Meat food is rich in essential amino acids and lipids, which are easily digested and absorbed by the human body and provide heat for the human body. The process of human evolution into a thinking primate is also a process of constantly learning to cook animals, which seems to indicate that human beings are born to eat meat.

However, the management of animal husbandry is relatively extensive, and water and soil resources can not be used efficiently. According to statistics, human animal husbandry consumes 80% of the earth's farmland and 10% of fresh water, and a large number of greenhouse gases emitted by livestock also stimulate climate change to some extent.

On the other hand, many people are worried about the meat in the market, because most artificially raised animals add hormones and antibiotics to their feed.

In addition, due to various factors such as cultural beliefs, there are many vegetarians in life. For example, Buddhism has always advocated compassion and refrained from killing. Therefore, children of Buddhist beginners in China can only be vegetarian.

In order to protect the natural environment and satisfy people's appetite, but not to make them violate their beliefs or worry about hormone flooding, researchers have continuously developed a meat-like food, namely vegetarian meat, using plant protein instead of animal protein.

Make the taste of vegetarian meat more confusing.

In China, vegetarian meat, as a dietary tradition, has existed in temples and folk in China for a long time. Some vegetarian snacks with a long history are so famous and delicious that they can almost be confused with the real thing. However, it is far from enough to scientifically analyze the production and development of vegetarian meat.

Ethan Brown, an American vegetarian, discovered the research on plant texture proteins by reading scientific papers. This protein is described as brown and textured, which he believes are the key attributes needed to replace meat.

Brown invented a machine that can make vegetable protein into "meat". He poured edible white beans, pea powder and water into the machine, and the mixed protein powder would become a wet solid after being squeezed and cooked by the machine. Then, the staff grinds it into vegetarian meat that looks like red meat (such as mammalian meat).

The most difficult challenge faced by food chemists is the taste of vegetarian meat, which is also our greatest concern. Real meat has a complex structure: the proportion of fat, muscle and bone affects the flavor of meat. But vegetarian meat does not have these conditions. It is found that the flavor similar to meat flavor can be formed by Maillard reaction (a common non-enzymatic browning phenomenon, and the flavor formed has natural meat flavor) or adding meat flavor essence.

Dave Anderson is a chef in a very popular vegetarian restaurant. He is very proud that his brown mushroom bacon (which can be torn like a steak) is made of puffed soybean protein. Because the expanded soybean protein is seasoned with salt water under vacuum, the sauce will penetrate better and taste more delicious. Through continuous experiments and analysis, Anderson developed more vegetarian dishes by using modern cooking techniques, such as lightly seasoned chicken strips, minced beef and beef burgers, which are no different in taste from real meat. Anderson said that his goal is to develop vegetarian meat that is very similar to meat in all aspects, hoping to promote the product and enter the supermarket in the future.

Meat production in test tube

In addition to replacing animal protein with plant protein, there is also "test tube meat".

As early as 2003, Margaret Atwood, a Canadian woman writer, wrote an idea in her novel The Last Men and Women: Chicken nuggets are made of "test-tube meat".

Here I want to tell you that eating "test-tube meat" every day will not stay in the novel, and it will probably become a reality soon. If one day people around you tell you that the delicious steak and crispy chicken legs on the barbecue rack are all native "test tube meat", I wonder if you still have an appetite?

Recently, Dr. mironov, an American biologist and tissue engineer, successfully cultivated edible meat in test tubes. The principle is to extract active single cells from animals and put them into test tubes containing nutrients. This cell will divide into thousands of new cells until muscle tissue is produced. You can grow enough fresh meat in a few weeks.

Dr mironov said that in future research, more refined meat can be extracted to benefit people who don't want to eat too much fat. American scientists Gabe Voges and his son used beef cells mixed with pectin and spices to create a series of products, including "grilled steak". But at present, these experiments are in the basic research stage, and the production cost is high, so they have not really entered people's daily life.

However, the controversy caused by "test tube meat" is becoming more and more fierce. Some people think that "test-tube meat" can be produced quickly, which can meet the large demand for meat brought by population growth and reduce the ecological environment caused by animal husbandry. The quality of this kind of meat can be adjusted artificially, and its nutritional value may be higher, so don't worry about excessive fat intake.

However, opponents believe that "test-tube meat" violates the laws of nature and its ethics needs to be studied. In addition, some people are worried about its quality, just like genetically modified food. So far, no one can guarantee its quality and safety.

However, with the development of science and technology, we don't need animals to eat meat in the future.

(This article is from Encyclopedia of New Theories on Science and Technology,No. 10, No.20 15).