been saying, Jacob,

453
00:25:47,556 --> 00:25:49,516
Speaker 1: the goal is to get whole cuts of meat like

454
00:25:49,556 --> 00:25:51,716
Speaker 1: a chicken breast, right, But they had to start with

455
00:25:51,756 --> 00:25:55,316
Speaker 1: a simpler project, the chicken nugget, and Viator still remembers

456
00:25:55,316 --> 00:25:57,356
Speaker 1: the first time they made a chicken nugget that actually

457
00:25:57,396 --> 00:26:00,316
Speaker 1: had the taste and texture of a chicken nugget. It

458
00:26:00,396 --> 00:26:02,876
Speaker 1: was a turning point, I would say at eat Just,

459
00:26:03,436 --> 00:26:07,276
Speaker 1: it was a little like touching the moon almost. In

460
00:26:07,316 --> 00:26:10,356
Speaker 1: December of twenty twenty, Single Poor became the first country

461
00:26:10,356 --> 00:26:13,116
Speaker 1: in the world to approve lab grown chicken for sale,

462
00:26:13,716 --> 00:26:16,196
Speaker 1: and eat Just began selling their chicken nuggets in one

463
00:26:16,436 --> 00:26:19,276
Speaker 1: fancy club in Singapore and since then now there's another

464
00:26:19,276 --> 00:26:22,756
Speaker 1: restaurant in places in Singapore. Now eat Just is moving

465
00:26:22,756 --> 00:26:24,916
Speaker 1: on to whole cuts of meat, like chicken breasts, which

466
00:26:24,956 --> 00:26:28,756
Speaker 1: seems like profoundly harder than a chicken nugget, right, Yeah,

467
00:26:28,756 --> 00:26:30,916
Speaker 1: I mean you can kind of throw anything into ground

468
00:26:30,916 --> 00:26:34,996
Speaker 1: meat or a chicken nugget and to mimic the quote unquote.

469
00:26:34,996 --> 00:26:36,996
Speaker 1: I mean, like, like like what's real in an original chicken nugget,

470
00:26:36,996 --> 00:26:39,916
Speaker 1: Who knows. But when you're talking about an actual chicken breast,

471
00:26:39,996 --> 00:26:42,116
Speaker 1: there's so much about the eating experience that you might

472
00:26:42,156 --> 00:26:44,916
Speaker 1: not even consciously know, but you're gonna know if it's missing.

473
00:26:44,956 --> 00:26:47,516
Speaker 1: I mean, that feels like a bigger leap. If we

474
00:26:47,556 --> 00:26:49,756
Speaker 1: think of the leap from the garden burger to the

475
00:26:49,796 --> 00:26:52,916
Speaker 1: impossible burger, like that's big. But going from a faked

476
00:26:52,956 --> 00:26:55,236
Speaker 1: chicken nugget to a fake chicken breast that feels like

477
00:26:55,236 --> 00:26:58,196
Speaker 1: an even bigger leap. It's huge. Do you think about it?

478
00:26:58,236 --> 00:27:00,196
Speaker 1: Like a chicken breast has those kind of you pull

479
00:27:00,276 --> 00:27:02,676
Speaker 1: up hearted chicken breasts has those sort of striations. Yeah,

480
00:27:02,676 --> 00:27:04,596
Speaker 1: the sinews right, you had to chop across them when

481
00:27:04,596 --> 00:27:07,716
Speaker 1: you're exactly right, and like the idea of creating that

482
00:27:08,196 --> 00:27:13,676
Speaker 1: in a out of a flurry. Our friend Sean Rama's farm,

483
00:27:13,716 --> 00:27:15,516
Speaker 1: he when he went there, he got to taste their

484
00:27:15,596 --> 00:27:18,796
Speaker 1: chicken skin and their chicken breast. We started with an

485
00:27:18,796 --> 00:27:22,716
Speaker 1: appetizer that looked something like like a pork rind. It

486
00:27:22,796 --> 00:27:26,396
Speaker 1: was like chicken skin on top of a sort of

487
00:27:26,516 --> 00:27:33,396
Speaker 1: mix of vegetables, and you know, because it was crispy,

488
00:27:34,236 --> 00:27:37,156
Speaker 1: it was sort of hard to tell like like what

489
00:27:37,316 --> 00:27:39,956
Speaker 1: the difference was, and so it was hard to be like, wait,

490
00:27:40,116 --> 00:27:42,556
Speaker 1: is this chicken or is this is this not chicken?

