Food sources from insects

Imagine you bite into a candy and find a cricket leg. It's so scrary. Or notice raisins in a bowl of cereal with legs and wings .

Certainly these things will be thrown into the trash. Those scary things are illegal, but the Drug and Drug Administration actually accepts this. FDA law allows an average of about 60 average insect pieces in about 6 100 gram chocolate samples. For peanut butter, it is allowed to have about 30 insect pieces per 100 grams. Scary?

For the industrial world, most people will think that eating insects is frightening. Treated foods contain bugs that are considered to reflect low quality hygiene. Because bugs can contain pathogenic bacteria, insect food sources are thought to be dangerous to health.

But in many parts of the world, diners really love insects. Young people in Central Africa can eat ants or larvae while playing. People who like snacks look polite around the roadside shops in Southeast Asia to buy crispy crickets. Even Aboriginal drivers in remote areas of Australia can drive motorbikes a few hours to search and then picnic with an audience.

According to Julieta Ramos-Elorduy of the National Autonomous University, Mexico, residents in at least 113 feed on insects. This hobby is called entomophagy , and it makes sense because insects are often very nutritious. In fact, many scientists around the world have put insect eating habits into their research menus. This is also the focal point of the February United Nations conference in Thailand. Researchers discussed insect feeding trends and evaluated the nutritional value of bugs and the environmental aspect of entomophagy.

According to organizer of the conference Patrick B. Durst 'We do not convince Europe and America to rush to eat insects'. However, there is a respectful attitude towards entomophagy that can help maintain health and environmental quality outside industrialized European countries. Durst, senior forestry expert of the regional office of the UN Food and Agriculture Organization located in Bangkok.

He hopes that Westerners can accept more insect protein sources, especially if they 'don't see the beetle when they're eating.' Dutch researchers are working on such a project - biotechnology to produce insect cells without insects as an inexpensive edible protein source.

Nearly 125 years ago, Vincent Holt published a 99-page document in the UK entitled 'Why not eat insects?' This document failed to promote a revolution in eating bugs. David Gracer, a community college writing teacher, now brings Holt's reasons out of the classroom. Not only did Gracer travel to preach, he also organized cooking demonstrations so that Americans could make insect pests. His company, Sunrise Land Shrimp. in Providence, RL, providing frozen insects and drying for chefs and many individuals.

Grilled mites seem to make Europeans and North Americans say 'scared' rather than 'delicious'. But why? 'Most people are happy to eat crabs, lobsters and shrimps, ocean creatures are equivalent to insects.'

Shrimp, other crustaceans and insects are all burning legs - members of the largest system in the animal world. While everyone was annoyed with the taste of locusts and bee larvae, Gracer pointed out that despite the noble status of lobsters, crustaceans seem to 'eat garbage and corpses' while most insects consumption of natural salads.

The taste problem

Edible insects make up only a very small part of the US market. In contrast, in most developing countries, eating bugs is not only a tradition but also a treat.

That's what biologist Gene R. DeFoliart has been studying for 33 years, initially as the head of the entomology department at the University of Wisconsin-Madison, and recently owned the food-insects.com website. Since retiring 17 years ago, he is collecting data on entomophagy. His website introduces the book 28 chapters still in progress.

Westerners seem to regard insect eating as a last resort, you only eat when there are no other meats. However, in tropical and subtropical regions, some insects such as adults or larvae are more popular than birds, fish or common animal meats.

Entomophagy thrives in Mexico, where Ramos-Elorduy collected about 1700 edible species. Although grasshoppers are particularly popular and cheap, diners in Mexico's big cities will sell a dish of maguey worms, larvae of giant butterfly Aegiale hesperiaris, for $ 25.

This reflects the fact that insects 'now have a clear position in industrial societies because chefs of different nationalities prepare them in very complex ways'. In Mexico, Ramos-Elorduy discovered that 'great demand belongs to five-star hotels'. Small restaurants seem to serve seasonal insects only, but the "five-star restaurant serves every day."

Banquet in Thailand with deep fried with chili.(Photo: Durst / UNFAO)

In many parts of Africa, the mopane worm - the caterpillar of Gonimbrasia belina, a species he relies on mopane - is a particularly popular dish. In fact, people here eat so much that biologists start worrying that these bugs will become extinct. Sales of separate dried mopane in South Africa have exceeded 1,600 tons per year.

