Earlier this week, a startup out of Israel launched a ‘fake meat’ product in its home country and parts of Europe. While plant-based/vegan alternatives to meat-based products is nothing new, Redefine Meat is doing something a little different: they’re 3D-printing fake meat.
Redefine Meat (aiming to do exactly what their name suggests) in July told us its 3D-printed meat alternative was coming.
With its eyes firmly set on meat lovers, Redefine Meat says it has worked closely with global meat experts and developed proprietary technologies to create a new category of high-quality meat products made from plant-based ingredients. Essentially, its product is made from a combo of coconut fat, beetroot, chickpeas and soy and pea protein, which is then 3D-printed to mimic the texture and look of beef steak.
“Having made huge strides in developing technology to replace the entire cow, the company today brings to market its first product range delivering unparalleled taste and texture,” it said in a statement at the time.
“The technological versatility to do what no other has done – replace every part of the cow with tasty plant-based meat,” its CEO Eshchar Ben-Shitrit added.
After unveiling the world’s first steak produced using industrial-level 3D printing in June 2020, Redefine Meat now has industrial-scale 3D printers, which will produce its ‘New-Meat’ product at scale.
UK vegans and veggos can, as of this week, now get their hands on 3D-printed ‘steaks’ in the restaurants of Marco Pierre White, who is a British chef who you may recognise as a judge from MasterChef Australia and MasterChef Australia: The Professionals.
Pierre White has also officially announced he will be serving the goods from Redefine Meat in his UK restaurants, with the mouth-watering innovation setting punters back an eye-watering £20-30 (approximately $37 – 55 in Aussie money).
The 3D-printed meat alternative is also initially available in a few restaurants across Germany, the Netherlands and Israel.
Redefine Meat aren’t the only crew 3D-printing ‘meat’, plant-based meat substitute startup Novameat announced earlier this year it was doing the same thing.
As a vegan, this is super cool but also super gross. But, I’m not the target audience, meat-eaters are, aaaand in my experience, that’s a hard audience to convince a 3D-printed whole ass cow is better to eat than one that used to be alive.