Global Warming Insanity: Environmental Wackos Want Us to Eat “Bug Burgers”
This is your warning that you may not want to be eating when you read this post. The Associated Press reports that the new rage in Switzerland is eating insects. The reason? To fight global warming, of course:
Swallow deeply, pinch the nose and repeat the mantra: “Tastes like beef, tastes likes beef.” Then bite into the burger of rice, chopped vegetables, spices and mealworm larvae.
The Swiss supermarket chain Coop, to a bit of domestic hoopla, has begun selling burgers and balls made from insects. It’s being billed as a legal first in Europe, a continent more accustomed to steak, sausage, poultry and fish as a source of protein.
The goal is to convince leery consumers to try a nutritious, if unusual food that “preserves the planet’s resources,” Coop says.
About one-third of the burger is mealworm larvae. A burger weighing 100 grams (3.5 ounces) has about 10 grams of protein in it — about the same amount found in a child’s-size beef burger.
. . . .
The U.N.’s Food and Agricultural Organization has promoted insects as a source of human food, saying they are healthy and high in protein and minerals. The agency says many types of insects produce less greenhouse gases and ammonia than most livestock — such as methane-spewing cattle — and require less land and money to cultivate.
The people who made this recommendation should be force-fed mealworms at their next meeting.
I’d pay to watch that.
According to the article, a law was passed in Switzerland in May to authorize the sale as fool of “mealworm larvae, house crickets and migratory locusts.” Apparently the new bug burgers and insect balls are very popular. And how could they not be, with a description like this?
The burger itself has little white specks of rice inside with traces of carrot, paprika, chili powder and pepper. After a hesitant bite, the main flavors that come out are the spices. The texture is curious, a bit like a meaty falafel with a crunch. An aftertaste lingered — but maybe that was just my subconscious playing tricks.
The insect burgers, like the meat variety, can be accompanied by buns, tomatoes and lettuce. The insect balls — a mixture of mealworms with cilantro, onions and chickpeas — seem to fit best in pita bread, perhaps with a spoonful of yogurt.
Mmmmmm!
Now, if you’ll excuse me, I’m going to go have a big, thick, juicy, environment-destroying burger.
… a real one. Made from a cow.
[Cross-posted at RedState and The Jury Talks Back.]
As soon as they make a product tasty enough that people will eat willingly eat it without being guilted into doing so — and this product certainly ain’t that, the only way most Americans could be persuaded to eat this is through the same sort of guilt that caused (and still causes in some sects) people to scourge themselves nightly — then I’ll try a bite.
Of someone else’s.
Tell you what, Patterico, when they’ve convinced you, I’ll take a bite of yours. Yeah. (That seems like a safe enough set of preconditions that I won’t have to worry about this again. Ever.)
Beldar (fa637a) — 9/9/2017 @ 1:11 pmI am reminded by this post that our host is from Fort Worth.
Beldar (fa637a) — 9/9/2017 @ 1:11 pm(Which would be proud of his position, if asked.)
Beldar (fa637a) — 9/9/2017 @ 1:12 pmYou can’t always get what you want.
won ton ton (028367) — 9/9/2017 @ 1:14 pmBefore I get my steaks cooked just how I like them later, I first soak my applewood charcoal bricketts in starter fluid, and let them burn for about 10 minutes to pile to get a very hot flame started.
And they want me to give up that for worms?
shipwreckedcrew (56b591) — 9/9/2017 @ 1:20 pmSeriously, protein sources must evolve beyond clearing forests to grow grain for meat production. It’s terribly inefficient and environmentally unsustainable to rely on animal products solely for protein. Think about it this way…if you like shellfish like lobster, know that it’s a tasty bug. Add garlic butter and lemon…anything tastes good.
Ben burn (ad9fa0) — 9/9/2017 @ 1:21 pmTell us the one about peak oil again, please, Ben burn! We love fairy tales here!
Beldar (fa637a) — 9/9/2017 @ 1:24 pmCowtown!
Patterico (115b1f) — 9/9/2017 @ 1:27 pmIt takes 150 gallons of water to grow a quarter-pound hamburger patty…or you can grow a pound of corn for 50 gallons. Imagine how much corn is in Beldars back yard after Harvey.
https://water.usgs.gov/edu/activity-watercontent.html
Ben burn (ad9fa0) — 9/9/2017 @ 1:30 pmhttps://www.terminix.com/blog/whats-buzzing/7-countries-where-insects-mean-a-great-meal
kishnevi (abbfd8) — 9/9/2017 @ 1:44 pmhttps://www.geek.com/news/lobsters-really-are-cockroaches-of-the-sea-1614260/
It’s all in your head.
Ben burn (ad9fa0) — 9/9/2017 @ 1:52 pm“I would gladly not pay you next Tuesday, for a bugburger today.”
— Gimpy
Colonel Haiku (2601c0) — 9/9/2017 @ 1:52 pmAnd like lobsters, cockroaches are traife.
kishnevi (abbfd8) — 9/9/2017 @ 1:53 pmAll you’ve done there is show why a quarter pound hamburger patty costs $3 and an ear of corn 15 cents.
