Ground-up insects could nourish millions

Cricket flour, anyone?

Ever since a United Nations report touted insects as an eco-friendly protein source in 2013, crickets have appeared in dozens of energy bars, chips, cookies, crackers and flours. In January, a company called Six Foods (which makes Chirps cricket chips) even made it onto the show Shark

Tank. To keep up with demand, the largest insect farm in North America, Entomo Farms in Ontario, Canada, has had to increase its farm space from 460 square metres to 5 500 square mertres in just the last three years.

Wait. Crickets?

Bugs in general are an exceptionally green protein source, especially in a world in which water is becoming more scarce. Many food producers consider crickets to be a good “gateway bug” for modern eaters: they’re not too grosslooking, and they require 12 times less feed and 2 000 times less water to raise than cattle. Crickets also add no methane, a greenhouse gas 25 times more potent than carbon dioxide, to the atmosphere.

Any particular kind of crickets?

“The two major cricket species that are farmed are Acheta and the banded cricket,” says Jarrod Goldin, president of Entomo Farms. “The Acheta is slightly bigger, but one of the world’s oldest viruses affects the species and wipes out farms every few years, so we use the banded cricket because they’re much hardier.”

How does one turn a cricket into flour?

By chilling the insects until they fall asleep and die, drying them, and grinding them into powder. “There are multiple methods for drying and grinding crickets,” says Megan Miller, cofounder of Bitty Foods, which makes Chiridos chips and preblended gluten-free cricket flour. “Some companies dry-roast them and then mill them, and others process the crickets into an emulsion and then spray-dry them.”

Is cricket flour really healthy?

“Crickets don’t contain many carbohydrates. The insides are organs and hemolymph (a fancy name for bug blood), which together are made of pure protein and fat,” says Miller. “The exoskeleton is a mixture of protein and fibre.” Crickets are also 30 times higher in vitamin B12 than beef, and high in omega-3 fats.

Can I bake with it?

Yes, but be careful. It’s called cricket flour, but really you should think of it as cricket protein powder, like those enormous tubs of whey that bodybuilders buy. To bake with it, you need to add wheat or gluten-free baking flour or you’ll just end up with a pile of hot cricket sand. “Basically it is like adding sawdust to your dough,” says Stephen Jones, director of Washington State University’s Bread Lab. “It would add nutrition and fibre, but do nothing for the functionality.”