经济学人:食品领域新革命 液体午餐

 　　Business: Food technology Liquid lunch 商业：食品科技，液体午餐

　　A startup called Soylent wants to change the way people consume calories. 成立不久的Soylent绿色食品生产公司想要改变人们消耗卡路里的方式。

　　“One should eat to live, not live to eat,” wrote Moliere, the French comedic playwright¹. 法国喜剧作家莫里哀曾写过“人应为生而食，不应为食而生”。

　　Some workaholic entrepreneurs have taken him at his word. 一些企业家工作狂都已信奉他这句话。

　　Soylent, a two-year-old startup, is trying to save consumers time and money by selling them a healthy, cheap “meal” that they can drink. Soylent是一家成立了两年的小公司，它向消费者销售健康便宜并且能喝下去的“饭”，以此来节省消费者的时间和金钱。

　　Each vegetarian² portion has only around 400 calories, costs around $3 and boasts of being as nutritious³ as, and more environmentally-friendly than, processed food and meat. 每种素食成分的热量大概只有400卡路里，售价3美元左右，和加工过的食品和肉类一样富含营养而且更加环保。

　　Soylent has found a place among American workaholics who resent the cost and hassle of preparing regular meals. Soylent在那些因费钱费力而不喜欢准备正餐的美国工作狂中找到了销路。

　　This is especially true in Silicon⁴ Valley, home of many “early-adopter” engineers too consumed with coding the future to break from work. 这在“早期接受者”工程师之家的硅谷更是如此。工程师们过度忙于给未来编码而没有时间休息。

　　Their bad diets can damage their health. 不健康的饮食会毁坏他们的健康。

　　Several years ago Sam Altman, an entrepreneur who is now president of Y Combinator, a startup boot camp, was so cost-conscious and focused on building his first company, Loopt, 时任Y联合者（Y Combinator，成立不久的创业孵化营公司）总裁的企业家山姆·阿尔特曼几年前专注于成立自己的第一家公司Loopt，

　　that for weeks he ate only ramen noodles and coffee ice cream, until he developed scurvy⁵. 他非常有成本节约意识，以至于连续几周只吃拉面和咖啡冰淇淋，直到他得了坏血病。

　　He later became an investor⁶ in Soylent. 后来，他成为了Soylent的投资人。

　　At first the product was sold as a powder, but even that was a hassle for some consumers, so on September 9th it started shipping⁷ version 2.0,  起初，Soylent的产品是以粉末状销售的，但即便这样，对一些消费者来说还是很麻烦，因此在9月9日，它的销售版本升级为Soylent 2.0，

　　which comes already mixed and bottled. 该版本的产品为开盖就能直接喝的瓶装饮料。

　　The name Soylent is a tribute to a 1966 science-fiction novel, “Make Room! Make Room!”,  Soylent这个名字来自于1966年一部科幻小说“Make Room！Make Room！”，

　　set in an overpopulated world where everyone eats a mixture of lentils and soy (and, in the film version, human flesh) . 小说故事设置在人口过剩导致资源匮乏的未来世界，在那里所有人都吃由扁豆和大豆制成的Soylent饼片（在电影版本中，他们还吃人肉）。

　　Rob Rhinehart, the drink's 27-year-old creator, came up with the idea when he was working on a different startup, focused on wireless⁸ internet. 流体食品开创者罗布·莱因哈特，今年27岁。他在一家研究无线网络的小公司上班时想到了一个主意。

　　He was so poor that he started mixing his own food, and later dropped the other project to focus on food technology. 他太穷了以至于开始把自己的食物都混合着吃，后来他丢下另一个项目跑去研究食品科技。

　　He is, by any measure, extreme. 不管以何种标准来衡量，他都太穷了。

　　He considers shopping at grocery stores, in the presence of “rotting” produce, a “multisensory living nightmare”, and no longer owns a fridge. 站在一堆“腐烂”的农产品面前，让他觉得在杂货商店购物就像在做一场纠结的，活生生的恶梦，因此他再也不使用冰箱了。

　　Soylent has proved that it can appeal to a niche⁹, as well as to a handful of financiers:  Soylent证明了它能吸引利基市场和一部分的金融家：

　　in January the firm raised $20m from investors¹⁰, including Andreessen Horowitz, a well-regarded venture-capital firm. 一月份，它从投资者中筹集到了2000万美元，它的投资者包括安德森·霍洛维茨基金，一家有名望的风险投资公司。

