Lab-Grown Salmon Hits the Menu at an Oregon Restaurant as the FDA Greenlights the Cell-Cultured Product

[Judi Lynn]

The decision clears the way for the first cultured fish to join the small but growing alternative protein market

Margherita Bassi - Daily Correspondent
June 11, 2025

While lab-grown chicken has been legal in certain U.S. states for a couple of years, the Food and Drug Administration (FDA) has just approved the first cultured fish for entry into the alternative protein club: salmon produced by the food tech company Wildtype.

On May 28, the agency issued a letter stating it has “no questions” about Wildtype’s claim that its cell-cultivated salmon is “as safe as comparable foods produced by other methods.” This marked the final step in the FDA’s safety consultation process for the product, reports the Verge’s Dominic Preston.

Emily Nytko-Lutz, an intellectual property lawyer who specializes in biotechnology patents, tells the Verge that seeking the agency’s pre-market safety consultation isn’t required for a company to sell its food, but it helps with marketing. In fact, Wildtype celebrated the green light by announcing a partnership with the James Beard award-winning chef Gregory Gourdet, who began serving the lab-grown salmon at Kann, his Haitian restaurant in Portland, Oregon, in late May.

“Introducing Wildtype’s cultivated salmon to our menu hits the elevated and sustainable marks we want our menu to offer guests who share a similar value system to ours,” Gourdet says in the announcement.

Lab-grown or “cultivated” meat has emerged as an alternative to killing animals for food. In terms of fish, the FDA’s decision comes as the seafood industry is suffering from pollution, climate change and overfishing, writes International Supermarket News. Meanwhile, seafood demand is projected to increase due to an ever-expanding human population and growing affluence. As such, lab-grown fish could lessen the burden on the fishing and fish farming industries, per Wildtype, as well as mitigate concerns about food contamination.

More:
https://www.smithsonianmag.com/smart-news/lab-grown-salmon-hits-the-menu-at-an-oregon-restaurant-as-the-fda-greenlights-the-cell-cultured-product-180986769/

[bucolic_frolic]

1. Cultivated meat has not flexed a muscle two minutes in its life

The cells, oils, fats, muscle have to be different. Just like chickens grown in 39 days in a pen are not your great granddad's peck and scratch barnyard animal which had less fat, more muscle, and a varied diet.