How Does a Lab-Grown Stem Cell Hamburger Taste?

Buzz

Ngày cập nhật gần nhất: 15/4/2026

Content

More stories from The Week...

By Chris Gayomali

Two years back, Mark Post from Maastricht University in the Netherlands embarked on a mission to develop a lab-grown hamburger. This innovation eliminated the need for cows, slaughterhouses, and drastically reduced the carbon footprint linked to traditional cattle farming.

Today in London, Post's groundbreaking achievement was finally sampled. Food writer Josh Schonwald and Austrian food researcher Hanni Rutzler tasted the $330,000 petri-dish patty in front of an audience of journalists. What was their conclusion?

"The flavor is quite intense," Rutzler noted. "Its appearance closely resembles meat, and it has a firm texture." Rutzler added:

The exterior of the meat was surprisingly crispy. The taste was juicy, akin to real meat, yet distinct. It doesn’t mimic meat substitutes like soya; it genuinely tastes like meat. [NBC News]

Schonwald was slightly more reserved. "It has a lean quality," he remarked. "The lack of fat alters the flavor… I’d place it somewhere between a Boca Burger [soy burger brand] and McDonald's in terms of taste."

During Monday’s tasting, the lab-grown meat was combined with salt, egg, breadcrumbs, red beet juice, and saffron to achieve a natural reddish hue. It was pan-fried and lightly seasoned with salt and pepper.

Creating the artificial meat patty was a complex process. Stem cells were extracted from a live cow through a biopsy, and then thin strands were carefully layered to form the foundation of actual muscle tissue. Post explains that approximately 20,000 strands are needed to produce a single 5-ounce hamburger.

Although lab-grown meat is far from being commercially viable, Post claims that a single stem-cell sample could eventually produce up to 20,000 tons of beef. It’s worth noting that traditional cattle farming has a significant ecological impact and is widely regarded as unsustainable.

A 2006 United Nations report, for instance, highlighted that the meat industry emits "more greenhouse gases contributing to global warming, measured in CO2 equivalent, than the transportation sector." A substantial portion of this environmental damage stems from methane emissions produced by cows:

Including emissions from land use and land use changes, the livestock sector is responsible for 9 percent of CO2 from human-related activities. However, it produces a disproportionate amount of even more harmful greenhouse gases. It generates 65 percent of human-related nitrous oxide, which has 296 times the Global Warming Potential (GWP) of CO2, primarily from manure. Additionally, it accounts for 37 percent of all human-induced methane (23 times as warming as CO2), largely from the digestive processes of ruminants, and 64 percent of ammonia, which significantly contributes to acid rain. [UN.org]

Post’s initiative was primarily funded by an anonymous donor, whose identity remained undisclosed—until now. On Monday, it was revealed that the project’s backer is Google co-founder and futurist Sergey Brin. "If it succeeds, it could be truly transformative for the world," Brin told the Guardian. "If what you're doing isn’t perceived by some as science fiction, it’s probably not transformative enough."

So, would you be willing to try lab-grown hamburger meat? Share your thoughts below.