A Bay Area startup is creating actual meat that's made without harming, trapping or killing animals.
The meat from Eat Just, headquartered in Alameda, is real, humane and better for the planet.
"Real animal meat," Eat Just CEO Josh Tetrick said. "Not soy, not pea protein, not wheat protein, but real animal meat, just maybe without the need to slaughter an animal."
It all starts in a lab where biomedical engineers, cell biologists and biochemists work to grow animal cells.
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"We take the cells from the animal," Senior Director of Cellular Agriculture Vitor Espirito Santo said. "We feed them nutrients like proteins, sugars, vitamins. Essentially like the feed that we give to the animals we give to the cells, but in a liquid form."
Eat Just is just getting started.
"There's a way to do it for beef, there's a way to do it for pork, there's a way to do it for all the animal proteins," Tetrick said. "It's the same idea."
Eugene Cordero, a professor in the Department of Meteorology and Climate Science at San Jose State University, said companies like Eat Just are necessary.
"Food, what we eat, contributes up to 20% of our carbon footprint, and that's not just in the United States, that's global," he said.
The good news is Eat Just has Food and Drug Administration approval to eventually sell its meat, but it still needs United States Department of Agriculture approval. That could take some time.
Meanwhile, the fight to raise awareness goes on in academia and in the kitchen.
"You know, to eat a burger or a piece of chicken or that piece of bacon, there's an animal that's harmed on the other side of that process," Tetrick said. "We don't have to live in that world. We can live in a different world."
