Bugs for Breakfast, Bugs for Fun in Oaxaca

Bugs for Breakfast, Bugs for Fun in Oaxaca

Ever since cicadas invaded Oak Park and my friend C2 and I developed recipes for Chicago Tonight and Good Morning America, I’ve been an unabashed insectivore. I prefer meat and vegetables, but for fun, and sometimes for breakfast, I have no problem hunkering down a few hundred bugs.

Last Friday, at Secrets Resort in Huatulco, Oaxaca, Hurricane Carlotta was tearing up real estate, the black flag was raised on the beach, and I was thinking Thailand, Japan, maybe we were next. It was awesome, in the basic sense of the word; I was struck dumb by the energy of angry nature and the incredible power of the water.


The next morning, as the storm dissipated and the sun rose, I tucked into a plate of chapulines over cheesy potatoes.





The grasshoppers were smoky, earthy, crunchy. I was pleased that at this all-inclusive, that could easily have stuck to the basics, decided to take a chance and serve guests a food that I’m sure 98% considered inedible (there were bacon, eggs, etc., available, too).

Oaxaca is a tremendously bio-diverse region (probably why Cortez decided this was the hunk of the New World he wanted to make his own personal kingdom), and with the range of good things to eat, it might seem odd to go for the bugs. But they're not filling…and they’re quite traditional, so I was way in.

This morning, we walked through Copalita, an archaeological zone unlike any I’d visited around Mexico City or up in Yucatan: it’s on the water, and canals lead the water into areas around the temple structures. Of the 20 buried citizens of this ancient city, 19 have been determined to be female. A lot of fertility figurines have been unearthed, and after the hurricane, the water washed away the ground to reveal even more stuff. There’s a lot to discover here, and here I was introduced to the chicatana, an edible bug that Alberto, our guide, told us is frequently eaten raw (though like chapulines, it’s often roasted, too).



Getting back to the hotel, and taking into account that we’d been warned by hotel literature to stay away from local food vendors, we went directly to a local food vendor (sorry Kasmania, but huge thanks for setting up this trip for us).

Elisabeth made us some shrimp.



As we ate, a most excellent child, Carmet, showed us a chicatana she’d caught.





Here was a kid who had very little, but she entertained us, and herself, throughout lunch, as she played with her bug. She said it was too small to eat, so she put it in a coche, and tooled it around, then she built a house for it out of shell, later the bug piloted a helicopter on a hunk of coral. Carmet put this edible bug in a variety of playful environments, much to our major amusement. She could tell we were being real with her, and when we laughed, she laughed.

Anyway, as much as I was awed by the hurricane, and intrigued by Copalita, I was touched by this kid, as I am by all kids, who are the best people in the world, my favorite forces of nature. Being around this little person, I was reminded of my own daughters, thousands of miles away in all directions.

It was a good day to feel like a father. And eat bugs.

Wait a minute...you do not like White Castle but you like bugs??!!!

Had good nopales salad tonight, with chapulines on the side. I think I've had enough bugs for the day.

Don't run with scissors. Don't eat bugs.

My cat ate half a moth yesterday. I'll give you his number.

seriously I really do appreciate the pictures and writings david hammond posts on here even though I do not like the idea of eating bugs. As far as the cat goes I think he was more attracted to the movement of the moth rather than wanting to eat a moth. Even cats would prefer good red meat or cat food to eat opposed to a powdery moth.

I dunno, he's eaten them before. He seems to prefer them and silverfish...he used to eat spiders, but his palate has matured, I guess.

A couple years back when we had those cicadas all over the place here in Chicago, I told my mom I'd eat some cicadas if she caught them for me. So she did. I ate them prepared very simply: just plunged into boiling water until they stopped moving. To my surprise, they were quite tasty. A bit grassy, a bit nutty, little bit buttery, and somewhat like canned asparagus. Thumbs up from me. Do remove the tough wings, though.

Weird thing is, my wife, who identifies herself as an unadventurous eater, has eaten crickets and ants (or maybe it was ant larva) in Mexico and enjoyed them, too.

In a few decades we'll be coming up on 500 years since Bernardino de Sahagun reported to Europe on the tzicatana in his Nueva Historia, from its divine associations to its swarm ethology (mirroring the movements of the Aztecan armies) to its apparent deliciousness to the Nahuan-speaking people in the region. I can't find the corresponding illustrated page in the Florentine Codex freely accessible online, but will try to get a scan soon. You can read a brief translation of part of the section here:

http://books.google.com/books?id=S3ILAQ ... CDUQ6AEwAA

These are generally leafcutter ants (tzicatl in Nahuatl, big ant, compare with standard azcatl) - only the queen females have wings, and they only come out and swarm at certain times of year. This is a different subfamily of ants than the agave-dwellers whose eggs you might have enjoyed as escamoles elsewhere in the country. Colonial manuscripts are a specialty for me, entomophagy slightly less so, though I do like chapulines in the little local newspaper cones with lime and salt, and the wormlets at Sticky Rice are not bad.

Right before a huge breakfast platter of trasejo, chorizo and cecina (which in Oaxaca is spicy pork rather than dried beef), we snacked on some chapulines. The ones on the lower level, far right, were seasoned with chiles and garlic and by far the tastiest version of this insect I've had. The bugs, fried, have a lot of crispness going for them, and adding some seasoning makes them interesting for more than just a bite or two. No one is going to argue that chapulines, all by themselves, are hugely flavorful; this "seasoned" version (one among many on this young lady's table) was really good.



Later in the day, at the almost equally spectacular Monte Alban, we were told that chapulines were enjoyed by local Zapotecs since well before the city's founding in 500 B.C.