But to grow the garlic and lemon and to churn the butter we’d still need to clear forests to grow grain for meat production and plant lemon groves and garlic fields.
I say make soylent green from leftists. Now that’s good use of resources.
Rev.Hoagie® (6bbda7) — 9/9/2017 @ 1:54 pmI’m hearing the usual ‘arguments ‘.
Ben burn (ad9fa0) — 9/9/2017 @ 1:55 pmAnd there again, demolition man, was disturbingly prophetic.
narciso (d1f714) — 9/9/2017 @ 1:56 pmseems to me like they’re just ingredients
chicago’s taught me not to pre-judge anything in the realm of the culinary
and i been making good use of them weird vegan “chorizo” crumbles when i find them on sale cause of my friend F more or less stopped eating meat after he moved here to Chicago, and i’ll make a casserole or eggbake for him to have handy cause he’s been working a ferocious amount of overtime
there’s definitely a lot of aspects of failmerica’s future i find much more troubling than bugmeat
but this reminds me it’s time to use up another can of pork brains
this one i’m gonna do a sort of biscuits and gravy thing with
i’ll make my own gravy but use store-bought biscuits i think
some day i wanna conquer homemade biscuits but that’s gonna wait for a new kitchen – and it’ll be a quest to find the recipe i stick with
but anyways with the brains the key thing will be to add bacon grease to the gravy
the distressing thing about pork brains (besides the ungodly amount of cholesterol) is they don’t taste particularly of pork – hence the bacon grease this next time around
surprisingly the texture is actually quite nice
happyfeet (28a91b) — 9/9/2017 @ 1:57 pmI love it when y’all get ‘Sciency’ on me.
Ben burn (ad9fa0) — 9/9/2017 @ 1:58 pmEat the Swiss!
nk (9651fb) — 9/9/2017 @ 1:58 pmWith me the key thing is not to eat them at all.
Patterico (115b1f) — 9/9/2017 @ 1:58 pm“The average liberal benburn-out, when resting, inhales and exhales about 7 or 8 liters of air per minute. That totals about 11,000 liters of air per day. Inhaled air is about 20-percent oxygen.”
https://www.sharecare.com/health/air-quality/oxygen-benburnout-consume-a-day
Colonel Haiku (2601c0) — 9/9/2017 @ 1:59 pmI’m all in favor of envirowackos eating bugs. Or not eating anything at all. I’m not all that much in favor of them eating plants, since plants are more highly evolved than they are and more beneficial to mankind.
nk (9651fb) — 9/9/2017 @ 2:00 pmit’s largely a southern thing (deep south) what almost entirely appears in the form of pork brains and eggs
but there’s a midwest fried pork-brain sammich you can find in the outskirts of chicago and in iowa – some odd pockets of kansas as well
and in the city here you can definitely find pork brain tacos if you put your mind to it
that’s what i used my first can for – basically disappeared the brains into potatoes, fresh garlic, grated carrot etc and topped it with a verde sauce in a corn tortilla
this wasn’t particularly brave cause Mr. burn kinda hits the nail on the head about the garlic and lemon – or olive oil with salt and garlic
happyfeet (28a91b) — 9/9/2017 @ 2:04 pmI hear that it ain’t easy, being green.
It also means eating smaller fish. Top of the chain fish such as swordfish are frowned upon too. But eating smaller fish also means less mercury in your diet, so that’s a real benefit. And yet again, sardines aren’t my favorite.
Tillman (a95660) — 9/9/2017 @ 2:05 pmI’m waiting for Al Gore to actually match his carbon output to his hot air output.
Since he’s the world’s leading authority that’s only fair.
But as long as his footprint is 20-30 times the average citizen’s how serious can the problem really be?
Same with Leo “oh my gosh I have no idea what Chinook winds are!” DeCaprio.
harkin (40514d) — 9/9/2017 @ 2:06 pmWhen you can’t argue the evidence…
Ben burn (ad9fa0) — 9/9/2017 @ 2:07 pmAlways listen to the lefties, after all they’re the ones who convinced Europe to go diesel.
http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/earth/environment/11878435/Europe-must-now-come-clean-on-diesel.html
harkin (40514d) — 9/9/2017 @ 2:09 pm@21. =Haiku!= Gesundheit!
Heyyyy Abbott!!!
Costello: What makes a balloon go up?
DCSCA (797bc0) — 9/9/2017 @ 2:10 pmAbbott: Hot air.
Costello: What’s holdin’ you down.