491
00:27:42,996 --> 00:27:46,236
Speaker 1: If it tasted just like the real thing, what do

492
00:27:46,316 --> 00:27:49,476
Speaker 1: they served to you? Next? Next up was the piece

493
00:27:49,596 --> 00:27:53,436
Speaker 1: de resi stalls. I suppose it was another mix of

494
00:27:53,516 --> 00:27:59,636
Speaker 1: vegetables over like a muscular, fatty piece of chicken that

495
00:27:59,836 --> 00:28:02,756
Speaker 1: felt like a kin to a piece of chicken breast,

496
00:28:02,796 --> 00:28:07,036
Speaker 1: but again with with skin on it, And as much

497
00:28:07,076 --> 00:28:11,876
Speaker 1: as I wanted to doubt, I was very impressed. It

498
00:28:11,956 --> 00:28:16,876
Speaker 1: was you know, it had the texture, it had the taste,

499
00:28:16,956 --> 00:28:20,156
Speaker 1: and it had the flavor of the genuine article. It

500
00:28:20,196 --> 00:28:23,436
Speaker 1: was legit. So it sounds like you went in skeptical

501
00:28:23,916 --> 00:28:30,076
Speaker 1: totally and you were impressed. I was impressed with the product.

502
00:28:30,276 --> 00:28:33,476
Speaker 1: Now I remained skeptical that this is going to happen

503
00:28:34,116 --> 00:28:37,916
Speaker 1: anytime soon, Jacob, What what Sean's alluding to is like, Yeah,

504
00:28:37,916 --> 00:28:40,796
Speaker 1: they made tremendous advances on the taste and the texture.

505
00:28:40,916 --> 00:28:44,716
Speaker 1: What they're struggling with is the cost. Yeah, okay, right now, vetours,

506
00:28:44,756 --> 00:28:47,196
Speaker 1: does it cost them about fifty dollars to make one

507
00:28:47,476 --> 00:28:53,836
Speaker 1: chicken nugget? Amazing? Yeah, I mean yeah, that's so they

508
00:28:53,916 --> 00:28:55,676
Speaker 1: got a little ways to go here before this is

509
00:28:55,676 --> 00:28:58,436
Speaker 1: gonna be a big product. In fairness, that's way cheaper

510
00:28:58,436 --> 00:29:00,276
Speaker 1: than it was a few years ago. They're doing better,

511
00:29:00,316 --> 00:29:02,396
Speaker 1: but they still have obviously a long way to go.

512
00:29:02,876 --> 00:29:05,116
Speaker 1: They got to scale up, They gotta get cost down.

513
00:29:05,396 --> 00:29:07,276
Speaker 1: They need to find a way to grow more cells

514
00:29:07,436 --> 00:29:11,196
Speaker 1: per batch, faster and without spending so much to feed

515
00:29:11,236 --> 00:29:13,636
Speaker 1: the cells. But it's a constant struggle, Viator tells me,

516
00:29:13,716 --> 00:29:16,356
Speaker 1: because if they push too much in that direction, the

517
00:29:16,476 --> 00:29:19,716
Speaker 1: quality of the product can suffer. That as an impact

518
00:29:19,436 --> 00:29:22,476
Speaker 1: on the flavor of the cells. Maybe they don't taste

519
00:29:22,476 --> 00:29:26,076
Speaker 1: as much as chicken anymore, or they are the flavor

520
00:29:26,156 --> 00:29:28,876
Speaker 1: maybe is a little less powerful. Yeah, I mean this

