NationStates Jolt Archive

Linky (http://ca.news.yahoo.com/s/afp/080703/canada/lifestyle_canada_gastronomy_bugs)



VANCOUVER, Canada (AFP) - The owners of Vij's restaurant knew they were taking a huge gamble when they decided to add bugs to the menu of their upscale, internationally-known Vancouver eaterie.

"Eating bugs is a foreign concept in North America," co-owner Meeru Dhalwala told AFP. "People here think bugs are dirty. There's a yuck factor."

But gram for gram, experts say insects are more nutritious to eat and better for the environment to produce than popular foods such as beef and chicken.

And so for mostly ecological reasons, Dhalwala and her husband Vikram Vij -- who describe themselves as both environmentalists and "food experts" -- decided to introduce crickets on their new summer menu at the restaurant, which specializes in Punjab-influenced Indian food.

So, is this shock-value entrepreneurial ism for the restaurateurs, a new fad for increasingly jaded exotic gourmets, a legitimate eco-alternative for consumers concerned about the sustainability of their food supply? Will bugs become an acceptable part of the North American diet, or is the ick factor just too much? For some strange reason, as soon as I read this story I knew NSG would have all the answers.

Hmmm- bugs like crickets have been part of the menu in many countries for centuries, if not millennia. If we can adjust to pizza, chinese food, indian curry and so on - why not to honey covered insect ?

I've noshed on bugs before. I'd nosh on 'em here, if they were cooked up tastily....

My kid ate a cricket in entomology for extra credit last school year, she said it was good.

I'm sure people could get used to eating them regularly if they got over the bias.

Will bugs become an acceptable part of the North American diet, or is the ick factor just too much?
They manage to choke down plenty of arthropods already -- crabs, lobsters and various other Crustacea. Getting them to jump across to another subphylum like Insecta should just be a matter of getting the marketing right :).

I don't mind meal worms. A little chewy, even after being cooked though. I have the problem with steak though.:p

They manage to choke down plenty of arthropods already -- crabs, lobsters and various other Crustacea. Getting them to jump across to another subphylum like Insecta should just be a matter of getting the marketing right :).

Seeing as, pre-20th-C, lobster was seen as a nasty sea bug to be tossed back or as nasty food for the lower classes, yummy bugs should b e increasingfly more acceptable...

I'm sure people could get used to eating them regularly if they got over the bias.

I'm inclined to agree, but it's the how that fascinates me. Defining 'food' is a social process, but how does it work? Why have North Americans accepted curry but not dog? How did organ meats or pigs feet go from commonplace peasant fare to "gross"? Other cultures have been eating bugs for hundreds, if not thousands, of years, how has it remained taboo here when so many other foodstuffs successfully crossed into our diet?

I've eaten the fairly-common chocolate covered cricket, it was okay. Kinda've... acidic? I also, as a child, ate a few ants after reading a book in which the people regularly ate ants. They didn't taste like anything. Then I cried 'cause I felt bad for killing the ants. :(

I've eaten the fairly-common chocolate covered cricket, it was okay. Kinda've... acidic? I also, as a child, ate a few ants after reading a book in which the people regularly ate ants. They didn't taste like anything. Then I cried 'cause I felt bad for killing the ants. :(

I used to stomp on ants with my mothers boots because I was afraid they'd eat my cereal. I also used to try to bar the upper cupboard to make sure no stole the cereal. I would have nightmares about someone breaking in and stealing the cereal (We didn't live in a very good neighborhood at the time). I no longer have that obsession with cereal :).

I wouldn't trust eating a cricket whether it came from an upscale restaurant or not. I know how many diseases, parasites and worms those little bastards carry, having raised them myself. Also, I don't think I could get over just how much I loathe them, taste aside. They are just horrible bugs.

I'd eat a silkworm, though.

I bet you can make excellent meatballs from ground up bugs, so it might be a rather useful alternative for regular cattle. It may be a matter of time before our hamburgers are made from insects, and why not? Everything tastes good with ketchup, after all.

Let me just say this...Anyone ever eaten a hotdog? If you answered yes, you have eaten bugs (or parts of them anyway)...

And this...Myself, aside from hotdogs, had a number of deep fried grasshoppers (free range) DE-lish and oh so crunchy! (but the little legs get stuck in your teeth)
I have also tried red ants (like candy they were), you just have to bite them before they bite you...;)

Let me just say this...Anyone ever eaten a hotdog? If you answered yes, you have eaten bugs (or parts of them anyway)...
As is anyone whose ever eaten anything with flour in it. It's got bug larvae in it.

My kid ate a cricket in entomology for extra credit last school year, she said it was good.

I'm sure people could get used to eating them regularly if they got over the bias.I ate a hissing cockroach in freshman Earth science for extra credit. It was pretty good.

