You are what you eat

“CHOW TM contained spun, plaited, and woven protein molecules, capped and coded, carefully designed to be ignored by even the most ravenous digestive tract enzymes; no-cal sweeteners; mineral oils replacing vegetable oils; fibrous materials, colorings, and flavorings. The end result was a foodstuff almost indistinguishable from any other except for two things. Firstly, the price, which was slightly higher, and secondly, the nutritional content, which was roughly equivalent to that of a Sony Walkman.”

The quote above is from “Good Omens”, a book originally published in 1990 and recently adapted for the screen by a team including Neil Gaiman, one of its authors, who will hopefully burn in a Hell not of his own choice for what he did to his own work. Gaiman is also the author of the quote above.

Said quote describes the work of an ambitious and very zeitgeisty Famine unleashed on the late 1980s world along with his pals. The book’s about the Apocalypse, which it details from a magnificently funny perspective. Besides funny, however, “Good Omens” is apparently also prophetic.

“We start with a source of carbon, like carbon dioxide, and use a little bit of heat and hydrogen to form chains which are then blended with oxygen from air to make the fats & oils we know, love and drool over.

That’s how we get rich, delightful ingredients without animal suffering, palm plantations, or dangerous chemicals. All in the most efficient, most resilient, least polluting way known to science.”

That quote is not from “Good Omens”. That quote is from the website of a company called Savor, which is both clever and witty, and well done. The company recently made noise in the media by declaring its synthetic product to be as good as butter, at least in terms of taste. I Can’t Believe It’s Not Butter 2.0, if you will.