In some restaurants in Vietnam, you can order đuông dừa. This dish consists of sweet fish sauce with coriander leaves, chilis and giant white coconut larvae served still wiggling in the bowl! Coconut worms are considered a pest, as the larvae kills the coconut tree as it feasts on it. The government has banned growing them for food as they are trying to reduce the spread of this coconut tree hungry insect.

Eating coconut worms harvested from the wild kills two birds with one stone, decreasing the population of coconut larvae and making a delicious meal! I personally have never eaten a coconut worm (seeing as there is a lack of coconut trees in Edmonton), but it is one of the items on my bucket list.

One of the insects I have eaten though is crickets. The crickets I ate were roasted and flavored like potato chips. Flavors such as barbecue, sour cream & green onion, and salt & vinegar. The taste of cricket without any seasonings has a slightly woody flavor. It is quite bland and will take on the flavor of whatever it has been seasoned with. Because of the cricket’s mild flavour, they can be turned into cricket flour to add protein into your baking or smoothies.

Unfortunately, the livestock (beef, pork, chicken, etc.) we prefer to eat here in North America is not good for the environment. Livestock account for approximately 14.5% - 18% of greenhouse gas emissions every year. Switching to a diet with more insects lowers the demand for traditional meat products, thus lowering the land needed for growing crops and housing livestock. This will result is lowered levels of greenhouse gas emissions.

Get started today. You can purchase cricket flour from many stores and start cooking your own high protein carrot cake muffins or chocolate chip cookies.