The Lab-Grown Meat That Is Finally Reaching Restaurant Menus

Cultivated chicken and beef are now available in select restaurants in Singapore, the US, and Israel. Here is how the technology works, what the meat actually tastes like, and when it might be affordable.

Cultivated meat — animal meat grown from animal cells in bioreactors rather than from slaughtered animals — has moved from science fiction to restaurant menu in Singapore, the United States (following FDA and USDA approval in 2023), and Israel. The specific products currently available commercially are limited: UPSIDE Foods and GOOD Meat in the US are selling cultivated chicken in select restaurant contexts. The technology for cultivated beef, pork, and seafood is advancing but at slower commercial timelines than chicken.

The production process involves three stages. First, cell acquisition: cells are extracted from a live animal through biopsy — no animals are killed in the process — and the specific cell types that will form muscle tissue are isolated and cryopreserved. Second, proliferation: cells are grown in bioreactors in a nutrient-rich growth medium that provides the amino acids, vitamins, and growth factors that cells need to divide. Over days to weeks, a small number of initial cells can proliferate to billions. Third, differentiation and maturation: cell culture conditions are altered to trigger muscle fibre formation, the biological process that creates the structure we recognise as meat.

The taste assessment from people who have eaten commercially available cultivated chicken is generally positive — described as tasting like chicken, with a texture appropriate for the product form (nuggets, fillets) rather than precisely replicating the specific muscle architecture of conventionally farmed chicken. The most advanced products use scaffolding techniques to provide the three-dimensional structure that whole-cut meat requires, which is the remaining texture frontier for the technology.

The cost challenge: currently produced at approximately $17-25 per kilogram for cultivated chicken in commercial production, compared to conventional chicken's $2-4 per kilogram retail price. The cost reduction path involves larger bioreactor scales, cheaper growth media (the current media use expensive pharmaceutical-grade components that agricultural-scale production will reduce), and improved cell line efficiency. The target for cost parity with conventional chicken — which would enable mainstream market entry — is estimated in the 2030s under current production trajectory projections.