There's a lot of buzz around insect-based protein these days. You can find pasta sauces like One Hop in many gourmet grocery sources, substituting crickets or mealworm for beef to make bolognese. Paleo dieters are intrigued. Lucky Peach says even if people are squeamish about eating grilled crickets, insect protein can be added to other foods to fortify them. Even Nas is convinced.

Among the benefits: they're vastly more sustainable, generating down to a hundredth the carbon footprint. The one doubt is whether bugs actually have enough protein to sustain us.

The other half is soy, according to DNA tests carried out by Canadian journalists. None of the fast-food chicken tested came out at 100 percent, but Subway was the only one with results so drastic the team decided to test it twice.

"2017 might very well be the year of algae." Spirulina is already used as a protein-rich ingredient by many food manufacturers and health-conscious home chefs, but algae is poised to explode in popularity.

It's packed with vitamins, rich in omega-3s, and sustainable. The barrier here is flavor, with even NASA rejecting it for tasting weird, so the protein's path to market is likely as an additive or substitute for now.

The beef with beef: 

—28: Times more land required to grow a gram of beef protein compared to chicken or pork.

—95%: Projected increase in beef consumption between 2005 and 2050.

—289,000: Hectares of forest lost per year in Bolivia, driven in bulk by beef.

—47%: Percentage of California's water footprint that goes to meat and dairy.

—$735,000,000: Healthcare costs averted if people just didn't eat more meat than guidelines prescribe.