Past, Present, Future: Old Traditions of Eating Insects in Texas’s Hottest Restaurants and the Science of Insect Agriculture
In the April 2024 edition of Texas Highways, Julia Jones highlights the benefits, challenges, history and seeming inevitability of eating bugs with a healthy dose of entomology from CEIF Texas A&M University Center Director, Dr. Jeff Tomberlin.
April 2024 Cover (© Texas Highways)
It’s hard not to be distracted by the gorgeous pictures of entrees, drinks and appetizers inspired by authentic, traditional Mexican dishes that include crickets, grasshoppers and ants. But the meat of the article lies in the discussion about how insects are key to solving worldwide challenges as the human population grows over the next 25 years, even though human consumption of bugs goes back thousands of years.
Texas restaurants that use insect ingredients may be looking to the past for inspiration but it’s the insect agriculture sector where Texas is at the forefront of innovation. Dr. Jeffery Tomberlin (CEIF’s Site Director for Texas A&M University) explains the difference between insect-eating and CEIF’s work in utilizing insects as novel proteins for food and feed and harnessing their unique capacity to break down and repackage nutrients.
The section below, in particular, distills the objectives of the Center beautifully while recognizing the challenges we face with regard to the public perception of entomophagy—
“First, it aims to use insect protein as feed for farm animals, while also making insect ingredients more feasible for widespread consumption at the dinner table. To achieve the latter, these insect innovators understand they’ll have to upend some firmly ingrained attitudes about what should and shouldn’t be put into our bodies.”