The Plan to Put Pig Genes in Soy Beans for Tastier Fake Meat

For Gastón Paladini, pork is a family affair. In 1923, his great-grandfather Don Juan Paladini moved from Italy to Santa Fe, Argentina, where he started putting a South American twist on classic Italian sausage recipes. Eventually, Don Juan’s company became one of Argentina’s largest meat producers. It still bears the family name: Paladini.

But in 2020, Gastón started having the kind of heretical thoughts that would have made his ancestors blush. What if you could capture the essence of pork—that meaty, umami sweetness—and put it inside of a plant? Paladini’s imagination ran…