Posted on 05/21/2005 7:44:57 PM PDT by aculeus
Sarah Azubi, 17, had hers deep fried. "They were crunchy like chips and tasted a bit like nuts," she said approvingly of the new delicacy on the menu at a Dresden restaurant. "There was a soft juicy bit in the middle around the crunchy shell."
Another diner, Nancy Weinhold, 25, was less convinced by the plump maggots, imported to Germany from Mexico, which the Espitas restaurant began serving last month. "I will try most things once but was really tempted to give this a miss," she said. "They looked disgusting - two-inch long, fat, squishy grubs that looked as if they should have been eating the lettuce, not lying on it waiting to be eaten. I closed my eyes for the first bite, but they were really not that bad."
Few diners seem to share her reservations. Since the head chef, Uwe Engert, started dishing up yellow kingworms (Zophobas morio) in everything from salads to cocktails as a "nutritious and extremely tasty" alternative, the Espitas has been full every night.
Mr Engert himself is a convert, describing the beetle larvae as a "protein bomb for those who are not too squeamish", ideal for human consumption because the exoskeleton is easily digestible.
The restaurant owner, Alexander Wolf, stumbled across the delicacy during a trip to Mexico. Given the popularity of Mr Engert's larvae salads at €13 (£8.90), fried larvae with cactus and corn (€19), and larvae in ice cream or chocolate sauce (€7), he now intends to branch out into grasshopper and ant dishes.
"I was visiting an area close to Mexico City where these larvae seem to be the staple diet," said Mr Wolf, 27, who prides himself on the authentic Latin American ambience in his three restaurants. "The locals cook them in everything from soups to burritos. The larvae used to be a pest as they hatched into a beetle which can destroy crops. People started eating them simply to get rid of them."
He is now considering starting his own maggot farm in Europe. "We have them deep-frozen on the ground to stop them hatching and then ship them over," he said. "We are now planning our own colony here so we can sell them elsewhere in Europe. I reckon they will go down well in the UK. London, especially, has a tradition of variety in its cuisine."
Information appearing on telegraph.co.uk is the copyright of Telegraph Group Limited and must not be reproduced in any medium without licence.
LOL
At the drive thru...
I would like a number 3 please, supersized.
Someone who was much hungrier than I've ever been. Through most of human history that could have been pretty much anyone...
Hot dog meat, and AMERICAN CULTURE!
Hot dogs, sausage & voting on judicial nominees, - you don't want to see how they're made.
That's very touching. But what does it mean? The whole of the human story is overcoming adversity, keyword being overcoming. Nothing wrong with eating bugs and dirt, if the goal is making a personal vow that your kids won't have to.
It means I'm DAMN GLAD to live in a society where even the poor are fat.
That has NEVER happened before, anywhere, at any time. EVER.
It's quite remarkable.
It's a winner.
Gee, stepping on them would have given you the same result.
=))
LOL
diversion ping - how's 'bout some maggots with that salad?
OK, then. I think we're on the same page.... or at least in the same book.
Same planet. Different worlds?
Sumpin like that. :)
Reading the responses to this post, I remembered that I have a book, published in Philadelphia, PA in 1833, titled
'A New Family Encyclopedia; or Compendium of Universal Knowledge: Comprehending A Plain and Practical View of Those Subjects Most Interesting to Persons in the Ordinary Professions of Life.'
It does live up to its title, encompassing subjects from human anatomy, animal life, plants, medicine, industries, politics, etc.
In the chapter on cheese-making is this suggestion on how to have one's cheese covered with skippers-
'Skippers in Cheese - Wrap the cheese in thin brown paper, so thin that the moisture may strike through soon - dig a hole in good sweet earth about two feet deep, in which the cheese must be buried about 36 hours, and the skippers will be found all on the outside of the cheese; brush them off immediately, and you will find your cheese sound and good'.
Curiosity got the better of me, I did a google search for 'skippers in cheese' and found this link -
www.deathonline.net/decomposition/corpse_fauna/flies/cheese.htm
I found out more than I really wanted to know about skippers, cheese, and corpses.
I think I'll become anorexic first thing this morning.
Uhhhhhh. What exactly do you mean by "bring up"?
Maggot...the other white meat.
If you can't beat 'em, eat 'em!
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