Show LOCUSTS AS FOOD FOR MAN by prof brof ulley riley state entomologist of missouri nead heart before the american nelen Selen bentine dentine tille association at detroit in the rew row words I 1 have to communicate muni cate under this lieada head it is lot not my purpose to inflict a long dissertation on edible insects tho no subject has been sufficiently treated of by various authors and especially by lorby kirby and spence in their admirable introduction to entomology while within the year mr W it gerard has brought together most of the facts in in a paper entitled Ent in a paper read before the poughkeepsie society of natural history it is my desire rather to demonstrate tho the availability of locusts as food for man and their value as such whenever as not happens they deprive him of all other sources of nourishment with tho the exception of locusts most othet insects that have been used as food for men are obtained install in small smail quantities and their thel ruse use is moro a matter of curiosity than of interest they have been employed either by exceptional individuals with perverted tastes or eise else els eis as dainty tit bits to tickle some abnormal normal and epicurean palate not so with locusts which have frol from froin h time imm immemorial emoral formed a staple stape article of diet with many peoples and are used today to day in largo quantities in many parts of the globe any one at all familiar with the trea treasures ares on exhibition at the british Itu museum seum must have noticed amo amoia its nineveh sculptures one eno in which aw arp represented men carrying diu kinds of meat to some festival and among them some who carry lon ion long iong sticks to which aro are tied locusts thus us indicating that in those early days represented by the sculpture locusts were sufficiently esteemed to make part of a public feast they are counted among the clean meats in leviticus si xi 22 sti and are referred to in other parts of the bible as food for man maa in most parts of europe asia and africa subject to locust ravages these insects have been and are ara yet extensively used as food herodotus rodo it us mentions a tribe of E ethiopians thio which fed on locusts which came in swarms from the southern and unknown districts and livingston has made us familiar with tho the fact that the custom yet prevails among many african tribes indeed some tribes have been called from the tho almost exclusive preference they give to this diet wo we have it from pliny that locusts were in high esteem among the parthiana Part Parth hians idus and the records cordson of their thel ruse use in ancient times as food in southern southern europe and asia are abundant this use continues in those parts of tho the world to the tile present day in morocco where as I 1 am informed by one mr brovey blackmore mackmore of london who has spent some time in that country they do more or less damage every year and are used extensively for food whenever they abound so as to diminish the ordinary food supply while they ara arc habitually roasted for eating and brought lato into tangier and other towns by the country people and sold in ili tho the market and on the streets the jews who form a large proportion of the po population illation collect the females on ont byor jy for this purpose having an idea that the male is unclean but that under the body of odthe femal females cs there are some hebrew characters which snake make them lawful food in reality there are tinder under the thorax certain dark markings the species used and which is BO 80 injurious to crops being the tho rad Bad president of the russian entomological boc soc society 1 lety tells me that they are also to this day extensively used as nood food in southern russia while many of our north american amerlean indian tribes and notably the snake and digger indians of california aro are known to feed upon them no further evidence need be cited to prove the present extensive use of therein these those an sects as articles of food let lot us then briefly consider the tho nature of this locust food and the different methods of pre pro preparing it the records show us that inan in ancient times these insects wem were cooked in a variety of ways Edi poda and aiumu Acrid peri which are the more common devastating locusts of the old world are both of large size and they are generally prepared by first detaching the legs and wing wings S the bodies are then either boiled roast roasted edi stewed fried or broiled tho romans romaus are aro ald said to have used them by carefully roasting them to a bright golden yellow at the present da ini irn iri most part parts of africa and especially in lit russia they are either cither salted or smoked mo ked abd like red herning herring Chau chabier Ch anler anier leri lerl in his account of the empire of morocco eion ebon london av says that thus cured they are into the market I 1 in prodigious quantities but that they have rim gim fim an oily olly and rancid taste which habit only can pan render agreeable tha the Moor moors suse use them to the pre present sent day dayi in the manner de described a by jackson in his bis travels in morocco 0 viz I 1 by first baill boiling ng and then frying them but bat the jews in that country more provident than the moons