Ever wanted a juicy hamburger, but without the actual beef? A potential alternative is plant-based meat. Plant-based meats are -- as the name implies -- made from plants. It’s the restructuring and manufacturing of plants to feel and taste like an animal product. As more research and innovation emerges, plant-based meats may become both more popular and bio-friendly. For a transcript, please visit https://climatebreak.org/plant-based-meat-with-ricardo-san-martin/
For a transcript, please visit https://climatebreak.org/plant-based-meat-with-ricardo-san-martin/
Dr. San Martin: Plant-based meat is contradiction itself.
Ethan: That’s Dr. Ricardo San Martin, research director of the alternative meat program at the Sutardja Center for entrepreneurship and technology at UC Berkeley, who's all about plant-based meat alternatives.
Dr. San Martin: It's an attempt to mimic foods that we know, like meat, beef, or chicken, it could be fish, with plant components. You need a lot of restructuring of plant components to make them look, taste and mouth feel like an animal product.
Ethan: We assume plant-based alternatives may not taste the same as meat, but are healthier and better for the environment. However, Dr. San Martin says it's complicated.
Dr. San Martin: You have to consider the whole production chain to argue that one is better than the other. I would argue that it should be better than the other, the plant based. We don't have too many independent numbers to corroborate that.
Ethan: Plant-based diets may take time to become commonplace. But he believes we should be educating kids.
Dr. San Martin: Every time the kids get together, there's not a message of healthiness. There's a message of stacks of cupcakes and pizza and things like that. There's more to be done at the school level to understand that we should be eating healthier.
Ethan: For more information on plant-based meat and Dr. San Martin’s work, and for more climate solutions, go to climatebreak.org or wherever you get your podcasts. I’m Ethan Elkind and this was Climate Break.