The Good Food Institute, or the GFI, is one of my favorite non-profits in a recent couple of years. I enjoy their pragmatic, and scientific way of describing the innovative technologies behind plant-based and cultured meats.
Loyal listeners of My Food Job Rocks know that I am very interested in this type of technology as I mention it in almost every episode. Some of the My Food Job Rocks interviews with people like Deya Trujillo from Beyond Meat, Paul Shapiro, the author of Clean Meat, and Tom Mastrobuoni, the CFO of Tyson amplified this hunger for knowledge.
Loyal readers will also notice that once in a while, I write about plant proteins, mainly because they’re interesting and also a pain in the ass. I posted an article about the perils of plant proteins on LinkedIn and David Welch, Director of Science and Technology of the Good Food Institute, said I wrote a good article. Jumping on the chance, I asked to interview him or any other person in the GFI.
He then connected me with Matt Ball, who then sent an email to 5 individuals who enlightened many different ways.
In terms of food industry and technical works, I was able to interview 5 people who are technical experts in helping communicate, or perhaps a better way to describe it as, digest the complexities of plant-based and clean meat. Here, I’ll introduce them:
(You can click the pictures to access their episodes)
Zak Weston – Corporate Engagement Specialist
An active member of the Effective Altruism community, Zak joined GFI after several years of experience in sales and working with start-ups. He works with leading grocery, foodservice, and restaurant companies to help increase the quality and quantity of their plant-based product offerings.
Aylon Steinhart – Business Innovation Specialist
Aylon graduated from UC Berkeley’s Haas School of Business and has co-founded two startups. At GFI, Aylon uses his expertise in entrepreneurship, go-to-market strategy, marketing, and business development to help entrepreneurs launch the next generation of good food startups. He brings significant business leadership experience to GFI and has worked with companies such as Kellogg’s, Applebee’s, and Nestle.
Erin Rees Clayton, Ph.D. – Scientific Foundations Liaison
Erin has degrees in chemistry, epidemiology and genetics and has ten years of research experience focused on a variety of topics, including molecular biology, nutrition, poverty, and social disparity. Erin seeks out funding opportunities for plant-based and clean agriculture research, and she is also working to establish a dedicated plant-based and clean food lab at a top research university in the United States.
Isaac Emery, Ph.D. – Senior Environmental Scientist
At GFI, Isaac studies the significant environmental and human health impacts of industrial animal agriculture and evaluates the reduced impact of plant-based and clean meat. Isaac has more than a decade of research experience in biomedical science and life cycle assessment of energy and agricultural systems. As a multidisciplinary scientist, he has a passion for discovering and communicating the most effective and efficient ways to reduce the adverse impacts of our diets.
Marie Gibbons – Research Fellow, MS Student
Marie is conducting clean meat research at Harvard Medical School under Dr. George Church with the support of GFI’s REAP Grant funding. She is a MS Physiology student at North Carolina State University with a BS in Zoology, minor in Psychology, and 10 years of veterinary experience. She also serves as a New Harvest Research Fellow. Marie is using her passion for animal welfare and interest in medical science to explore and promote the cellular behavior needed for large-scale muscle cell production in bioreactors using serum-free media.
These guests are extremely knowledgeable in their chosen disciplines. If you want to learn more about Plant Based or Clean Meat, I suggest listening to all of these episodes. Once this series is over, I’ll be making a cool category somewhere on the website.
This is the future everyone, in My Food Job Rocks, it’s important for us to talk about the cutting edge of food. And these guys are the experts.
If you’d like more information, follow the Good Food Institute at gfi.org. Facebook is the best way to get their info, but if you want to learn more about the tech, I recommend downloading their white papers and learn all about the tech.