O. Ricky Madibela, who used to work at Botswana Agricultural University, said because the metamorphic caterpillar in the soil, 'digging deep into the ground was a taboo'. However, today people dig the soil around mopane trees to find the 'next generation seed' of caterpillars. And this doesn't last long.

However, in other regions, once popular entomophagy is weakening. Evidence for this transition occurred in Ecuador when entomologist Andrew BT Smith of the Canadian Museum of Nature in Ottawa and Ecuadorian Aura Paucar-Cabrera, University of Nebraska-Lincoln, are studying the beetle Platycoelia lutescens. For this project, Paucar-Cabrera interviewed 48 residents in and around Quito about this white beetle's role in the local diet.

People admit that Andean insects - called catso blanco - are spices in the kitchen. 24 people from the rural and urban working class said they ate this bug at least once a year. Some took the whole family to nearby meadows in late October or early November to catch the adult beetles that appeared after completing metamorphosis in the ground. But of the 24 wealthier families and the surveyed professionals, only one admitted to having tried it. The rest stated that they were not interested in that.

Similarly, adolescents from the Luo, Kenya tribe, seem to consider eating bugs to be of the last century, according to food scientist Francis O. Orech, Maryland State University, in Princess Anne. He is Luo himself. Orech remembers eating ants and termites as a child. Currently, to interview about 30 Luo entomophagy people, he and a group of Danish researchers have to consult people over 45 to find out who still knows where to find bugs, how to catch them. and prepare them to eat.

Better than beef?

The five species most commonly eaten by Luo surveyed are ants, termites and a mondo cricket species. All are good sources of minerals, but crickets are the highest and ants are the lowest. Orech's team presented in the International Journal of Food Sciences and Nutrition in 2006.

In fact, the team found crickets contained more than 1,550 mg of iron, 25 mg of zinc and 340 mg of calcium per 100g of dry tissue. Traditional dishes in developing countries often lack these minerals from global standards. Based on an analysis of the Luo-caught insects, only three crickets are needed to provide the daily iron needed.

If per gram, crickets or grasshoppers may be more nutritious than the same amount of beef or pork , according to Victor B. Meyer-Rochow of Jacobs University in Bremen, Germany. One reason: water accounts for a large percentage of meat while insects seem to be drier. And most of the fat in beetles seems to be long-chain, unsaturated fat - better than the majority of normal pets.

A comprehensive nutrition study was published in Ecological Implications of Minilivestock: Potential of Insects, Rodents, Frogs and Snails (Ecological application of small animals: potential of insects, mice, frogs and snails) Slugs), published in 2005. The book presents calorie, protein, fat and fiber data in most major edible insects. Additional versions summarize the potential of these bugs in contributing important substances to diets such as amino acids, minerals, healthy fatty acids and vitamins.

Many insects have relatively high levels of essential amino acids - those that humans need but cannot create. These include lysine and tryptophan, two that seem to be deficient in daily diets in developing countries. Bukkens said the quality of insect proteins is often good enough to compensate for the lack of substances in vegetarian diets.

Despite this optimistic assessment, Bukkens did not force his family to eat insects. 'I used to eat but I don't particularly like them.' Without food, she said she would eat anything. 'But since we have a lot of meat in developed countries, I don't see why we turn to insects.'

Even DeFoliart, who was called Mr. Entomophagy, admitted that he had never prepared insects at home. His daughter once once seduced her to try a barbecue. When the daughter invited her second mother, DeFoliart smiled and recalled that his wife answered: 'Oh no, I have to rest for a while.'

Clean and green

Customers who want to minimize the traces they leave on the environment may have to reevaluate their aversion to bugs. Commonly consumed insects are all vegetarian, at least for most of their lives, and are generally clean when choosing food and shelter . Furthermore, edible insects often consume more plants than traditional meat animals. Therefore, bugs can use a useless food source for ordinary meat production such as cacti, bamboo shoots and shrubs.

Moreover, insects convert what they eat into tissue more efficiently than other species. For crickets fed diets similar to other Western animals, the conversion efficiency was twice as high as that of broilers and pigs, 4 times higher than sheep and 6 times higher than calves. The rapid reproductive ability of insects makes them more attractive to the environment. For crickets, DeFoliart calculated that 'food conversion efficiency is almost twice as high as 20 times'.

