If you dread the epic return of billions of loud, buzzing cicadas this spring, here’s something to consider:
What better way to battle the drone than to eat them?
Scooping up these beady-eyed little insects as soon as they emerge from the earth and popping them into the oven to roast isn’t that crazy. More than 2 billion people eat insects on a daily basis around the world.
Entomophagy, or the intentional consumption of insects as food, remains rare in the U.S.
But with billions of cicadas up for grabs this spring in a historic emergence not seen in more than two centuries, Dr. Jenna Jadin, a climate smart agriculture specialist, is calling attention to the nutritional benefits of insects when used more widely on a global scale.
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In a recent interview with Lee Enterprises, Jadin revisited recipes from her 2004 cookbook, “Cicadalicious,” and offered up tips in the kitchen. The book includes recipes for dumplings, tacos and other treats starring the alien-like bugs as protein.
This is an ideal time to test out new cicada recipes in the kitchen. For the first time since Thomas Jefferson was president, billions of two particular periodical cicada broods are set to surface in the Midwest and southeastern United States this spring.
When Jadin was a 21-year-old graduate student at the University of Maryland in 2004, she thought the idea of eating cicadas was “interesting and gross.” But she has since traveled around the world eating all kinds of insects and sees them through a completely different lens.
A safe, sustainable global food source?
Jadin became interested in entomophagy during her years working for the USDA in Washington D.C.
“At the time, the USDA was exploring how to support studies or practice on people eating insects as food, so that’s when I started getting into this as an academic topic, an intellectual love,” she said.
She said the Food and Agriculture Organization of the United Nations has studied entomophagy for quite some time — since 2003.
“They do a lot of research and also policy advancement on using insects as food … The approach is not to promote people eating grasshoppers, but it’s grinding down the insects into protein powder and then using that to form other types of food,” Jadin said.
For example, the FAO has found success in providing low-cost protein patties for children in Sub-Saharan Africa. Insects provide as much protein pound per pound as lean beef, Jadin writes in her 2004 cookbook.
“That’s where there is insufficient protein, and these kids really need it. And so that’s a way to get them protein that’s way cheaper, way more environmentally friendly, and better on land use — and better on water use than beef or any other meat would be,” she said.
Quite a few brand brands throughout Europe also use insect protein as the basis for food products sold widely in Germany and the Netherlands, she said.
Tyson Foods, a big-name meat producer in the U.S., is also investing in edible insects, but not necessarily for human consumption. The food company announced last fall that the company was investing in Protix, a Netherland-based company, as they further their reach globally, Jadin said. The goal is to expand the use of high-quality insects primarily in pet food, aquaculture and livestock industries.
Today, Jadin said she works with various organizations in the U.S. and internationally on land rehabilitation and ecologically-focused agricultural issues.
Jadin said she’s also reworking her "Cicadalicious" cookbook and expanding the recipes to include other insects.
Tips, tricks
As rare as periodical cicadas emerge (every 13 or 17 years), they are quite the delicacy, Jadin said. They also are protein-packed, low-carb, low-fat, and gluten free. Some say the bugs have a nutty flavor or that they taste like asparagus.
Jadin suggests scooping the cicadas up when they're freshly emerged with a paper bag and blanching (quickly boiling) them to remove any potential soil and bacteria.
If you plan to cook them right away, season them and pop them in the oven. Otherwise, freeze them until you’re ready to cook up a dish.
Oh, and don’t forgot to rip off the legs and wings.
Jadin also warned that people with shellfish allergies should avoid consuming cicadas because similarities between the bugs and crustaceans.
Since the cookbook came out in 2004, Jadin has discovered roasting the cicadas longer to dry them out is optimal.
She has since also experimented with mixing cicadas — "Chex mix style" — with fried okra and other vegetables as a flavorful snack. Jadin suggested experimenting with different breaded coatings and a variety of seasonings to see what works best for you.
Using cicadas as a nut replacement, a pizza topping or as a crouton with your favorite soup are also fun ways to enjoy cicadas, she said.
"I think the nicest way to eat them is to deep fry them with breaded coating," she said.
Jadin's is still in the research stage of writing her new book. Once finished, it will include recipes and serve as a tool to educate people on the benefits of other insects as a global food source, she said.
“What I’ve been doing is reviewing the data on insect-eating around the world. I’ve also been sampling wherever I’m traveling, and now I’m starting to put together better recipes. I’m still in the literature research part,” she said.
Where it all started
Jadin said she was a graduate student at the University of Maryland in 2004 studying evolutionary biology and ecology when her professor, Mike Raupp, a well-known cicada expert at the time, was getting bombarded with phone calls from journalists about an upcoming cicada emergence.
“Because people were freaking out about these bugs, these quite large, slow-moving bugs that kind of bump into you and fly into your hair. Even though these bugs are harmless, people would get scared,” Jadin said.
Jadin said Raupp created a public outreach class for the purpose of graduate students helping him field press inquiries. Jadin was assigned to research cicadas’ nutritional value and environmental impact.
“There was evidence that birds had a higher fledging rate, and some other small birds had more offspring in those (emergence) years, because there was more food availability … And then while I was going down a rabbit hole in the early days of the internet, I started coming across research about people eating cicadas,” she said.
She learned Native American tribes historically ate them — and that it was quite common in some cultures and in other countries.
“So the cookbook wasn’t necessarily because I was fascinated with cicadas. It was just that they were out, and it was more of my fascination with cooking and insect eating,” she said.