19 January 2021

Just pretend it's ramen......


... but with more protein.
Yellow mealworm finger foods, smoothies, biscuits, pasta and burgers could soon be mass produced across Europe after the insect became the first to be found safe for human consumption by the EU food safety agency...

The insect’s main components are protein, fat and fibre, offering a potentially sustainable and low carbon-emission source of food for the future. When dried, the maggot-like insect is said to taste a lot like peanuts...

Dried yellow mealworms can be eaten as an aperitif and come in a range of flavours. Alternatively, the insect can be turned into a flour-type ingredient for a dessert.

Thanks to a recipe provided by Jiminis edible insect company, a yellow mealworm cupcake is easy to knock up with three tablespoons of cocoa, 60g of margarine, an egg, a tablespoon of low-fat yoghurt, 30g of flour and 25g of powdered mealworm – with some whole ones left for later.

Add a little water to the cocoa and mix that into the melted butter, egg, yoghurt and some baking powder. Add in some freshly crushed mealworms. Distribute the mix between moulds and cook for 20 minutes. Glaze the top of the freshly baked cupcakes with some icing sugar – and add the spare mealworms on top for decoration.
More at The Guardian.

4 comments:

  1. Seems to me the cupcake is easy to knock up with three tablespoons of cocoa, 60g of margarine, an egg, a tablespoon of low-fat yoghurt, 30g of flour, just mix it all with some water, bake for 20 minutes and when cool powder with some icing sugar, and viola ! some yummy non worm cupcakes.

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  2. *shrug* I'd eat it. Lobsters are just wet cockroaches, after all. We really need to get over this bias against eating bugs. Sustainable, affordable, and readily available.

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  3. I 've had them; the taste and texture are fairly uninteresting. A bit like puffed rice.

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  4. My entomology professor in college brought "snacks" on a field trip we did to collect insects for the university collection. There were brownies with roasted crickets (I stead of nuts), chocolate covered ants mixed into trail mix (instead of chocolate candies or yogurt covered raisins), fried mealworms, roasted grubs with butter and salt, and locusts dipped in honey and crushed nuts. The mealworms were salty, crunchy, and a bit like roasted nuts. The grubs tasted a bit like slightly soggy movie popcorn. The brownies were no different than a regular brownie as long as you didn't see a leg as you bit I to one. The ants were better than chocolate covered peanuts -no greasy after-taste or mouth feel. And the locusts were really good. Only about half of us realized we were eating bugs before he brought out the mealworms and grubs...which was actually the point. Pick the wings and legs off the locusts if you try them though- they're pretty tough and don't taste great!

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