Images courtesy of Singapore Food Agency And Local Wikipedia
Eating exotic or “strange” foods is neither unusual nor unfamiliar to Filipinos. We eat dinuguan (pig’s blood braised in vinegar and offal), bagoong (fermented fish or shrimp), balut (fertilized duck egg), tamilok (woodworm) and betute (stuffed baby frog).
The Philippines is known for its biodiversity in flora and fauna. It is home to about 21,000 species of insects, 70 percent of which are endemic to the country. Edible insects include migratory locusts (balang) and grasshoppers, June beetles (salagubang), crickets (kuliglig), termites, and the larvae of beetles, ants, and bees.
Local delicacies at Everybody’s Café in Pampanga include KamaruMole crickets fried or adobo style, with legs and wings removed before cooking. Balaw Balaw in Angono, Rizal offers uokBeetle larvae found in fallen coconut trees, cooked as adobo or steamed with tamarind leaves and their own version of kamaru.
Insect larvae can be from the beetle or moth; they look like worms with cylindrical and segmented bodies. They can usually be eaten raw or fried. In Tuguegarao City, beetle larvae are known as abrasive is popular and expensive. In Isabela it is used in a dish called dinakdakan. Abaling is a popular dish among the Ibanag, Itawes and Ilokano.
Bohol has its chichawormfried larvae, seasoned with sugar, salt and chili powder. In Nueva Ecija, June beetles are cooked with tomatoes as breast milk or adobo style and its meat tastes like chicken.
Abus is the Ilocano word for giant red ants that lay their eggs in leaf nests on treetops. In Ilocos Sur, summer means harvesting the pupae of the red weaver ant, it’s over, sautéed with onions, garlic and soy sauce or cooked with tomatoes as an omelette.
Its eggs are known as the caviar of Ilocos and have a rich, spicy flavor. Restaurants in Bangued, Abra and Vigan, Ilocos Sur, offer this seasonal and expensive delicacy, which is only harvested within an 11- to 15-day window. In Natonin, Mountain Province, Kachiw yag abuhos is a dish that uses finger-sized river fish called kachiw and the eggs of the red weaver ant.
In Panay, apan-apan (local term for grasshoppers) traditionally refers to grasshoppers fried or sautéed in soy sauce as part of Subscribe Tradition to eat a few snacks while consuming alcohol.
Tasty bugs in Singapore
At the beginning of July, Singapore approved 16 species of insects, including crickets, locusts, larvae and silkworms, as food. The Singapore Food Agency (SFA) will also allow the import of insects and insect products for human consumption and animal feed for livestock with immediate effect.
Some local restaurants and retailers are planning to add insects to their menu. A Singaporean restaurant chain called House of Seafood has prepared 30 insect-based dishes, including sticky rice balls garnished with silkworms, salted egg crab with superworms, and fish head curry with crispy crickets on the side.
To ensure food safety in Singapore, the SFA guidelines stipulate that insects cannot be harvested from the wild and must be produced in regulated premises.
The European Union, as well as Australia, New Zealand, the United Kingdom, South Korea and Thailand have allowed the consumption of certain insect species that meet their legal requirements.
In London, restaurant Yum Bug specialises in turning barbecue into meat substitutes such as ground beef or braised lamb. They target people who eat meat by offering them a better alternative that “still feels like meat and contains complete animal protein”.
In Europe, France is the centre of European insect farming for animal and plant feed; the biotechnology company InnovaFeed owns the world’s largest insect farm, covering 55,000 m², which produces 15,000 tonnes of protein annually.
That’s how it works!
The 2013 report by the Food and Agriculture Organization of the United Nations (FAO) states that at least 2 billion people worldwide eat insects every day, which is 30 percent of the world’s population. The most commonly consumed insect groups worldwide are ants, beetles, caterpillars, leafhoppers, crickets, dragonflies, grasshoppers, leafworms, locusts, scale insects, termites and wasps.
A 2024 report titled “The Global Atlas of Edible Insects: Analyzing the Diversity and Commonalities Contributing to Food Systems and Sustainability” identified 2205 species consumed in 128 countries. Published in the scientific journal Nature, It states that Asia has the largest number of edible insects (932 species), followed by North America (mainly Mexico) and Africa. The countries with the highest insect consumption are Mexico (452 species), Thailand (272 species), India (262 species), China (235 species) and Japan (123 species). The custom of eating insects, or practicing entomophagy, is deeply rooted in culture.
Good for the planet
Insects are a far more sustainable and environmentally friendly source of high-quality protein and essential nutrients because they can be harvested without destroying forests and also provide an alternative to livestock farming, which produces methane.
The world population is estimated at 8.2 billion today and will grow to 9.7 billion by 2050. Given the devastating effects of climate change, water scarcity, overfishing and reduced cropland productivity, it is easy to imagine that insects are good for the planet and for all of us.
