I plopped down in the sports bar Thursday to watch World Cup soccer and eat my first fake meat burger. I don’t mean to slight the surging United States women’s team, but the plant-based protein slab made nearly as big an impression as the match.

No surprise then, that a burger that bleeds like meat, tastes like meat and looks like meat is winning over millions of skeptical consumers, taking Wall Street by storm and prompting Big Ag to jump into a lucrative business that started on the vegan fringe.

But…