Jiminy Crickets

Sheesh Kabobs made with Eastern Lubber Grasshoppers- Mmmm.

Would you eat a bug? 80 percent of the world’s population already does but here in the Western world, we have a big yuck factor with regard to insects. We would rather swat, smush or step on them than ingest them, but could things be changing? Insect connoisseur, David George Gordon has penned Eat-A-Bug as a testament to the merits of including bugs in our diet. His recipes are those pictured here. Apparently, bugs are plenty nutritious and a good alternative to beef for both environmental and health reasons and unlike other resources on our planet, they are a-plenty.

But honestly- fried green tomato hornworms? Maybe Anthony Bourdain would dig this, but do you really think Americans are going to go for it, no matter how pretty the presentation? It’s a stretch. Not so though, says Laetitia Giroud. She is betting the farm, her bug farm in fact, on the coming Bug Revolution. Giroud has set up shop in Spain raising beetles, crickets and flies with the hopes of changing the Western world’s perspective. For those less inclined to eat a whole insect, she has cooked up a cricket powder that she says is killer in a chocolate chip cookie.  Ok, I would try that. Hey, I would actually eat a cricket, a beetle- maybe, a worm- I just don’t know.

Deep fried tarantulas- now we may have gone too far. What say you?

{Images: Chugrad McAndrews}

Related posts: