Honestly I haven’t tried it but I wouldn’t mind certain things containing bug parts (on purpose) to make up for protein in them. And honestly that crunch sounds quite good.
It has one of the same inherent inefficiencies as animal meat: they need to eat something to grow. Therefore we need to use a lot of resources to produce a lot of food for them to eat, before we can eat them.
It always seems much more efficient to use those resources to grow food for us to eat directly. Also, getting Americans to eat a vegetable is slightly easier than getting them to eat a bug.
I think the “magic” of bugs is that they can eat things that would be inedible or unhealthy for other omnivores (like pigs). If we can convert some of our food and paper waste into protein and chitin, it might be worth the investment.
This only works for small farms but regular animals already fill that spot there too. Chicken and pigs are mainly fed kitchen scraps in these settings. The issue is once you go into large-scale commercial farming it becomes way too inefficient to use waste products and buying feed is more economical viable. Doesn’t matter if it’s insects or mammals or.
A lot of animal feed is already made up of a lot of “food waste”. Rice bran, maize and wheat offal, fish meal, and bone meal, all of that are byproducts of food for human consumption and commonly found in animal feed. You can even find some that have things like sawdust or other wood products inside. There are even studies into using waste paper for cattle. And while this might sound wrong, it doesn’t harm the animal. But the issue is, humans don’t want to eat something that ate something we don’t like. And I don’t see that changing with insects either.
For me the exciting part about bug farming isn’t really their use as food (for humans or animals) but more their potential to eat “real” waste (like things that birds and mammals shouldn’t eat) and then be turned into non-food items - like chondroitin or have other derivatives made out of their chitin.
Right now it’s not very efficient but with some selective breeding (or faster, GMO mealworm gut bacteria) they could start working on the landfill issue. Their poop would have to be incinerated since it would concentrate flame retardants and other toxins, but we might be able to get something useful out of them.
edit: i have a box of mealworms that I wanted to try feeding just styrofoam to to see how many generations it would take to have mealworms that thrive (not just survive and turn to cannibalism) on the stuff, but i felt bad, now they eat kitchen waste and shredded paper.
1 is they’re a lot more efficient at producing calories vs calories eaten compared to larger animals, and insanely more water efficient. And 2, which varies by insect, is what they eat and the results of it. Many insects eating habits have positive impacts on environmental health and are sought after for that purpose. Earthworms are a famous example, but there are all kinds of insects that play a composting role in nature, eating decaying organic matter and converting it into nutritionally rich soil for plants. Pollinators are another example.
If you don’t use pesticide (as we should, it’s poisoning the air and the water), bugs will come whether you want it or not. You probably won’t be able to make an industry out of it, but I don’t think that’s the point we’re advocating for either.
- in 2013, UN tried to encourage people to eat more bugs
- bugs are still part of the cuisines of a lot of the world
- bugs for food can be raised in tiny spaces with minimal resources
- the main issue is Western countries where bugs are seen as icky (but then we’ve also lost track of where our food comes from and are grossed out by simple organ meats) – we still do shrimp and crayfish and lobster but only because we refuse to see them as bugs
- one sideline that came out of the paleo community – our bodies have a “genetic library” of digestive enzymes, but it is also common for our body to “forget” enzymes (ex. lactase) through lack of use, but apparently our body never forgets chitinase (the claim being that chitin was such an integral part of our diet for so much of our evolutionary history) – side effect of this is yes, you can quite easily consume those shrimp tails rather than pushing them off to the side of your plate
I think whenever news articles talk about bugs they always show a gruesome picture of someone taking a bite, as though eating beef would be a person carving right into the animal. Yes, some cultures do eat bugs, but this is unlikely to be the form factor in which most people would eat them.
Cochineal is a food safe dye made from insects, used in cosmetics and beverages. There are probably other examples, but overall I would expect that insect derived foods would be ground and eaten like powders or patties in the west.
I’ve eaten a few things made with powdered crickets. They were ok. I think treating it as a protein powder and adding it to baked goods makes the idea of eating “bugs” more palatable for most people.
This! I don’t know how I would feel about the texture experience of eating whole insects, but using them in stuff as a powder seems very doable.
Cricket flour isn’t bad at all. It adds a burnt toast flavor that works best in heavier spiced baked goods. I’ve made this recipe a few times for halloween and challenged people to “eat bugs” and everyone who tried it has liked it. I do make sure they don’t have a shellfish allergy first.
I bought some of the little flavored crickets you can get, I got cheese flavor and bbq flavors. They’re not bad, they remove the legs so it’s just a little morsel, they taste a lot like sunflower seeds. I don’t think I’d be opposed working them into my diet if I needed to.
Just use a plant based protein powder then. That’s what I don’t understand, why bugs when you could use soy or peas or some other plant based protein source? It’s even more efficient, no animal cruelty, and not “icky” at all.
Might be a convenient talking point, but imho plant-based should definitely be the priority.
I agree to an extent but if you take a look at one of the best diets in the world for a moment the Mediterranean diet has lots of plants, fish and rarely meat
I think this is a good alternative on paper, but aren’t we in the sixth mass extinction and isn’t the insect phyla the largest at risk?