Let me just say this...Anyone ever eaten a hotdog? If you answered yes, you have eaten bugs (or parts of them anyway)...
Same if you eat anything made of grains (cereal, bread, etc)


I have no problem with them. Lobsters, crabs, and several other seafoods are nothing more than big water bugs anyway

Not counting hotdogs and other foods of questionable design I can honestly say that I've never intentionally eaten an insect before, that I can recall. After having been to Tanzania, however, and learning firsthand how awesome natural foods from different cultures can be I wouldn't be opposed to chowing down on some six-legged critters. So long as they're cooked and/or flavored first, I don't care if it does have a smooth, creamy inside beneath the crunchy outside.

If it tastes good, I don't see why not.

Well yes people do eat lobsters and crabs. But I don't, cuz that shit is nasty. I don't eat fish either, for that matter. Really, the more evolutionarily advanced a species is, the more likely it is to taste good IMO.

How good can a cricket taste? There's no meat! Just exoskeleton and ichor. Yeah, you could spice it up and fry it, but you might as well just spice up and fry some mushrooms and steak and noodles. Mmmmmmm.

If it tastes good, I don't see why not.
After thought: Assuming it won't kill me or cost me too much monies.
Well yes people do eat lobsters and crabs. But I don't, cuz that shit is nasty. I don't eat fish either, for that matter. Really, the more evolutionarily advanced a species is, the more likely it is to taste good IMO.
People must be delicious.

How good can a cricket taste? There's no meat! Just exoskeleton and ichor. Yeah, you could spice it up and fry it, but you might as well just spice up and fry some mushrooms and steak and noodles. Mmmmmmm.

Eat several of them. Or breed really big crickets.

People must be delicious.

That's definitely the rumor. Of course, there's tons of health risks involved in that, otherwise I'd be down.

Eat several of them. Or breed really big crickets.

Kinda defeats the point. Breed -really- big crickets, with mammalian physiology and have yourself a hamburger. This is good and natural since it appeals to my biological need to eat meat, handed down generation after generation ever since the first humans would leap onto the backs of cows and gnaw into their yummy flesh.

I'd probably be a bit distrusting at first but hey, if it tastes good, what's the problem? It can't seriously be that dangerous either, considering we eat animals that live in mud :rolleyes:

It can't seriously be that dangerous either, considering we eat animals that live in mud :rolleyes:

....mudkips?

I once swallowed a bee while biking down a steep hill very fast.

I don't see the big deal. They're full of protein. Boy scouts and survivalists have been eating them in North America for donkey's years.

Also, this: http://www.washingtonpost.com/ac2/wp-dyn?pagename=article&node=&contentId=A16056-2004Apr15&notFound=true

I know of people freezing cicadas to enjoy out of season.

How about the worm in the tequila?
How about these babies:

http://www.hotlix.com/

http://www.ent.iastate.edu/misc/insectsasfood.html
http://eatbug.com/recipes.htm
http://www.uky.edu/Ag/Entomology/ythfacts/bugfood/bugfood.htm


Hey, I'd try it.

It's one of the few Nagano foods that I'm not willing to try. The raw horse? No problem. Squid guts? Didn't like it, but willing to give her a go. The traditional Nagano breakfast of fried crickets and bee larva... No. Just... no.

I don't see the big deal. They're full of protein.

...so is poop.

Boy scouts and survivalists have been eating them in North America for donkey's years.

Boy scouts and survivalists, not exactly my dietary role models. :p


How about the worm in the tequila?

Yet another reason to avoid tequila, aside from it being the devil's liquor.

Let me just say this...Anyone ever eaten a hotdog? If you answered yes, you have eaten bugs (or parts of them anyway)...
Also peanut butter, I believe, is expected to have a small amount of insect in it.
I'd be willing to eat bugs, but not in an "upscale, internationally-known [...] eaterie." I'm not waiting 90 minutes for a table just so I can pay $20 for a fucking bowl of crickets.

....mudkips?

I was referring to pigs mainly. Of course the conditions are most likely industrialized and sterilized these days to some degree, so "used to eat animals raised in mud" would probably be better wording.

I was referring to pigs mainly. Of course the conditions are most likely industrialized and sterilized these days to some degree, so "used to eat animals raised in mud" would probably be better wording.

Oh, right, pigs. Well, they're mammals - it's like family. You like your family, right? Enough to consume their flesh? :)

Bugs have been eaten in the past. There is no doubt that in the rough time Jesus was suppose to have been on earth eating bugs was common all around the place. The thing is eating bugs makes you look poor. Eating something with more meat on the other hand wastes more energy in its creation and is much harder to consume on a regular basis

The few bugs I have has in Vietnam didnt taste too bad. That being said I covered them in some kind of sauce. And i didnt get sick on that particular holiday.

If there is a market for bugs people should be allowed to eat them. In the mean time its great marketing. Soon everyone in the region will know it as the bug restaurant. Well done to the entrepreneurs who decided to do this

It's pretty similar to sushi, and, more recently, shabu.

First, they're strange and gross (not as much shabu-shabu, which is close to fondu)...then people start to man up and try it, and eventually, you have it in grocery stores