The human love of meat appears to be hard-wired. The world consumes more than 550 million metric tons of meat and seafood each year. That number has been climbing for decades and is expected to continue to rise through at least 2050.

What if we could give humanity the meat it craves, but produced differently? Plant-based and cultivated meat that are just as delicious as the meat you love, but more affordable and healthier.

Think it's not possible? With examples ranging from the "horseless carriage" (car) to the smart phone in your pocket, Meat reminds readers that scientific innovations often move from disbelief or opposition to inevitability and ubiquity, much faster than almost anyone expects.

Envisioning a future where meat is both a delight and a force for good, Friedrich explores:

Humanity's 12,000-year-old practice of raising animals for meat, and why we need to figure out a better way. The science and scientists behind the efforts to create plant-based and cultivated meat that is indistinguishable from conventional animal meat, but less expensive, more nutritious, and safer. How plant-based and cultivated meat can preserve forests and biodiversity, mitigate climate change and ocean pollution, and lower antimicrobial resistance and pandemic risk. The economic and food security benefits of making meat more efficiently, which include trillions of dollars in economic output annually, tens of millions of good jobs, and the possibility of a revitalized farm economy.