In just a few years we may be seeing edible, lab-grown ground chuck that smells and tastes just like the real thing.
Utrecht University‘s professor of meat sciences, Henk Haagsman, and his Dutch colleagues are working on growing artificial pork meat from pig stem cells. Their goal is to grow a form of minced meat suitable for burgers, sausages and pizza toppings within the next few years. Items such as steak are much further away though as it is not yet known how to grow blood vessels within tissue.

This could be a big deal when it comes to world hunger. A single cell could theoretically produce enough meat to feed the world’s population for a year. But the challenge lies in creating several industrial-size bioreactors to grow it on a large scale.
The meat would also be “cleaner” than what we are eating today. There would be no feed grain production and processing, breeders, hatcheries, grow-out, slaughter or processing facilities. They can even stuff the meat with omega-3 fatty acids that are great for our own brains and hearts.

Likely the consumer will at first be reluctant to eat “test tube meat,” but I believe if people are educated about the benefits of this meat it will really catch on.
But will the big beef industry “allow” vitro meat into the homes of people around the world?

Here are a few links with more information on vitro meat.

Wired.com - Test Tube Meat Nears Dinner Table

Guardian.co.uk - When meat is not murder

Wikipedia.org - In vitro meat

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