Cicada Ice Cream Seller Told to Cool It

[cigaretteman]

A public health official in central Missouri has asked an ice cream shop to cool it with the cicada ice cream, even though customers apparently can’t get enough of it.
Sparky’s Homemade Ice Cream in Columbia, Mo., sold out of its only batch of the insect-filled dessert within hours of its June 1 debut.
Employees collected the cicadas in their backyards and removed most of the dead bugs’ wings. They then boiled the bountiful bugs and covered them in brown sugar and milk chocolate. The base ice cream is brown sugar and butter flavor.
Gerry Worley, an environmental health chief with the Columbia County Department of Public Health, says the agency’s food code “doesn’t directly address cicadasâ€￾ and that he has advised against their use as an ingredient.

Missouri cicada ice cream seller told to cool it | TheGazette

 

[Cyclonepride]

Time for an FDA sting

 

[CycloneWanderer]

Is this the kind of bug that crazy people eat raw and are fine? Why get involved when they are taking some care to ensure safety?

 

[Broodwich]

There doesn't appear to be anything in the food code that directly addresses brussel sprouts either.

 

[ThatllDoCy]

I wouldn't eat that for this reason. People treat their lawns with all sorts of chemicals, and because the collection was by employees from various places there is no guurantee that these bugs are not contaminated. Otherwise, I have eaten grub cookies etc. and they taste fine just kind of a mental thing that you are eating a bug.

 

[Naughtius]

Meh. I'll stick with my Soylent Green, thanks.

 

[VeloClone]

Meh. I'll stick with my Soylent Green, thanks.

+1

 

[Incyte]

I wouldn't eat that for this reason. People treat their lawns with all sorts of chemicals, and because the collection was by employees from various places there is no guurantee that these bugs are not contaminated. Otherwise, I have eaten grub cookies etc. and they taste fine just kind of a mental thing that you are eating a bug.

I get your point but much more chemicals are applied to crops then people's lawns.

 

[bugs4cy]

People love the bizarre. When I was an undergrad the Insect Horror Film Fest was such a hit that it got a couple undergrads on the Jay Leno Show and it was a flippen job to collect enough insects to cook up for people to eat at the event. We didn't serve cicadas, but crickets were popular. We didn't buy from a pet store because they were often fed dog food, and thus had a weird taste. We focused on crickets from prairies where we knew insecticides were not in use. Roast em up (remove the legs - too tough) and dip in chocolate and they taste like roasted nuts with a chocolate shell.
:yes:
Cultures other than American have different views on eating insects - much more accepted outside the US.

 

[cigaretteman]

Today, it's grasshoppers in the news:

Yesterday it was cicadas in the ice cream. Today's taboo is grasshoppers in the tacos - but there's a difference.
While Sparky's frozen critter crisp dessert was invented on a lark, "tacos de chapulines" are a popular cart and bar snack in Mexico City, Oaxaca and even in certain parts of the United States. Devotees cite the cooked bugs' appealing crunch and protein content - said to be twice that of beef.

However, local authorities aren't keen on where La Oaxaqueña Bakery and Restaurant owner Harry Persaud was sourcing his grasshoppers. While he has a permit to import them, the vendor he's using is not FDA-approved, and he has yet to locate a domestic, approved source. In the meantime, Persaud is reportedly considering raising his own.

Health department bugs out over grasshopper tacos – Eatocracy - CNN.com Blogs

 

[cigaretteman]

Turns out the cicada story wasn't entirely accurate:

Earlier this week, the internet was abuzz with reports that health officials in Columbia, Mo., had stepped in to prevent local ice cream parlor Sparky's from serving (apparently quite tasty) ice cream made with cicadas, the noisy bugs that swarm vast stretches of the South and Midwest every 13 years.

It turns out those reports didn't get the story completely right. According to reporter Melissa Klauda, who broke the cicada ice cream story and also served up a delicious bit describing other ways to eat the critters (loving that photo of the cicada pizza!), health officials didn't ban the frozen treat. Rather, when folks from Sparky's called to ask about the safety of serving up insect ice cream, the officials "advised against the use of cicadas in the ice cream because the department did not have information regarding cooking temperatures for cicadas."


Sparky's management ultimately decided to stop selling the ice cream, wrote Klauda -- adding that her "words were twisted" by publications who said that the health department had stepped in.

Indeed, if health departments were to start making rules about eating creepy crawlers like cicadas, they might decide to give the practice of eating bugs, also known as entomophagy, a big thumbs-up.

According to connoisseurs, bugs are nutritious -- and sustainable. According to this article written by the aptly-named John Roach, cicadas are "a healthy alternative to that bacon double-cheeseburger without the bun" -- low in fat, high in protein, nary a carb in sight. People say they taste like peanuts.

Last year, Los Angeles Times reporter Jeannine Stein interviewed husband-and-wife team Peter Menzel and Faith D'Aluisio, authors of "Man Eating Bugs: The Art and Science of Eating Insects," about their new book "What I Eat: Around the World in 80 Diets."

For more on cicadas' food worthiness, check out this site.

"Bug Chef Extraordinaire" David George Gordon offers recipes such as "Sheesh! Kabobs" (which incorporate marinated Orthoptera, an order of insects including grasshoppers and crickets) at his website.

Cicada ice cream. Yum. And possibly good for you too. - chicagotribune.com