moors salt sait them tem for using with the dish called dafna which forms the dinner of ahejew the jewish population the dishis dish diah is made mado by placing meat nish fish egg toma torna toes edile in a fact almost anything edlie edible ie 1 in in a jar which is ii placed in he the ovea oven e on friday night and taken out hot on the sabbath so that ther the people get a hot meal without the sin of lighting a fire on that day in the abbe goa ardys c description fon de do maroc 1 3 paris 1860 he be tells telis us that they are placed in lp bags salted 3 and either baked or boiled they are then dried on the terraced roofs of the houses enned fried in oil they aro are badler the hilt lilt DAr dai damaras dauparas naras paras collect locusts by lighting fresn the rath path pf af the devouring sw swarms arins jn rp asting th the wings eNyIngs and ano legs legre crisp F asp I 1 up and are separated the bodies aret arel ben eaten fresti or dried in lil hot ashes and put away for future use our digger indians 3 roast them and grind or pound them to A kind kind kird of flouri flour which they mix mb with pounded acorns acorn or with of erries berries make into pak gak gakes es and ano dry in the sun aun for future use i irhe the s species employed by the ancients were ere ero doubtless the same as those employed at the present day viz 0 already mention i edy edi ed and anil to a less jess degree the smaller finalle r motley we have no records of any auy ex extended use of our owr own boeh boch y mountain I 1 sp specie ecles eoles nsf unies unless which is not imp improbable ro bable babie the tho sp species ecles eeles employed by uhe the indians on the pacific mass mabs hopu hork prove to be the same or a geographical raca bacq of the same whenever the occasion oce i as vion ilon presented I 1 partook of locusts prepared in different ways way andy and ong one day ate of or no other kind of bf food must have consumed in ju on one a form and arid another the tho substance of several thousand half grown locus locusts ts Cohla commencing enci enel na the experiments some misgivings 1 ngsi and nd fully J expecting to have to overcome 0 disagreeable flavor I 1 was soon most agreeably surprised to find that the insects were quite pala paia palatable tatje in whatever way prepared the flavor of the raw locust is most strong and disagreeable but that of the cooked insects is agreeable and sufficiently mild to be easily neutralized li by any anything th ined with which they may be in mixed ie and to admit ot of easy disguise according to taste or fancy but the great point I would make in their favor is that th they ey need no elaborate preparation or seasoning they require no disguise and herein lies their va value lue in exceptional emergencies for when people are driven to the point of starvation by these ravenous pests it follows that all other food is either very scarce scarce searce or unattainable A broth made by boiling the unfledged cato calo Calop pheni teni for two hours in the proper quantity of water and sea sed seasoned with nothing in the world but pepper and und salt is quite palatable and can scarcely be distinguished from bee beef f broth though it has a slight flavor peculiar to it and not easily d described se the addition of a little butter improves Improve alit allt it and the flavor can of co course urselie lae las modified with mint 1 sage and other spices ad fried or roasted in bothin nothing g but thel the irown rown dilwith oil oll with the addition of a little salt and they are by no means unpleasant eating and have quite adulte a nutty flavor in fact it is a avdi flavor like most peculiar and not unpleasant flijerrs fl avers ayers that one can soon soom learn to get fondon fond of prepared in this manner ground and co compressed M they would doubtless keep for a I 1 long iong q n time yel Y di their thein I 1 air consumption sump og a jarg e q qa ldes ules nies ides in this form would not I 1 t ink I 1 n k prove As as wholesome wholes eme e as when made maje into soup or broth f for or I 1 fo found U nd the chitin ous covering and the corneous parts especially the spines on the tibia dry and chippy and somewhat irritating to the throat 1 this object tion would not apply with the same force to the mature individuals 3 especially of larger species where the heads legs aud and wing wings are carefully separated before cooking and in fact some of the mature insects prepared in this way then boiled aud and afterwards stewed stewed with a few vegetables and a lit little tle tie butter pepper salt and vinegar egar made an ex cellena fricassee lest it be presumed that these opinions result from an unnatural palate or from mere individual taste let me add that I 1 took pains to get the fie opinions of many other person indeed I 1 shall not soon forget the experience of my first culinary beffart efrost in this I 1 ine line so fi fraught aught with fear and so forcibly illustrating the power of example in overcoming prejudice this attempt was made at an hotel at first finst it was wa Q impossible to get any assistance from the followers of the ars coqui natia naria they could not more flatly have refused to touch taste or handle had it been a question of cooking vipers nor love lova nor money could induce them to do elt olt either