Move Over, Beef Tallow: Mosa Meat Files to Sell Cultivated Fat for Blended Meat in Europe
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Dutch startup Mosa Meat has filed a novel food regulatory application for its cultivated beef fat in the European Union.
The maker of the world’s first cultivated beef burger has applied for market authorisation in its home region.
Mosa Meat has submitted a dossier in the EU for a cultivated beef fat ingredient, which can be mixed with plant-based ingredients for use in blended meat products like hamburgers, meatballs, empanadas, or bolognese.
It is only the second company filing for approval for cultivated meat from the EU Commission and the European Food Safety Authority (EFSA), following French startup Gourmey‘s application in July. The two bodies will now evaluate the dossier in a process that’s expected to take 18 months. If successful, Mosa Meat would be able to sell the ingredient in all 27 member states and the three EEA countries.
The development comes months after Mosa Meat held a public tasting for cattle farmers, product developers and other industry representatives at its headquarters in Maastricht, where it dished out hybrid beef burgers. “The burgers in our public tastings were produced with a very similar blend, using our cultivated fat,” CEO Maarten Bosch tells Green Queen.
Eyeing regulatory success in multiple countries

The EU has been the toughest regulatory nut to crack for cultivated meat companies, thanks to a complex and stringent novel food framework that Mosa Meat describes as the “global gold standard for food safety”.
The approval process involves the EU Commission as well as its member states, alongside input from scientific experts at the European Food Safety Authority (EFSA), which ensures that the authorisation retains the buy-in of all stakeholders.
Unlike regulators in other countries (like Singapore), the EU’s regulatory process requires cultivated ingredients to be submitted individually, instead of full products. While Mosa Meat chose its fat as the first ingredient for submission, Bosch reveals that it also has a dedicated team working on cultivating muscle tissue.
Speaking of Singapore, this was the first market Mosa Meat had applied for approval, though the original nine- to 12-month timeline the country has touted has been hard to realise. “We remain in communication with the regulators in Singapore but, at this time, we don’t have any new updates or timelines to share regarding the process,” says Bosch.
A new Food Safety and Security Bill, which codifies the assessment framework, can break the deadlock and speed up the process.
Beyond Europe and Singapore, Bosch teased submissions in “two other geographies” imminently. The company has previously indicated interest in the UK, Switzerland and the US – though the new Trump administration could derail progress in the latter.
“We are eager to collaborate closely with regulatory authorities to ensure full compliance with safety requirements,” he says.
Why Mosa Meat decided to start with cultivated fat
Blending cultivated fat with plant-based ingredients would allow Mosa Meat to introduce its initial burgers to customers while “staying true to our long-term vision, Bosch says.
“Fat is the primary driver of flavour in meat, influencing taste, aroma, and mouthfeel. Of the main components of meat – muscle, fat, and connective tissue – fat has the most significant culinary impact,’ he explains.
“Many plant-based products struggle to replicate this experience, as oils like coconut behave very differently from beef fat in terms of melting, taste, and aroma. Cultivated fat helps bridge this gap, delivering the authentic beefy experience that consumers crave.”
So how does Mosa Meat make it? “We start by taking a small sample of cells from a cow. This sample contains cells that could become either muscle or fat,” says Bosch.
“For this product, we isolate and focus on nurturing the fatty potential of the cells in a nutrient-rich and serum-free medium. This process mimics their natural growth cycle, allowing them to duplicate by orders of magnitude and take on that beefy quality. Once harvested from the cultivator, the final product can be combined with our in-house plant-based mix for any dish that uses a beef mince,” he describes.
Its innovations impressed taste testers at the public event last year, as well as chefs like Hans van Wolde – owner of the two-Michelin-starred eatery Brut 172 – who formally joined its product development team in 2023.
“When I first tried a Mosa Burger as part of the internal development team, I was blown away by the beefy taste and the amazing mouthfeel of the beef fat,” he says. “It gave me goosebumps. I genuinely believe this new way of making beef can delight connoisseurs and casual beef lovers alike while enjoying the positive benefits of cultivated beef from a sustainability perspective.”
The promise of hybrid meat
Bosch suggests that the exact composition of its burgers is being refined right now, but adds: “Our immediate focus is on using cultivated fat in our own Mosa burgers, but we’re also in discussions with several plant-based product producers about potential collaborations.”
Hybrid meat has been described by investors as the most viable way of commercialising cultivated meat at the moment, thanks to the high costs and scalability challenges. Most cultivated meat products that have come to market have been in hybrid format – Eat Just, the only company to sell these proteins in a supermarket, uses only 3% of cultivated cells in its Good Meat chicken for retail.
When Mosa Meat co-founder Dr Mark Post first unveiled a cultivated meat burger in 2013, the two proof-of-concept patties cost $330,000. The firm has since managed to slash costs repeatedly. In 2020, it cut the price of its growth medium by 80-fold, and a year later, reduced the cost of its fat medium by 66 times.
In May 2023, it opened what it claims is currently the world’s largest cultivated meat facility in Maastricht. This “cultivated meat campus” is its fourth plant, expanding its footprint to 7,340 sq m (79,007 sq ft), and has a 1,000-litre bioreactor scale that can produce “tens of thousands of cultivated hamburgers”.
Could cultivated beef fat take on tallow?
It’s been a tough time for the cultivated meat industry, both from a policy and financial perspective. In the EU, Italy has banned these proteins, and countries like France and Hungary have tried to do so too. Across the pond, policymakers in over a dozen states have proposed a ban, with Florida and Alabama being successful.
But with efforts to greenify the EU’s food system on the rise, and the EU Commission batting away arguments to justify a cultivated meat ban, there are signs that regulatory progress could accelerate here. A 2024 survey of 16,000 citizens from 15 EU countries found that Europeans are largely in favour of cultivated meat if it passes safety assessments from food regulators, and a majority are willing to try it.
And while investment in cultivated meat has been decreasing (dropping by 75% in 2023, followed by another decline in 2024), Mosa Meat was one of the outliers, raising €40M ($42.4M) in a funding round in April. It took total investment in the company to over $135M, with backers including Mitsubishi Corporation, Dutch state investor Invest-NL, and Leonardo DiCaprio.
The other reason why Europe needs cultivated meat is the climate impact. Livestock farming takes up 71% of the EU’s agricultural land and contributes to 84% of its food system emissions, but meat and dairy only provide 35% of calories and 65% of proteins in the region.
According to an independent life-cycle assessment, cultivated beef can cut emissions by 93%, use 95% less land, and consume 78% less water than its conventional protein.
Another beef product bad for the planet is tallow, which has exploded in popularity thanks to skincare influencers on TikTok and brands looking to move away from seed oils. Does Mosa Meat see an opportunity to tap into the consumer market for this fat too?
Bosch isn’t ruling anything out. “While our current focus is on developing complete products, such as our Mosa burgers, we remain open to exploring creative culinary applications for our cultivated fat in the future,” he says.