Friday, March 7, 2014

Your Favourite Celebrity Could be Tasted at Your Local Deli....

Our Future: Kanye West Salami?
Photo via
Picture this: you are walking down your local grocery store and stop by the deli to get some cold cuts. Your eyes browse over all the choices: Black Forest Ham, Turkey Ham, Genoa Salami, Ellen Degeneres Salami, Pepperoni, Julia Roberts Soppressata -- wait, what?
According to the Los Angeles Times food blog, meat made in test tubes from human cells may actually be in the works. New start-up, BiteLabs is claiming it wants to make human test tube meat a reality, and they want to use celebrities to do it.

As stated by the BiteLabs website, here is how the process will work: a sample of tissue containing myosatellite cells (cells that help repair and regrow damaged muscle) will be taken from a person during a biopsy. The cells are then multiplied in a lab and used as a medium as artificial blood to grow muscle.

When the cells have reached maturity, they will be ground and mixed with different meats, spices, fats and oils for flavour to reach the end result of a cured meat.

The company already has a few samples in the works, including James Franco, Jennifer Lawrence ("A different kind of Hunger Games!"), Ellen Degeneres and Kanye West. As a note, none of these celebrities are actually affiliated with BiteLabs.

In case you were wondering what these celebrities will taste like:




Photos via BiteLabs
The company also outlines how test-tube meat would eliminate environmental and ethical concerns associated with meat production as test-tube meat would require less than 1% of the land used in traditional livestock farming.

Fortunately (or unfortunately for some of you..), many are speculating that this is most likely the work of scientists who hope that this ludicrous idea will spark a lab meat discussion and (hopefully) not actually use Kanye West to make cured meats. BiteLabs' hope is to warm consumers to warm up to test-tube meat and to use celebrities as a way of doing this.