The bugs would be cultivated outside the natural population & would likely be common species with no risk of extinction. Plus they have a much smaller carbon footprint than many meats, so might help us end the current human imposed mess.
I think it’s a good bandaid but I don’t think it’s a perfect solution. I haven’t seen information on feed and slaughter. Maybe you can help me locate a source.
For sure! Heres a link to a pdf on cricket cultivation based on farms in thailand that have been raising crickets for a few decades.
Tldr is they eat veggie scraps and most of their waste makes great fertilizer when applied correctly.
Edited to add: i agree its not a perfect solution, but i do think its a useful option :)
I appreciate the link! And maybe they could help with recycling and waste treatment. However, I feel like if the world suddenly decided insects replaced livestock corporations will eventually want to be involved. That is where the ethics starts to dwindle. Production feed is usually not nutritional. It will need to make them grow big and quick and I don’t think scraps will cut it. Or what an insect contained an “abnormality” of some sort. We’d be killing the whole stock and then some to correct the issue which is cruel. I understand they are going to die anyways but some insects are intelligent in their own ways and the fear of death is something majority of animals share.
Thats super fair. The ethics of eating something like bugs is definetly a complex discussion & for some people eating any kind of animal is off the table.
& I 100% agree that moving to bug protein would do little to nothing to challenge mega corporations & the damage they cause to both people and the environment.
I dunno eating bugs isnt some magic fix, & there are arguably higher priority issues – but I still think its neat that there are people out there exploring different ways of doing things & looking for even small steps towards a more sustainable future.
Yes! I am all about looking at things at different perspectives :). I’d say it’s a very important tool to help each other learn and solve problems. And sometimes we need to hold each other’s hands to make the bigger steps. I want a sustainable future yesterday loll. 😭
sameee lol I want a chance to live in the nice future, with the fresh veggies and the clean air. just gotta try and get there one step at a time
I bought some fried mealworms for my pet rats. I’ve tried them, they aren’t bad. They don’t really taste like anything. They just crunch. I had a pleasure of eating fried beetles. They taste like shrimp.
Meat is meat. If you eat meat, why don’t you eat bugs?
Exoskeletons are harder to remove than bones
I’ve eaten quite a few things with bugs. Mostly powdered and in something else – cricket bread is quite good and very high protein. Grasshopper too. Even black fly casings can be ground up and added into things (though I wasn’t as big a fan).
I think insects are a good option for low cost protein. They can be cultivated vertically, and don’t require as many resources as some other proteins. I think they add some nice nutrient diversity to diets trying to limit meat consumption. Plant proteins are great, but you can only eat so many forms of soy before it starts messing with your body.
I hope it catches on more. I think once people see and try products where the bug body isn’t as noticeable, they’ll get over some of their ‘ick’ factor.
Chapulines are absolutely delicious and I would definitely recommend if you can find a proper Oaxacan place that serves them.
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Remember to stay kind. Encouraging people to make small steps results in more positive change than caustic judgement.
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Its not about making excuses, its about meeting people where they are. Perfectionism sets people up for failure, and leaves many people feeling like it’s not worth doing anything because they can’t do everything. Encouraging people to take any steps they can helps the movement overall.
Welcoming new environmentalists and staying kind when having discussions helps the movement. It does take emotional labor, and its okay to take a step back sometimes. It is also okay to vent about how you’re feeling in an appropriate space (such as a post in the vegan community, during the weekly how you’re feeling thread on beehaw, with friends, in your journal, etc). However, taking that frustration out on random people in an innocuous post about bugs is neither helpful nor healthy.
So yes, please stay kind.
I raise my own crickets on the farm and grow my own vegetables. It’s basically a closed system, I compost everything. I add additional nutrients using seaweed.
How far do your plants have to travel to get to your plate? Last time I checked so-called modern farming uses a lot of petrochemicals. Organic farming isn’t any better–they use so much plastic to block weeds and pests.
Also, most plant material I grow is not edible by humans. I cannot eat corn stalks. Maybe you can. It seems wasteful to compost all this biomass as there is still so much nutrition left over.
Sounds to me like your carbon footprint is higher than mine. Maybe you should try to create a farming system yourself. One that yields 100% of the daily nutrition humans require. It is not so easy.
I am glad you are vegan. Much better than eating cows. They drink too much water.
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I’m nice to my crickets though. You don’t have to hurt them, you just place them into the freezer and they fall asleep like it’s winter time. And then you roast them and mill them into flour. Okay that part does hurt them, but they’re asleep. Seems kinda peaceful.
I get that hurting a mammal with complex emotions is very unethical, but where’s the limit?
What about fermented food? Tiny bacteria are alive when you eat them. They probably don’t feel pain but I can’t imagine they’re thrilled to meet their doom.
How about mushrooms? They aren’t plants, and they apparently communicate with the trees. How do you know they don’t possess some kind of sentience?
What about harvesting plants? Everytime you run a combine through a field it’s like an insect genocide. Even if you’re only eating plants you’re still eating insects because they get caught by the harvester and milled into the final product. The FDA allows up to 50 insect parts per 1/4 cup cornmeal.
