Bugs: The other dark meat
Posted on Apr 18, 2008 under edible insects, mopani worms by stett | No CommentInspired by the chapulines I ate at El Tule I ate a few weeks ago, I wrote up a list of other edible insects from around the world. Since most Silicon Valley restaurants aren’t ready to embrace edible bugs I didn’t expect to get the opportunity try any more bugs but thanks to adventurous eater Peter Licht, I sampled another creepy crawly delicacy: a mopani worm from Botswana.
“I’m known as someone who will eat anything,” says Licht, a San Jose resident and freelance brewer.
My kinda guy.
His friends know of his unflinching appetite so when they travel around the world they bring him things like dried beef from Bhutan (which is quite good) and mopani worms.
Peter’s friend’s sister brought him about 30 smoked worms and he was kind enough to ask me if I’d like to try one. Of course I said yes. I walked over to his downtown house and he pulled out a baggie that contained the last of his stash: two worms.
After chatting a bit about worms, tacos, sourdough bread, and beer, we got down to eating to eating the worms. Here’s how they looked on the plate.
How’d they taste? Smoky, dry and a bit like beef jerky, but less salty and much less beefy. They were as crunchy as a Cheeto, but surprisingly mild and non-funky. Add a little salt and they’d go great with a cold beer. If I were a subsistence farmer in Africa trying to get by, I’d definitely eat these little buggers.