521
00:29:28,996 --> 00:29:34,556
Speaker 1: is a really interesting, profound question, right, Like making things

522
00:29:34,796 --> 00:29:38,076
Speaker 1: get cheaper and better or at least equally good, is

523
00:29:38,116 --> 00:29:43,196
Speaker 1: like a core technological problem in history, right, And maybe

524
00:29:43,236 --> 00:29:46,196
Speaker 1: the most important thing in the world economy for the

525
00:29:46,236 --> 00:29:49,356
Speaker 1: last fifty six years has been the way computing power

526
00:29:49,396 --> 00:29:52,116
Speaker 1: has gotten better and cheaper. Right. There's this famous thing

527
00:29:52,116 --> 00:29:56,116
Speaker 1: More's law that every two years computers basically get twice

528
00:29:56,116 --> 00:29:58,836
Speaker 1: as good, and that has been this huge driver of

529
00:29:59,116 --> 00:30:01,916
Speaker 1: like everything in Silicon Valley. Right, And this is very

530
00:30:01,956 --> 00:30:04,396
Speaker 1: much a Silicon Valley universe. You have venture capitalists. This

531
00:30:04,436 --> 00:30:06,956
Speaker 1: company is in the Bay Area. They're pouring money, and

532
00:30:06,996 --> 00:30:10,476
Speaker 1: what they want is a computer like outcome. Right. They

533
00:30:10,556 --> 00:30:13,036
Speaker 1: want it to get twice as good at half the

534
00:30:13,076 --> 00:30:16,516
Speaker 1: price constantly. And it's not obvious that just because it

535
00:30:16,556 --> 00:30:19,996
Speaker 1: worked with computer chips, it'll work with cultured meat. It

536
00:30:20,076 --> 00:30:22,156
Speaker 1: doesn't work in every domain. But I have to hope

537
00:30:22,196 --> 00:30:24,356
Speaker 1: that it will, right. I have to hope that all

538
00:30:24,396 --> 00:30:27,716
Speaker 1: this money will pay very clever people who are motivated,

539
00:30:27,836 --> 00:30:30,836
Speaker 1: who will make cultured meat, meat without animals, that is

540
00:30:30,876 --> 00:30:33,476
Speaker 1: at least as good as meat from animals and at

541
00:30:33,516 --> 00:30:36,676
Speaker 1: least as cheap. I think it's cool that they're trying,

542
00:30:36,756 --> 00:30:38,956
Speaker 1: and it's exciting to hear Sean say that as close

543
00:30:38,996 --> 00:30:41,436
Speaker 1: as they are, and I'm excited for the day that

544
00:30:41,596 --> 00:30:43,676
Speaker 1: we can really take this technology to the next level

545
00:30:43,676 --> 00:30:46,716
Speaker 1: of Jacob okay, because Vitor says that once they get

546
00:30:46,836 --> 00:30:50,676
Speaker 1: the template, they can make almost anything. As long as

547
00:30:50,676 --> 00:30:55,156
Speaker 1: you have the equipment, infrastructure, and the means, like the

548
00:30:55,156 --> 00:30:58,636
Speaker 1: culture composition to feed those cells, you can essentially grow

549
00:30:58,676 --> 00:31:03,036
Speaker 1: any type of meat, any type of meat. Jacob okay,

550
00:31:04,116 --> 00:31:14,956
Speaker 1: are you thinking what I'm thinking, Human beings? No, No, Jacob,

551
00:31:15,116 --> 00:31:18,836
Speaker 1: Jurassic Park. This is like almost the same technology from

552
00:31:18,836 --> 00:31:22,476
Speaker 1: that movie. Okay, they got the dinosaur DNA, they made dinosaurs,

553
00:31:22,836 --> 00:31:25,436
Speaker 1: And in fact, there's a company in Belgium right now

554
00:31:25,476 --> 00:31:28,956
Speaker 1: that says they're developing wooly mammoth burgers. You know, in

