bugging out

Entomophagy (from the Greek word “entoma” meaning insect and “phagein” meaning to eat) has been around ever since humans first walked the earth, especially in places where bugs are way more available than, say, sirloin steaks. Right now, nearly 100 of the 2,000 insect species on earth are already on the menu for more than two billion humans in Africa, Asia and even parts of Europe.

Modern bug-crunchers say the menu is both economical and environmentally sound. Raising or capturing insects takes less time and uses less land and food than raising cows, pigs or sheep, two good reasons why a 2013 report from the U.N. Food and Agriculture Organization urged us all to “Eat more insects.”

Before you go yeccchhh, consider this: Who’s to say a large grasshopper is less appetizing than a lobster? Both have long skinny bodies and plenty of legs, but USDA numbers show that, nutritionally speaking, the bug beats the lobster with more fat, carbs and iron per serving. The only category in which the lobster is a teensy little step ahead is protein: 22 grams per 3.5 ounce/100 grams serving of the shellfish vs. 20.6 grams for the creepy crawly.

People who eat bugs say they actually taste good. Wasps are similar to pine-nuts; ants exude a vinegar-flavor acid that adds zip as a simple seasoning or in “ant-salt” around the rim of a cocktail glass. Chapulines — grasshoppers — have no distinct flavor of their own. They pick up the taste of whatever they’re mixed with, making them probably the most common insect ingredient.

You can try chapulines crunchy-fried as an appetizer at Toloache (166 East 82nd Street, 251 West 51st Street and 205 Thompson Street), atop guacamole at Dos Caminos (50th and Third, 675 Hudson Street and 475 West Broadway) or in tacos from the El Rey Del Sabor food cart (60th and Third and 43rd Street between Fifth and Sixth Avenues). If you’re willing to travel south on the Second Avenue bus, the Black Ant (60 Second Avenue) serves up a grasshopper and cheese stuffed tortilla, plus gusanos de mahguey, the worms usually found in Tequila bottles, with veggies, flower petals, more grasshoppers and yes, those vinegar-y ants.

Prefer home cooking? The truly adventurous can DIY hunt-and-capture with Stefan Gates’ “Insects: An Edible Field Guide” (Ebury Press, 2018). Those who like their ingredients neatly packaged can just type “edible bugs for humans” into the search bar on Amazon to bring up 34 different yummies ranging from variously flavored grasshoppers to cricket flour and ready-made treats such as chocolate-dipped crickets and worms. Yes, Amazon’s also got recipes: “Eat Grub: The Ultimate Insect Cookbook,” by Shami Radia & Neil Whippey (Francis Lincoln, 2016) and “The Eat-a-Bug Cookbook, Revised: 40 Ways to Cook Crickets, Grasshoppers, Ants, Water Bugs, Spiders, Centipedes, and Their Kin,” by David George Gordon (Ten Speed Press, 2013).

So go for it. Maybe once. After all, as those U.N. folks suggested, your bug a day helps save the planet.