Gracer likens this difference to fuel-efficient and gas-saving vehicles: 'Cows and pigs are trucks in the food world. And bugs are like Priuses, even bicycles. '

And bugs can be kept long-term, Durst points out a growing industry in northeastern Thailand since 1999. Entomologists and agricultural staff at Khon Kaen University have developed crickets technology. Low cost and receive guidance for local people. Currently, 4,500 families in Khon Kaen province raise crickets, and there are nearly 15,000 more families across Thailand, according to a report by Yupa Hanboosong, an entomologist at Khon Kaen University, at a recent meeting by Durst. organization.

Asian markets provide insect larvae and other specialties.(Photo: Rochow / Jacobs Univ)

A family can maintain crickets as a sideline activity without outside help, just a few hundred square meters. 400 families in only 2 local villages produced about 10 tons of crickets in the summer, the highest harvest time. When the weather is subdued, yields may drop to 80% or more. However, this also means that extra income is around 130 to 1600 dollars a month per family throughout the year. It is almost heavenly for people in poor places on Thai soil.

Most of their livestock phones come out of the big city, like the outdoor restaurants in Bangkok. However, Hanboosong said that some were exported to neighboring countries such as Laos and Cambodia. Families in Thailand also raise ants, another popular edible insect. And her colleagues in Khon Kaen have developed new farming techniques for grasshoppers and big water bugs (Thai favorite food). The truth is that Hanbosoong's study of Thai insect eaters found that 75% of people who eat bugs just because they are delicious - especially with beer.

Insect breeding faces the problem that most insects appear seasonally. This also reduces the pressure on the natural population. But Durst's data at the seminar did not provide much evidence for over-exploitation of insects in Thai forests. In fact, he said there were suggestions that increased entomophagy might be good for ecology. For example, it can turn villagers into better environmental managers because of the ability to collect insects consumed.

There is even a discussion about how to get people to harvest insects to make food in areas with insects, using humans to protect crops instead of pesticides.

This is not impossible.

Hanbosoong reported that when insecticides did not kill grasshoppers from corn fields 30 years ago, the Thai government launched a campaign (including recipes) for people to catch and eat insects. Although grasshoppers were not previously among the 150 species of bugs that appeared during the Thai meal, people also accepted this challenge. Today, grasshoppers are no longer vermin insects, and even some farmers now grow corn as bait for bugs, which they supply to the local market.

Banh Xeo with biotechnology

Durst believes that the two main reasons why many Americans and Europeans are still shy: their worries about hygiene and their pest appearance. Hygiene can be treated by completely removing the outside of the bug and cleaning or removing the organ. It is more difficult to disguise the beard, legs, eyes or as some look like soft worms.

Dutch scientists think they can have a solution for both. They are using biotechnology to produce insect cells - just isolated cells. Researchers describe their efforts last year in Biotechnology Advances.

According to Marjoleine C. Verkerk, University of Wageningen, their goal is to produce a source of sterilized protein and can be dried and added to bread or molded into hamburgers . Her team is mass producing isolated egg cells of silkworms, cabbage worms and gypsy moths.

Raised in a bioreactor, these cells do not allow the growth of viruses or stimulate cancer-causing genes, which can occur in intact insects. While researchers analyze the nutrient content of these cells, Verkerk has also started a survey of consumer attitudes about strengthening diets with insect-based materials. She admits business is still a difficult thing.

A facility in Japan has a more remote application for insects: space food.

Although specialization is a chemist, Masamichi Yamashita today said 'I like to be called a' cosmic farmer 'wishing to fly to Mars.' At age 60, he no longer had the opportunity to become an astronaut. So he is doing the next best thing. Through his work at the Japanese Space Science and Space Science Institute, he is helping to design houses that allow future generations to live for years in closed spacecraft or on positions on the platforms. another crystal.

His team debated in Advances in Space Research a few months ago that the key to this effort was to integrate beetles as a potential food source and to recycle natural waste. He and his colleagues are developing an ecological system that includes hawk and caterpillar moth eggs as food sources. These perverted insects - especially silkworms - are quite common in Japan and other parts of Europe. ASIAN.

How do they taste? Yamashita said 'I used to eat soft shell crab in Washington, DC once. Their taste is almost the same. '