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The world's first lab-grown beef burger was fried up and eaten in London earlier on -- the single patty made from cow cells.

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And it's got an eye-watering price tag. Dan Rivers reports.

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It looks like a burger. It cooks like a burger.

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But this beef patty was grown in a lab, not a cow -- perhaps the beginning of a revolution in meat production.

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Of course its critics have already labeled it "Frankenburger," arguing it should never replace conventional meat.

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But what does it actually taste like?

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There's quite some intense taste. It's close to meat. It's not that juicy, but the consistency is perfect.

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The bite, you know, feels like a, you know, a conventional hamburger.

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Not a ringing endorsement, but this is a first attempt.

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And of course it lacks the all-important salt, pepper and ketchup.

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People need to understand that there are major issues with current meat production.

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Everybody has to ask themselves the question: 10, 20 years from now,

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if you entered a supermarket and you find these two products that are exactly the same and they taste and feel the same,

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but one has environmental issues and animal welfare issues and the other has not, what are you going to choose?

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It was made by taking stem cells from a living cow, which are multiplied to create muscle tissue, which grows in strands.

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Twenty thousand strands have gone into this one proof of concept burger, or about 40 billion cells.

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It took three months to grow, which is quicker than a cow,

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but at this prototype phase, much more expensive, about $300,000, making it the world's most expensive burger.

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It may be 10 or 20 years before you can buy a cultured beef burger like this in a supermarket, but it could be a vital weapon in combating global warming.

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Cultured beef requires less than half the energy of beef produced in a field, and less than a 20th of the greenhouse gases are emitted as a result.

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The problem is, the marketing, getting past the yuck factor and convincing people this is OK to eat.