A single seared shrimp sat atop a scoop of mashed avocado with a healthy pile of salty black specks overflowing onto the plate beside it. If I didn’t already know what I had gotten myself into, I would have been certain the topping was caviar—each spot popped just like a sturgeon egg might have. But rather than…
So, what are you having for dinner tonight? Some grilled chicken? Yet another steak? Allow us to change your mind.
“Eating bugs is a great idea!” shout future-minded gourmets, the kinds of people who eat waxworm tacos willingly and feed bug cookies to their coworkers. But are insects like crickets and grasshoppers really the solution to our environmental and food-security woes? Well... maybe not. Not entirely, at least.
You may feel squeamish about chomping down insects with their eyes, legs, and antennae still intact, but would you eat insects if they were disguised in butter and sugar-filled cookies? We baked chocolate chip cookies made from pulverized insects and brought them to our office where our brave coworkers tasted them.
Entomophagy – the practice of consuming bugs – is one of the greatest ideas humans ever stole from other animals. Insects, after all, are an abundant, nutrient rich resource. We used to eat them all the time (close to 30% of the world's population still does*) – so why do so many of us regard them as disgusting?
Whaddya mean you didn't chow down on cicada during this summer's mass emergence? You'd be surprised how delicious those little creepy-crawlies are with a bit of salt and vinegar. Besides, if you had, you'd have gotten a head start on our inevitable bug-eating future.
This past week, I decided to try my hand at cooking a new meat: caterpillar. To my surprise, I found the caterpillars in question, waxworms, easy to cook and quite tasty. If you've been thinking about trying bug-eating yourself, this is a project you can try at home.
Earlier this month, the UN released a paper touting the nutritional and environmental benefits of insects. The paper caused quite a stir in the media, with a mix of fascination, head-nodding, and not a little revulsion. But why is the UN advocating entomophagy? Why aren't we eating bugs already? And should you really…
Let's say that in your post-apocalyptic wanderings, you stumble across a home or restaurant with a particularly sturdy—and well stocked—wine cellar. Suddenly you have a plethora of varietals at your fingertips, but your daily diet still consists of SPAM, small rodents, and MREs. How do you know which wines will best…