555
00:31:29,316 --> 00:31:32,356
Speaker 1: foody circles, there's all this talk about your burger blend like, oh,

556
00:31:32,396 --> 00:31:35,436
Speaker 1: we do like you know, twenty percent short rib, twenty

557
00:31:35,476 --> 00:31:38,236
Speaker 1: percent brisket or whatever, and every chef thinks they have

558
00:31:38,276 --> 00:31:41,516
Speaker 1: the best blend or whatever. I cannot wait to go

559
00:31:41,556 --> 00:31:43,396
Speaker 1: out to a restaurant and be like, I'll have the

560
00:31:43,556 --> 00:31:47,476
Speaker 1: like half Dodo bird, half Stegosaurus burger. Please, I'm in.

561
00:31:47,636 --> 00:31:50,156
Speaker 1: If it costs the same as a hamburger, it'll work.

562
00:31:50,196 --> 00:31:52,196
Speaker 1: Oh come on, Jacob, you wouldn't pay an extra dollar

563
00:31:52,236 --> 00:31:55,276
Speaker 1: for a stegosaurus burger. I'd pay an extra dog. How

564
00:31:55,276 --> 00:31:58,316
Speaker 1: does it come with fries? Sure, I'll throw in the

565
00:31:58,316 --> 00:32:03,116
Speaker 1: fries for free in I think the big question here

566
00:32:03,476 --> 00:32:08,596
Speaker 1: with the cultured meat is even if it does taste

567
00:32:08,596 --> 00:32:11,596
Speaker 1: the same, will people eat it? It still feels weird.

568
00:32:11,876 --> 00:32:14,036
Speaker 1: I hear what you're saying. But a couple of things.

569
00:32:14,716 --> 00:32:18,036
Speaker 1: First of all, think about all the stuff in the

570
00:32:18,116 --> 00:32:21,516
Speaker 1: whatever freeze or aisle of the grocery store. Like, look

571
00:32:21,516 --> 00:32:26,036
Speaker 1: at the ingredient list on any whatever frozen pizza. It's insane.

572
00:32:26,116 --> 00:32:30,356
Speaker 1: Nobody looks at it. I think basically most people don't care, right,

573
00:32:30,356 --> 00:32:33,116
Speaker 1: And if you think about today the way some people

574
00:32:33,276 --> 00:32:36,316
Speaker 1: care a lot, you can imagine those kind of meat eaters,

575
00:32:36,316 --> 00:32:39,556
Speaker 1: some you know, small percentage of people who will always

576
00:32:39,556 --> 00:32:41,956
Speaker 1: want their meat. But I think if you have something

577
00:32:42,316 --> 00:32:45,956
Speaker 1: that is indistinguishable from meat and the same price or

578
00:32:45,956 --> 00:32:48,676
Speaker 1: even a little cheaper, let's dream big. I think people

579
00:32:48,676 --> 00:32:51,156
Speaker 1: will get the cheaper thing that's basically the same. I

580
00:32:51,196 --> 00:32:54,516
Speaker 1: also think that these things may be somewhat generational, you know,

581
00:32:54,556 --> 00:32:57,636
Speaker 1: so like if you are have you been eating cultured

582
00:32:57,676 --> 00:32:59,796
Speaker 1: meat from the time that you were five, then it

583
00:32:59,796 --> 00:33:02,676
Speaker 1: doesn't feel weird to you. I think that I would

584
00:33:02,716 --> 00:33:08,356
Speaker 1: probably I'm more excited about cultured meat than about the

585
00:33:08,356 --> 00:33:11,396
Speaker 1: plant based I think they have a better chance of

586
00:33:11,476 --> 00:33:14,996
Speaker 1: getting to the truth. What I would call it taste parody.

587
00:33:15,636 --> 00:33:17,356
Speaker 1: It sounds like from what Sean said that they're already

588
00:33:17,396 --> 00:33:19,636
Speaker 1: there in some respects. We agree with the impossible Burgher.

