The best beef is thought to be prime rib and nearby cuts. The price reflects the value accorded to it. There is no more nutritional value in the more expensive steaks and roasts than in chuck roast, flank steak, or short ribs. Those who can afford prime rib buy it more frequently. Others of us usually, or always, make do with lesser cuts, often adding things like “Hamburger ‘Helper'”, to make “help” the beef go farther.
We have seen great strides in agriculture. It’s surprising that modern meat production, though more efficient than ever, has not been automated out of existence. In their endless attack on existing processes, financiers now have laboratories working on, and may have succeeded in, finding new means of meat production.
“Test-tube” meats have already become established. Some expensive seafood has been artificially duplicated and has been mass produced in huge kitchens, cauldrons, and processors. It’s long been sold to restaurants and retailers. Even gourmets have a hard time telling it from “caught” products. Fishermen have been put out of work, but no one seems overly concerned about the sad fate of those in the private sector who inevitably lose their jobs to financiers who bring their big guns of automation or cheaper offshore labor to bear on whatever targets they can profitably hit.
It’s just a question of time until there is similarly processed, “test-tube” manufacture of beef, pork, and chicken. Will the first to make meat products that look, smell, taste, and cook like beef charge more for the faux prime rib than the similarly produced hamburger?
Will those in religions that eschew pork products be allowed to eat fake hams, with fake smoke, that are cranked out by huge food factories, within which no pig, or any part thereof, has ever entered? Will those who say “Yes! We can eat it because it really is not pork.” be involved in shooting wars with those who say “No! We have a duty to kill you if you eat anything that even reminds us of pork.” Will Shiites be on one side, Sunnis on the other? Or, will whole new groups of enthusiasts emerge, using theological issues to gain political power?
On that happy day, will even the staunchest Orthodox Jew and the most fanatical Moslem be able to enjoy bacon, lettuce, and tomato sandwiches in peace together? My bet would have to be in the negative.