“When you can’t argue the evidence…”
Have you hugged a fracker today?
http://www.ocregister.com/2016/04/10/us-have-carbon-emissions-dropped-thank-fracking/
harkin (40514d) — 9/9/2017 @ 2:11 pmhere’s what i’d try with the meal worms my first time
the sour cream in this recipe needs some filler – and the bacon crumbles, diced mealworm, and the rest of the ingredients here would be a good introduction to mealworms
the crickets i’d have to think about
in texas we have those nasty horrifying cricket population explosions and they flock to the lights in the walmart parking lot to where you can actually hear them crunch and pop as you drive through – but there was also a smell you’d notice as you’d walk through the bug-guts – and i think if i smelled that while i was preparing my tasty crickets i’d yack
happyfeet (28a91b) — 9/9/2017 @ 2:14 pm@26. It bugs’em.
DCSCA (797bc0) — 9/9/2017 @ 2:14 pmLet’s see… if the anti-frackers were being funded by Russian oil interests, I wonder where the proponents of eating bugs get theirs?
Let them eat dung beetles!
Colonel Haiku (2601c0) — 9/9/2017 @ 2:20 pmThere was also a back Rogers eposodecwith Gary Coleman, and guest villain ray walstin that featured lizard burgers, I’ve had gator once, I don’t think it would catch on
narciso (d1f714) — 9/9/2017 @ 2:21 pm31. You think so?
Argue the evidence as their proxy.
Ben burn (ad9fa0) — 9/9/2017 @ 2:21 pmoops i did a typo up there
there’s never a space between meal and worm
which, that must be deeply meaningful i think
happyfeet (28a91b) — 9/9/2017 @ 2:21 pm“An aftertaste lingered — but maybe that was just my subconscious playing tricks.”
It may’ve been the vomit?
Colonel Haiku (2601c0) — 9/9/2017 @ 2:24 pmack I meant cream cheese above not sour cream
happyfeet (cb4403) — 9/9/2017 @ 2:26 pmi don’t think it impertinent to put it out there
if the texture reminds one of a falafel then maybe gyros not burgers are the way to go with these guys
happyfeet (28a91b) — 9/9/2017 @ 2:46 pmBurnie thinks the film Snowpiercer is the ultimate life.
NJRob (85cd77) — 9/9/2017 @ 3:36 pmI liitke like highlander the quickening where the solution to thecozone hot was worse than the problem.
narciso (d1f714) — 9/9/2017 @ 3:48 pm“Evidence”
https://static.pjmedia.com/instapundit/wp-content/uploads/2017/09/Screen-Shot-2017-09-09-at-8.25.57-PM-553×600.png
harkin (40514d) — 9/9/2017 @ 7:45 pmThose who desire to eat bugs certainly should, provided they spend their own money I don’t care. But no one is going to be nagged into eating them, I can tell you that.
Progressives always end up being caricatures of themselves. (The first thing Johnnie Cochrane’s Wookie posted here was a defense of eating bugs over beef.)
Bug meat is not going to be cheaper than beef or pork for decades–unless government steps in and subsidizes it–something like the ethanol mandate for gasoline.
Frederick (80401a) — 9/9/2017 @ 11:01 pmi should like a tuppence of bugmeat sir
please and thank you sir
family hasn’t had proper bugmeat in weeks
and with the missus in a family way too
a proper godsend it is and nothing less
happyfeet (28a91b) — 9/10/2017 @ 12:34 amMan she went north fast. Now takin dead aim at Ft Myra but thankfully only at cat 3….. that’s bad enough.
harkin (40514d) — 9/10/2017 @ 12:51 pmForgot to add link:
http://www.cnn.com/interactive/storm-tracker/
harkin (40514d) — 9/10/2017 @ 12:53 pmMake that Ft. Myers.
harkin (40514d) — 9/10/2017 @ 12:53 pmI want to sell the Swiss bug burgers. I want to register the brand name “Feature”.
Karl Lembke (cd9062) — 9/10/2017 @ 2:16 pm“Cowtown” has nothing to do with beef and everything to do with the women who live here. 🙁
Diffus (4a5ca6) — 9/10/2017 @ 10:37 pmchapulines
happyfeet (28a91b) — 9/11/2017 @ 6:27 amWhen I was a kid and curious about what naked savages halfway around the world did, I read about some tribes who ate bugs as a regular part of their diet, I presume to supplement their protein intake. They also ate people.
nk (dbc370) — 9/11/2017 @ 6:59 ammakes me think of the 2nd best ever bumper sticker: I Love Animals, they’re Delicious-!
For those wondering, the #1 : ‘Eschew Obfuscation” translation: (avoid confusing language…) on my car now!
NeoCon_1 (772a1b) — 9/11/2017 @ 8:58 amI was in college in the late 70’s working at McDonalds when a rumour was making the rounds that the chain had been mixing ground up worms onto the hamburgers a false but widely seen as plausible tale, then Jimmy Buffet came out with Cheesburger in Paradise then we we got really busy, I am convinced that Buffet either saved Mc DOnald’s or at least saved them tens of $millions n potentially lost sales over that rumour.
NeoCon_1 (772a1b) — 9/11/2017 @ 9:04 amI hope to leave this mortal coil before ever having to eat a bug burger, or whatever they’re called.
ROCHF (877dba) — 9/11/2017 @ 11:18 am