While some people may grow fresh herbs in their homes, others may be growing fresh meat in the future.

Scientists have already successfully grown frog and mouse meat in the lab — and they are currently working on pork, beef and chicken.

Their goal is to develop a cultured or in vitro meat that consumers can buy at a supermarket and grow at home — in a countertop incubator the size of a coffee maker — in the next five years.

Similar to a bread maker, consumers would leave starter muscle cells with a package of growth medium in the meat maker before bed and wake up to freshly grown meat.

Yuk! Can Soylent Green be far behind? BARF!



  1. Homer S. says:

    mmmm, cheap meat.

  2. blank says:

    Perhaps this will finally shut PETA up?

    I guess “grow your own fur coat” needs to be researched too.

  3. Dan says:

    I love this story.It will probably be availible and if it tastes good,has that protien punch people crave and is cheaper than real meat it will sell.Look at margerine for example it doesn’t taste like butter but the price difference sells it.

  4. Random Thought says:

    If it goes bad, can you just plug it back in?

  5. Bill says:

    Guess you must just empty the garbage can into this thing, plug it in, and grow hot dogs ??

    This story almost wants to make me become a vegetarian …

  6. Mick Dermitt says:

    I saw a bumper sticker on an old beat Chevette.
    Grow your own dope-Plant a politician!

  7. Greg V. says:

    I’ve seen this before, though not a DIY method. I’m all for it. Lab grown meat could potentially be cheaper, leaner, more humane, more environmentally friendly, and just more efficient to make. The big issue is the grossness factor, not in how it tastes but people’s reaction to the idea.

    Here’s a good idea of how they’ll try to do the P.R. spin. It’s “cultured” meat. It will remain a niche market for quite some time though until the concept, um, grows on people.

  8. Me says:

    Meat, it’s what to eat.

    Throwing raw meat at PETA protesters has always been entertaining. I wonder if throwing this stuff will be as satisfying.

  9. Raff says:

    Brings new meaning to the term mystery meat. Maybe there really will be boneless chicken ranches in the future. ah the wonders of technology.

  10. Joe says:

    So, will this machine have a dial to adjust the quality of the meat? Can you set to “Filet Mignon” or “Tenderloin”, for example? And, with just a few cells from certain endangered species, can I finally enjoy say, Bald Eagle from time to time?

  11. Gig Giacona says:

    I thought this was how they made SPAM(T). ( The Meat not the advertising)

  12. Don says:

    Phht! I’ve got a slab of ham in my fridge that’s been growing for two years now. Last time I opened the door I thought I heard it say, “Feed me!”

  13. Me says:

    Spam is just made of noses, feet, lips and earwax.

  14. estacado says:

    I bet vegetarians would love these. Now they don’t have any excuse to not to eat meat. But even if it’s successful, I’ll still prefer the old fashion kill-and-eat meat. It just feels more human.

  15. Greg V. says:

    No steak-quality meat yet. Currently just stuff suitable for making into hot dogs, sausage, hamburgers, etc.

    Forget about bald eagle burgers, you can theoretically take a tissue sample and make you-burgers. Is it cannibalism if you’re eating yourself?

  16. Angel H. Wong says:

    Look at the bright side, now we all will be able to eat Jennifer Lopez 🙂

  17. Dan says:

    There was a S.F. short story about a world of carnivores that did this to humans because they liked the taste of us.It was very upsetting for the people in the story.Imagine someone growing human meat for consumption like this.BTW I just want to lick Jennifer Lopez.

  18. david says:

    Meat was Divine Intervention according to Stanley Kubrik in 2001:A Space Odyssey. Yeah, we had to learn how to kill first, but the meat increased our brain capacity and gave us civilization.

  19. gquaglia says:

    One word “creepy”

  20. Improbus says:

    Soon only the elites will be able to eat dead animals.

  21. david says:

    Improbus, the real elites only eat vegetables.

  22. moss says:

    Ah, david. You mean like that lifetime neo-con, Adolf Hitler.

  23. Improbus says:

    I think you mean dirty hippies only eat vegetables. LOL.

  24. Mr. Fusion says:

    Hey, what ever turns your crank. I’ll take a dead Angus.

  25. John Wofford says:

    Any one who attaches a high Yuck grade to this should never, ever walk through a meat packing plant, especially the place where they bring it in alive and on the hoof.

  26. kzoodata says:

    I wonder what the “Family Guy” crew will make with this idea? I see Quagmire has already posted some things here.

  27. stew says:

    We did this when I was a kid it was called raising chickens. Imagine doing that now. And that was in the city in 1965. One family cept a goat, mowed the lawn all summer fed them in the fall.

  28. AB CD says:

    So you don’t want to harvest meat in the lab, but it’s ok to harvest babies, got it.

  29. Reply-to: #14

    It doesn’t matter to me where the meat comes from, it still takes 7 to 10 pounds of feed per pound of meat. There’s also the fact that it’s harder to digest meat and that the average North American gets too much protein.

    …not to mention the fact that I don’t really like the veggie-whatevers that my meat-eating friends claim tastes like the real thing.

  30. Greg V. says:

    It takes 7 to 10 pounds of feed for a pound of meat when you’re growing the whole animal. Here you’re only growing the muscle tissue, so no nutrients are going towards bones, fat, or inedible organs. Plus they’re doing it through whatever culture they’re using instead of through feed, so it should be a more efficient uptake and generate less waste. Plus there’s much less processing necessary afterwards.

    People become vegetarians for health reasons, moral reasons, or both. There are definitely moral-only vegetarians that would come back to eating meat this way. There are also moral vegetarian sympathizers (like myself) who don’t want to give up meat but would be willing to switch over to this too.


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