Science of the Lambs
food nerds save the day
What the fork is goin y’all hope you had a great holiday. We got lots of news to chew and oddly enough, it’s all science. Let’s step into the lab shall we?
Kiss Your Aspartame Goodbye
A major health organization has finally gotten around to sorta support what we’ve known for a couple decades, aspartame probably isn’t good for us. The artificial sweetener is synonymous with Diet Coke but it’s in plenty of other drinks and food products from gum to cereals to ice cream. Despite evidence showing regular consumption of aspartame being linked to headaches, depression and even seizures, the FDA defends aspartame as safe artificial sweetener to consume as long as it’s less than 18 sodas a day. So keep it under 17 and you’re golden.
Waste aversion
Tired of guessing if something in your fridge is spoiled or not? The sniff test, the tiny sample bite before ultimately deciding it’s not worth the risk and tossing it. We’re all guilty of food waste. Hell, we published a whole newsletter about it a couple months ago.
Consumer data shows the average household in the US buys and tosses nearly $3,000 of unused food annually. Well food waste might soon be a thing of the past thanks to PhD student Khengdauliu Chawang who’s developed a pH sensor for food packaging that will tell you how fresh your food is in real time.
Fucking incredible, give this woman every award please.
Lab to table dining
It’s been a banner week for fake meat as the FDA cleared lab grown meat as safe for consumption. You might’ve heard about “cultivated meat/cultured meat” by now, where scientists extract cells from a live animal via biopsy and grow the sample in a lab using a process similar to how beer is brewed. Before I dive into the complicated responses, can we just take a goddamn second and marvel at this scientific achievement. I’d put this technology up there with the development of agriculture not just helping alleviate the cost of food but accessibility.
There are inevitably people upset over this, first and probably most obvious, meat producers. If the war over the word “milk” has taught us anything, animal agricultural giants do not like competition. Ranchers balk at the cost of cellular agriculture suggesting it could cost as much as $40 per pound while ground beef is about $6 a pound now. However there is a quiet asterisk next to that lower price tag- 💰government subsidies💰. Each year the US meat and dairy industries receive more than $38 billion in taxpayer subsidies collectively and experts estimate if those industries were rug-pulled tomorrow, that $6 pound of ground beef would skyrocket to $30.
You might be thinking “at least vegans must be happy”. Hah, vegans are never happy! Cell cultured meat is causing a serious rift in the plant-based community as many are quick to point out that it still came from an animal. Even though the original animal wasn’t harmed or slaughtered (allegedly) and a few hundred cells produce enough food to replace the meat of hundreds of animals, it’s still tainted from the source. But some vegans can’t wait to try these new products and see this is a great alternative to heavily processed faux-meats now.
Considering the state of our current animal agricultural system, we need a change in any direction. A single pound of beef raised the old fashion way takes 2,000 gallons of water to produce. Seems wasteful especially considering the rising scarcity of water. Animal agriculture is responsible for 65% of the global nitrous oxide emissions and 15% of greenhouse gas emission, more than all forms of transportation emissions COMBINED. Not to mention mass deforestation, waste runoff polluting water tables, and need I remind y’all of our most recent zoonotic outbreak? I’d argue animal agriculture causes far more damage to our environment, as well as our bodies, than it helps.
I don’t give a fuck what you put on your plate but we can and should acknowledge the current system has room for improvement. We should embrace ANY innovation to reduce the cost of food, increase nutritional viability and expand access.
Speaking of burgers, we’ve got several meat-free recipes on our website, no faux beef required! Over this past holiday weekend I cooked up the BBQ Bean Sliders alongside our Fresh Herb Potato Salad and they were a hit with a party full of omnivores. Nobody asked or cared that it was vegan because they taste fucking amazing.
Want more food? Join our Sunday Recipe Club where this week Michelle offers some damn delicious and easy to make breakfast bars. All the cool kids are already signed up and… you’re cool, right? Thought so.
Til next week, keep your knives sharp 🔪
Putting a pH sensor on a basket of fresh raspberries would be life changing honestly. No more mold paranoia! Too many nooks and crannies on a damn raspberry to know for sure.
I remember you guys discussing this on the pod and at that time if I recall your conclusion is this could be considered vegetarian but not vegan. I would agree as weird as that seems. Myself being vegetarian but not full vegan can’t wrap my head around if I’d eat this once they are able to scale it up. It’s truly remarkable and has so much upside to it !