What about hurting a tree? They’re not sentient and cannot feel pain but I still believe it is unethical to harm a tree. Do they not deserve our empathy because they lack our human conception of sentience?
Being a good human is hard. I feel like in principle you’re right but I don’t know how to exist and not hurt anything ever. You’re right, I don’t know you. Maybe you’re just a better person than I am.
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Can I just say… It is a joy to argue with you. I mean that sincerely.
Okay, I read up on what sentience actually is and a few studies on insect sentience, social lives and capacity for pain. Having spent a lot of time with the little critters, I can see their point. Like they’re obviously social for one. Sometimes they really seem like they’re thinking. I don’t know.
Let’s say in principle I agree with you. How am I supposed to not die of anemia from lack of vitamin B12? I didn’t want to do laying hens for obvious reasons. Mushrooms have some B12 and I do grow them, but it’s not gonna be enough to keep you healthy long term. And don’t say supplements or fortified foods… I need something I can grow or forage locally.
What am I missing here?
PS. I dunno know about the taste buds thing, they’re okay but not delicious 😅
B12 comes from bacteria on the ground. If you eat dirty food you should get some.
I just have a B12 supliment I take.
I’m not sure where to get the active bacteria, but you could culture some nutritional yeast, or buy some inactive yeast from the store.
Nah I can’t do supplements, and the B12 in nutritional yeast isnt naturally occuring. Some microorganisms do produce B12 but not the ones they use to make nooch. I know, I was surprised to.
I did some more research though, and I do have a source of B12. Remember I said I was using seaweed for fertilization?
Boom: https://pubmed.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/11430774/
I can just eat the seaweed. 😂
In fact, it appears my people have a long history of eating seaweed: https://www.wildwalks-southwest.co.uk/all-about-laverbread/ (didn’t know that existed!)
So I guess I’ll go vegan. You win. The crickets will be disappointed that they’re getting evicted but I’m sure they’ll get over it.
I’m going to go 6 months eating just seaweed and potatoes, while doing blood work to check my nutrient levels. I’ll let you know if I don’t die 😅. Thanks for all your help.
Using logical fallacies in bad faith doesn’t make you look good
I am aware that users like you throw around logical fallacy terms in your comment all the time when you feel your being called out
I’ve observed it on reddit before multiple times
If you can’t be nice you should just give up
This is not the space to aggressively attack users
This is not a strawman argument and you know it, your just trying to throw “strawman” in response because you don’t like the response you’ve been given
I was vegan for many years, people like you aren’t the reason I stopped but I definitely don’t miss the weird aggression either. (btw farming plants still kills A LOT of bugs, usually in more cruel and prolonged ways than slaughtering them for food)
Yes it does… But feeding the crops to animals just to eat the animals still consumes just as many crops as well as the animal who ate them.
It’s more efficient to just eat the crops the other animals eat.
And this is the kind of behaviour I’d hoped people on lemmy would not continue on the solarpunk community
You’ve just continued the same kind of stuff that alienated a whole lot of users from r/solarpunk because they felt they couldn’t participate without being attacked for their food choices
What’s next, brigading posts with mass downvoting like you did on reddit to sway the visibility of comments in bad faith
If you can’t interact nicely with other users than maybe you shouldn’t be here
Solarpunk is not vеgаnism and while I don’t mind if you personally participate in vеgаnism it doesn’t give you the right to attack users here who don’t participate in it and gatekeep any activity on this subreddit
Solarpunk has no inherent ties to veganism and vеgаnism doesn’t have any ties to solarpunk
The mods previously back on reddit have said this subreddit is not r/vеgаn
Source: ___ ^^https://libreddit.nl/r/solarpunk/comments/tzoiqs/community_update_the_fine_arts_04_2022/
Be kind, and get along with your fellow humans nicely
Tried mealworm, crickets and a few others.
Pretty terrible tastewise imo, not worth it past the novelty stage.
I don’t really see the point honestly, I’d rather we stabilize our population rather than find ways to accommodate exponential growth a bit longer. We’re hitting that wall eventually.It quite common in some parts of the world. I tried it a few times and its not bad, but I wouldn’t go out of my way to get it.
When I used to live in Florida, we’d go once a year to visit the Keys and eat some “bugs” - they were Caribbean Spiny Lobsters. If you think about it, they are pretty closely related - insects and crustaceans. If you are ever confronted with the option to tuck into a big bowl of insects, consider it like a big bowl of shrimp! (full disclosure: I have not had this option, this is only my intellectualization of how to think about it. It is related to my intellectualzation of pretending spiders are crabs, to overcome arachnophobia - though this only extends to not screaming when touched by a spider rather than trying to catch spiders to eat them)
@Doctor_olo I personally would not. My spouse and I are vegetarian and I think we would stick with that. We are not dogmatic about it but I think that one can get all the protein they need from plants, pulses, and dairy. But if other’s want to try, power to them.
I have plans to try and eat some cicadas next time we get a big emergence.
