Uzbek pilaf is one of my favourite dishes. My stepfather used to cook it. He was a Tatar, which is probably why his pilaf was so tasty: always moderately greasy, not dry, grain to grain, the meat tender, soft, juicy. Pilaf was usually prepared for guests, on holidays or when a cow was slaughtered. A specialist from Bashkiria, for example, was hired to do the slaughtering. On that day we all cried and the cow cried, but the pilaf was still very tasty. Then the haymaking season would begin and we would go out to gather hay. I was always dissatisfied with this arrangement and began to fantasise, creating my own ideal world where there was a law: 'NO ONE EATS ANYONE'.  "That world would collapse immediately, of course, because everyone would die," my stepfather would say.

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As an adult, I came across Paul Shapiro's book Clean Meat, which tells the turbulent story of inventors and investors trying to bring to market the world's first true animal products, made without breeding or killing animals. Instead of animals directly, we will be able to tame and grow inanimate meat from their DNA. The story Paul Shapiro tells of this 'second domestication' is nothing less than domestication at the cellular level.

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I was incredibly inspired: the book described the possibility of creating hybrid steaks from beef, salmon and turkey. The only thing separating the science fiction from the real world was the question of finding investors and a well-functioning marketing department to bring this product to market.