Hi Everyone!
Today is Tuesday and that means a day with Elizabeth and Bleubeard.
You all know I love cookies. Actually, the cookie dough.
Not store bought rather homemade with good ingredients. Even though I have not made any lately here are few from my past.
Almond
Whipped Shortbread
These are just a few of the types of cookies I have made. So, why am I showing these?
Because to my dismay I read this article.
Scientists have successfully turned plastic bottles and agricultural waste into edible, protein-rich cookies
Whenever I read something like this I immediately think of
"Soylent Green."
Ya know, the 1973 movie that was based on the 1966 scify book, 
"Make Room! Make Room!" by Harry Harrison?
Welllllll.... it seems that NASA has backed researchers at Southern Illinois University Carbondale to turn plastic waste into edible, 3D-printed cookies called µBites.
In the simplest terms, the team uses high heat, pressure, water, and oxygen to break down plastic bottles and plant waste. Specially programmed yeasts eat the broken carbon pieces and turn them into proteins, fats, and vitamins. The final mixture, "slurry or slime" is put through a 3D printer to form small, disc-shaped cookies.
The cookies have passed the smell test.
To make the cookies appealing, the team programmed specific yeast strains to generate vanilla flavoring directly from the plant biomass. Another engineered strain converts ethylene glycol into beta-carotene, which the human body turns into Vitamin A.
Uhhhh I'm going to get my Vit A from real carrots.
Once printed, the uBites are hardened in a microwave. This means they likely have a firm, dense, or slightly uniform structure rather than a light, crumbly texture of traditional oven baked cookies.
At this point the FDA has NOT approved human taste testing.
The cost.
Currently, production costs sit at roughly $60 per kilogram, meaning they are far from commercial supermarket shelves. It breaks down like this per cookie.
Small cookie, (15 grms) .90cents.
Medium cookie, (25 grms) $1.50.
Large cookie, (30 grms) $1.80.
This may not seem like a lot but the cookies you buy now at the store run pennies to produced. Yeah, a rip off.
To sum it up.
By using synthetic biology to turn inorganic trash into organic sustenance, the researchers at Southern Illinois University Carbondale (SIU) have created a proof-of-concept for a closed-loop food system. Lead researcher Dr. Lahiru Jayakody notes that with global food demand skyrocketing, we must urgently "reinvent the food production system to ensure food security."
My personal note.
We already have bio engineered foods in the stores. Governments start slow getting people used to what's available. Then, as this concept proceeds in creating other foods they will be introduce into the food chain.
When "real" food becomes a luxury fear driven government policies will easily cause the public to conform. Hunger makes the human spirit cross lines it once thought impassable.
I'm old so maybe I won't be around for this but my grand and great grand kids just might be.
I think I will go bake come cookies to have with my real milk.
Have a nice Tuesday
Nicole
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