“We were promised flying cars and instead we got 140 characters,” quipped Peter Thiel back in 2013. The Silicon Valley entrepreneur’s dig at the banality of Twitter and other modern social media is a reminder that the future rarely turns out in the way we were promised it would – often it is rather more dismal. A 1960s futurist would be astounded to learn that not only do people in 2024 not holiday on the Moon, but also Man hasn’t even been back there since 1972.
It’s a similar story with meat substitutes. Around 2020 there was a boom in companies modestly promising to transform the way that humanity eats. According to their heady predictions, by now a decent chunk of us were supposed to be well on the way to eating mainly plant-based meals. The proposition made commercial sense: UK sales of meat substitutes rose 40% in the five years to 2019. Concerns about carbon emissions from the meat and dairy industry, plus a growing sensitivity to animal welfare, meant that more and more people were identifying as “flexitarians” – those who try to avoid meat, but do indulge
