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Why don't you try it and report back? I'll be waiting.
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I'm sure crickets or grasshoppers are fine. Billions of people eat them. If you're hungry enough, with some chili lime seasoning, you'd be glad to have them.
The point is there are some like the clown in the meme that want to force you to replace meat with them for the climate.
The point is there are some like the clown in the meme that want to force you to replace meat with them for the climate.
The crickets are protein that they flavor I have eaten cricket brownies that only tasted of the chocolate.. . In Africa (Botswana) the hotel dinner buffet served Mopani worms, which are actually a caterpillar. I tried them. Crunchy sardine would be my assessment. When Jesus went into the desert he is supposed to have eaten locusts and honey (aka bee spit).The point is, people have eaten bugs for millennia and nowadays insect protein is a viable option, especially in places where no one can afford a good ribeye.
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I'll have a jab at it.....
Most Western people like high meat-to-effort ratio. With that seafood, we have to do a bit of work, but the meat return is decent. It's also why we have boneless chicken and hamburger.
My wife, on the other hand, she'll eat shrimp whole, eventually spitting out a single lump of exoskeleton, she'll eat all of a fish, spitting out bones as she goes. I suspect, bugs wouldn't be off the menu for her.
However, you eat bugs, you have a low meat ratio, and you're eating the poo too. So, just from Westerner's POV, I think we'd have serious hangups about it. We've been spoiled, and most of us won't consider changing.
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I eat a lot less meat than I used to. So it goes a lot further. I put some meat in a "stew" and that flavors the stew ingredients.
One Andouille sausage, sliced up into small chunks, goes a long ways in a pot of Jambalaya or other Creole dish. It is healthier than eating a lot of meat and just as satisfying to me.
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A staple on our menu
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Ants are very sour, like vinegar. Crickets and grasshoppers taste like peanuts or roasted grain. Never ate spiders, though I have seen them sold roasted on a stick. My better half eats crickets all the time.Why don't you try it and report back? I'll be waiting.
I don't seek them out, but can eat them if hungry. There is an acceptable level of bug parts in all your processed foods. Plus, how many here have swallowed bugs riding a bike or motorcycle?
A great point, at least for me, is the effort vs food. That is why I never ate much crab or crayfish/crawdads/mudbugs.
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I spit them out
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People's food choice willingness is directly related to how hungry a person is. People who've starved a few days will eat things that they previously would have been unwilling to.
In the US, I don't see bugs being part of the menu unless other foods are just flat out unavailable. If simple things like peanut butter and rice become so prohibitively expensive that people in mass are unable to afford it, I see society having a significant event long before people are commonly eating these "last resort foods" like bugs.
In the US, I don't see bugs being part of the menu unless other foods are just flat out unavailable. If simple things like peanut butter and rice become so prohibitively expensive that people in mass are unable to afford it, I see society having a significant event long before people are commonly eating these "last resort foods" like bugs.
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Go to a Seattle Mariners game. They serve grasshoppers at the food stands.
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Seattle isn't right
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I will not disagree with that at all.
My memory is still good enough that I remember when this thread started.
"Food shortage" these days is more like "money shortage" for many people, what with inflation going on.
Many older people simply aren't as active as they were when younger, don't need the hefty intake of protein.
Re. the "insects from the sea." I have had a pretty American palate all my life. I've eaten crab and lobster but as someone else said, they are bland. Only edible when dipped in butter, which bumps up the fat content. Mrs. Merkt makes a seafood casserole, very tasty, with scatter shrimp and fake crab, which is made of surimi. Which is a paste made of ground up whitefish. Pollock, scrod or whatever. Then solidified and sliced. So one time a few years ago, I said, "Why don't you use real crab for a change?" Which she did, one time. We both decided that the fake crab had better flavor. To our untrained palates, anyway.
Shrimp, that's one insect of the sea that I've always liked. Battered and deep fried, never healthy. Not those flat, frozen things. Batter fried is now called tempura. It used to be offered at many fast food joints, which many years ago were mostly independents. There was a place in my former home town called The Plush Cow. They served a nice shrimp boat and fresh cut French fries for $2.99. This was in 1968, when I was working my first job out of high school. I'd treat myself to the shrimp boat about once a week, in spite of my gross monthly pay being $400.
"Food shortage" these days is more like "money shortage" for many people, what with inflation going on.
To some extent, this can be an aging thing. Your digestive tract sometimes cannot take as much heavy protein when you get old. Or you might have downright gut problems, as I've developed. Not only is that a physical intolerance, it can also be a mental one. You can develop an aversion to certain foods just by thinking about them. So I don't eat as much meat as I used to. Mostly smaller portions.
Many older people simply aren't as active as they were when younger, don't need the hefty intake of protein.
Re. the "insects from the sea." I have had a pretty American palate all my life. I've eaten crab and lobster but as someone else said, they are bland. Only edible when dipped in butter, which bumps up the fat content. Mrs. Merkt makes a seafood casserole, very tasty, with scatter shrimp and fake crab, which is made of surimi. Which is a paste made of ground up whitefish. Pollock, scrod or whatever. Then solidified and sliced. So one time a few years ago, I said, "Why don't you use real crab for a change?" Which she did, one time. We both decided that the fake crab had better flavor. To our untrained palates, anyway.
Shrimp, that's one insect of the sea that I've always liked. Battered and deep fried, never healthy. Not those flat, frozen things. Batter fried is now called tempura. It used to be offered at many fast food joints, which many years ago were mostly independents. There was a place in my former home town called The Plush Cow. They served a nice shrimp boat and fresh cut French fries for $2.99. This was in 1968, when I was working my first job out of high school. I'd treat myself to the shrimp boat about once a week, in spite of my gross monthly pay being $400.
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I started not eating as much meat about 20+ years ago. I love meat and I would eat more if it didn't have an impact on my health. But I decided I was pigging out on it and it would just be better if I didn't eat near as much meat as I used to (about 2-3X what I do now, or more).
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Yes and no - kind of.
I've said this before, but as time goes on, being able to grow your own food, have your own water source and generate most of your own energy, will not be just a "green" thing, it will be increasingly an issue of survival. Food, water and energy will get both more scarce and more expensive.
Oh yes, like barbeque pork spare ribs, which contain a lot of tasty fat. I loved to eat the burned fat edge on a steak.
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Q - what do you get if you don't properly seal your emergency flour/oatmeal stores?
A - extra protein !
A - extra protein !
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Indoctrination is slow and insidious. A lot of "regular" things today were at times in societal history very hotly contested issues.
If people want to eat bugs, awesome for them, it's when bugs are being pushed as a larger totalitarian effort to control the populace and shift culture away from beef and other meat products that I have an issue.
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