589
00:33:19,716 --> 00:33:22,556
Speaker 1: As impressed as we were, it's not quite there. And

590
00:33:22,596 --> 00:33:24,636
Speaker 1: to me, like I feel like I'm in the target

591
00:33:24,676 --> 00:33:27,036
Speaker 1: audience for this because I'm not a vegetarian, but I

592
00:33:27,116 --> 00:33:29,476
Speaker 1: care about the environment and animals. I try my best

593
00:33:29,516 --> 00:33:32,356
Speaker 1: to buy meat that's been raised ethically. I don't always succeed,

594
00:33:32,396 --> 00:33:34,636
Speaker 1: but I try so. If you said to me, hey,

595
00:33:34,636 --> 00:33:36,356
Speaker 1: here's the thing that would check all those boxes and

596
00:33:36,396 --> 00:33:38,156
Speaker 1: it tastes the same and it's the same price. I

597
00:33:38,156 --> 00:33:42,156
Speaker 1: would go for that. I think we agree. Fake meat,

598
00:33:42,236 --> 00:33:44,396
Speaker 1: cultured meat, whatever you want to call it, meat without

599
00:33:44,396 --> 00:33:48,356
Speaker 1: the animals. It's not there yet, but it really sounds

600
00:33:48,356 --> 00:33:50,516
Speaker 1: like it's getting there. And if they can get the

601
00:33:50,596 --> 00:33:54,316
Speaker 1: price down, I think that'll do it and I hope

602
00:33:54,316 --> 00:34:03,956
Speaker 1: it happens. Cashman, this is great man. Thank you for

603
00:34:04,036 --> 00:34:07,996
Speaker 1: having me in the Sportful Test Kitchen. Is my pleasure anytime.

604
00:34:08,116 --> 00:34:10,796
Speaker 1: Let's tell folks real quick. So your podcast, Jacob Goldstein

605
00:34:10,876 --> 00:34:13,116
Speaker 1: is called What's Your Problem? And actually we've been doing

606
00:34:13,356 --> 00:34:15,796
Speaker 1: a few food shows now. We did a whole interview

607
00:34:15,796 --> 00:34:17,916
Speaker 1: with Pat Brown, the impossible food guy, who you heard

608
00:34:17,956 --> 00:34:19,196
Speaker 1: a little bit from in this show. We have a

609
00:34:19,196 --> 00:34:23,036
Speaker 1: whole interview with him. We did another show recently about

610
00:34:23,076 --> 00:34:25,716
Speaker 1: this app Slice that's trying to help mom and pop

611
00:34:25,756 --> 00:34:28,996
Speaker 1: pizza shops compete with Dominoes. So well, lots of food

612
00:34:29,076 --> 00:34:31,916
Speaker 1: content as well as other kind of business and tech stuff. Jacob,

613
00:34:31,956 --> 00:34:34,556
Speaker 1: thanks for coming to the Sportfel Test Kitchen aka My kitchen.

614
00:34:34,676 --> 00:34:37,556
Speaker 1: Thanks for having me. This show is produced by me

615
00:34:37,676 --> 00:34:41,716
Speaker 1: along with senior producer and producer Andreas O'Hara, with help

616
00:34:41,796 --> 00:34:44,396
Speaker 1: this week from What's Your Problem host Jacob Goldstein and

617
00:34:44,476 --> 00:34:49,196
Speaker 1: producer It's Our editor is Tracy Samuelson. Our engineer is

618
00:34:49,276 --> 00:34:52,556
Speaker 1: Jared O'Connell. Music help from Black Label Music. The Sportfell

619
00:34:52,636 --> 00:34:55,036
Speaker 1: is a production of Stitcher. Our executive producers are Colin

620
00:34:55,076 --> 00:34:58,276
Speaker 1: Anderson Nora Richie. Until next time, I'm Dan Pash and

621
00:34:58,316 --> 00:35:01,476
Speaker 1: I'm Stephanie in Cincinnati, Ohio, reminding you to eat more,

622
00:35:01,636 --> 00:35:10,076
Speaker 1: eat better, and eat more better that