elther h er and aud in this respect the folks of the kitchen were all alike without distinction of color there was no ho other resource reco than to turn cook myself and operations once commenced the interest and aid of or a brother naturalist and two intelligent I 1 ladies ladles were soon enlisted it was most amusing to note how as tho the rather savory and pleasant odor odon went up from the he cooking dishes the expression of horror and dis disgust gIlst gradually vanished fr from om the faces of the curious eurious eily cily lous ious lo on and how at last the bf bead head ad cook a 8 stout tou t an and d j jolly 01 ly n egress took part I 1 in n the operations how when the different dishes were neatly served upon uppa the table and were freely par taken of with evident relish and many mady expressions of surprise and satis batis satisfaction action by the ladies and gentlemen interested this same cook was actually induced to try them and soon grew grow eloquent in their favor er how finally a prominent banker as alo also aio one of the editors of the tho town joined in the meal the soup soon vanished and banished silly prejudice then cakes with batter enough to hold the locusts together disappeared and bounced good then baked locusts with or without condiments and when the meal was completed with dessert desser tor of baked locust sand and honey a la john the baptist the 0 opinion wab was unanimous that that asistin distinguished prophet no longer deserved ou our sympathy pathy and that he had bad net not fared badly adly on his diet in the wilderness der ness prot prof H yel IEL straight of the W warrensburg ar rens burg mo normal School who made some experiments fur me in this line wrote we boiled them rather slowly for three or four hours seasoned the thel fluid with a little butter shit eilt E ait alt hit and pe pepper liper and it made an excellent soup actually would like to have it even in prosperous times mrs johonnot who is sick and prof johonnot pronounced it ex excellent cellena cel cei lent il it bad long been a desire with me to test the value of this species the rocky mountain locusts as food and I 1 did not lose the opportunity tuilio ty to gratify that desire which the recent locust invasion IMO into some of the thle mississippi valley states offered I 1 knew know well enough that the attempt would provoke to ridicule and mirth or even disgust the vast majority of our accustomed to anything any thing oft of the sort bort orta and associating with the word insect or bug everything horrid and repulsive yet I 1 was governed by weightier reasons than mere cUrlo curio curiosity sIty for many a family in kansas and nebraska was last yea year r brought to the brink of the grave basheer by sheer lack of food while ahil e the stlouis L ou I 1 3 papers re reported ported cases of actual death from starvation in some sections of missouri where the tho insects abounded indea and ate up every green thing the past spring I 1 se sent n t a bushel cf the scalded insects i to mr enoi bonnet oneff one of the tho oldest and besl best known caterer of bt st louis master bluster of the mysteries of the cuisine he het made a soup which was really and was so pronounced by dozens of prominent st Lous louisiana laria who 1 ho tried it shaw in his travels an in barbary oxford england 1728 in which I 1 two pages are devoted t tc a description of the ravage of locusts mentions thal that they uro ure sprinkled with salt and filed when they taste like crawfish and mr afir bonnet declared blared that this locust boup soup reminded him of rid nid abbt rib hini thing BO so much as craw crawfish fish bisque which is isso so highly esteemed by connoisseurs lie he also declared dei del that he would have I 1 ak on his bill of fare every day if hr ie could get the insects his method of preparation was to boil bull oil on a brik brlik fire having previous previously fy seasoned them with galt gait pepper and grated nutmeg the whole being be ing occasionally stirred d when cooked they are pounded in a mortar with bread fried brown or a puree of rice rico tiey they are arp then replaced in the met saucepan a and nd thickened to a brathby broth by placing an on a warm part of the stove but not allowed to boll for eor use the broth is passed through a strainer and a few added lidded I 1 have had a small smail smallpox box of friedges fried mes with me for foi th thelast the past two months month aud and they have been tasted by numerous persons including the men mer members abers odthe of the london entomological society and 0 of f thi the society f de le france without exception they ha haye have be been en pronounced far better that than than wak was expected und and ind those fried in their own oil with a little salt are yet good and aud fresh others fried fraed in butter butted have become slightly rancid ranelda francida ran cida elda n fadle haun of bf I 1 tiie tile butu butt butter mr C home horne F Z S writing rit to science gossip about sw ing ins of locusts which visited parts parth of lild bild india a in says jeays in the evening I 1 had asked two tvr gentlemen tu to dinner and gave them a curry and croquet t of locusts they passed for babul shrimps scrimps sh rimps which in flavor they much resembled ambled bled bied but the cook having |