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| Photo by Peter Halasz |
I'll get to that in a bit, but first ...
My Chicken Problem
I've started scheming and planning for transitioning my typical little suburban/small town home and 1/4 acre lot into a permaculture garden, as well as bringing my lifestyle into line. I've got all kinds of ideas, and I'll share them, along with progress, in later posts. Lots of details ...
But one thing I've thought about is livestock. I've seen and read plenty of information about permaculture that talks about the benefits of chickens to keep bugs down, eat weeds and fallen fruit, and aerate and fertilize the soil. Wonderful idea. And of course, they provide eggs and meat.
However, I have a problem: It's not legal to keep chickens or any other livestock in my town – not even bees! Now, I've thought about getting a quieter chicken breed and bribing the neighbors to silence with eggs, but I'm not sure I want to take the risk of a fine and losing my investment in chickens, coop and supplies.
Also, I'm not absolutely sure I'm prepared to kill a chicken myself. Even if the chickens are mainly for eggs and their ecological benefits, eventually you have to kill the old layers or give them to someone else to kill. I doubt it makes sense to set them out to pasture, like the Hari Krishnas do with their milk cows.
That leaves me with some meat options:
- Go vegetarian/vegan – doable. I was vegan for about 8 years.
- Keep buying grocery store meat – nasty stuff
- Buy local, humanely raised meat – nice but expensive
I want to keep eating some meat, for better or worse. And once my transition is complete, I'll probably still eat conventional meat from time to time. But I want meat I can raise myself to save money, be healthier, and contribute to fertilizing my yard. Then I thought of mealworms!
Why Mealworms Are Awesome
There's a lot of talk lately in environmental and scientific circles about using insects as an alternative animal protein source to chicken, beef, pork, fish, etc. (Mealworms, by the way, are beetle larvae, not worms.) The reason is that insects are relatively resource efficient. They're also healthful!
Live Mealworm Nutritional Values
- Protein: 20%
- Fat: 13%
- Fiber: 2%
- Water: 62%
Dried Mealworm Nutritional Values
- Protein: 53%
- Fat: 28%
- Fiber: 6%
- Water: 5%
Many (or most) of the world's cultures actually already eat insects. (And to be technical, a tiny percentage of processed food is insect parts, so you're eating them already.)
A 2012 ABC News article cited a Dutch study published in the science journal, Plos One, also in 2012. The study's authors, Dennis Oonincx and Imke de Boer:
...calculated that mealworm farming cut both carbon dioxide emissions and land use by about one-half to two-thirds when compared with milk, chicken, and pork production and by about 90 percent when compared with beef production. Energy requirements were roughly equal for mealworms, pork and beef, and were slightly less for milk and chicken.
The "energy requirements" referred to are for keeping the mealworms at an ideal temperature of 77-81º F (25-27º C). Depending on weather, that could mean a considerable AC/heating cost for commercial production. But since I would be raising a small number in my house, which I keep at about those temperatures much of the year here in subtropical South Texas, that's a null point for me.
What Do Mealworms Taste Like?
All the scientific reasonableness in the world won't do me any good if I'm too squeamish to kill and eat mealworms. So I put myself to the litmus test of eating one.
James' wife, Amy, raises mealworms for fish food. So last Tuesday when I was at their house, I told them about my plans and notions, and asked to try one. Amy complied and brought out her mealworms, which she raises in a bowl full of dry oatmeal with fruit and veggie scraps on top. I plucked one out and watched it wiggling in my hand. Then I popped it in my mouth.
I chomped down, and the juice squeezed out. It had a rich, buttery flavor, though rather bland, like unsalted butter. The exoskeleton was a bit chewy, like a shrimp. It didn't have a lot of flavor, but it tasted decent, and it didn't gross me out. Wasn't too bad at all! The experiment was a success!
Now, I don't plan on eating my mealworms "raw and wriggling" going forward. I plan on roasting them. I've read that roasted they taste a bit like roasted nuts, which I can see. I think they'll be a tasty ingredient for all kinds of dishes.
How Do You Raise and Cook Mealworms?
Those are topics for later blog posts, once I actually get into the project. I've only now overcome the first hurdle – the idea of it.
— #mealworms #permaculture #entomophagy
I have to say, I responded to this article on two levels:
ReplyDelete(1) EMOTIONAL: "Eeewwww!! You ate a LIVE BUG!"
(2) RATIONAL: Brilliant! Exactly the proper test to measure the feasibility of a practical solution to a real problem. Well done. (and well written too).
Bravo.