　　But it has plenty of obstacles to overcome. 但它需要克服很多障碍。

　　Yucky-sounding ingredients like algal oil (yes, derived¹¹ from algae) will put many off, as well as reviews from early users that Soylent makes them gassy. 听起来很恶心的原料，比如海藻油（的确从海藻中提取出来）以及早期用户评论Soylent的产品让他们吃了有口气，这些让很多顾客望而止步。

　　“I prefer my food with both flavour and texture,” says one young, vegetarian entrepreneur who has tried it. 一位尝试过Soylent产品的年轻素食企业家说“我喜欢我的食物有香味和质感” 。

　　Mr Rhinehart insists that Soylent's “neutral” taste is the best way to appeal to the broadest group of people. 莱因哈特先生坚持认为Soylent那种“中性化”的味道是用来吸引最广泛人群的最好方式。

　　Just how big that group really is, however, remains¹² to be seen. 然而这个群体真正有多大还有待分晓。

1 playwright   

n.剧作家，编写剧本的人

参考例句：

• Gwyn Thomas was a famous playwright.格温·托马斯是著名的剧作家。
• The playwright was slaughtered by the press.这位剧作家受到新闻界的无情批判。

2 vegetarian   

n.素食者；adj.素食的

参考例句：

• She got used gradually to the vegetarian diet.她逐渐习惯吃素食。
• I didn't realize you were a vegetarian.我不知道你是个素食者。

3 nutritious   

adj.有营养的，营养价值高的

参考例句：

• Fresh vegetables are very nutritious.新鲜蔬菜富于营养。
• Hummingbirds have discovered that nectar and pollen are very nutritious.蜂鸟发现花蜜和花粉是很有营养的。

4 silicon   

n.硅(旧名矽)

参考例句：

• This company pioneered the use of silicon chip.这家公司开创了使用硅片的方法。
• A chip is a piece of silicon about the size of a postage stamp.芯片就是一枚邮票大小的硅片。

5 scurvy   

adj.下流的，卑鄙的，无礼的；n.坏血病

参考例句：

• Vitamin C deficiency can ultimately lead to scurvy.缺乏维生素C最终能道致坏血病。
• That was a scurvy trick to play on an old lady.用那样的花招欺负一个老太太可真卑鄙。

6 investor   

n.投资者，投资人

参考例句：

• My nephew is a cautious investor.我侄子是个小心谨慎的投资者。
• The investor believes that his investment will pay off handsomely soon.这个投资者相信他的投资不久会有相当大的收益。

7 shipping   

n.船运（发货，运输，乘船）

参考例句：

• We struck a bargain with an American shipping firm.我们和一家美国船运公司谈成了一笔生意。
• There's a shipping charge of ￡5 added to the price.价格之外另加五英镑运输费。

8 wireless   

adj.无线的；n.无线电

参考例句：

• There are a lot of wireless links in a radio.收音机里有许多无线电线路。
• Wireless messages tell us that the ship was sinking.无线电报告知我们那艘船正在下沉。

9 niche   

n.壁龛；合适的职务(环境、位置等)

参考例句：

• Madeleine placed it carefully in the rocky niche. 玛德琳小心翼翼地把它放在岩石壁龛里。
• The really talented among women would always make their own niche.妇女中真正有才能的人总是各得其所。

10 investors   

n.投资者，出资者( investor的名词复数 )

参考例句：

• a con man who bilked investors out of millions of dollars 诈取投资者几百万元的骗子
• a cash bonanza for investors 投资者的赚钱机会

11 derived   

vi.起源；由来；衍生；导出v.得到( derive的过去式和过去分词 )；（从…中）得到获得；源于；（从…中）提取

参考例句：

• Many English words are derived from Latin and Greek. 英语很多词源出于拉丁文和希腊文。 来自《简明英汉词典》
• He derived his enthusiasm for literature from his father. 他对文学的爱好是受他父亲的影响。 来自《简明英汉词典》

12 remains   

n.剩余物，残留物；遗体，遗迹

参考例句：

• He ate the remains of food hungrily.他狼吞虎咽地吃剩余的食物。
• The remains of the meal were fed to the dog.残羹剩饭喂狗了。