Woman Uses Insects To Flavor Her Food And Claims Crickets Taste Like “Fried Chicken”

People around the world eat a variety of diets, but one thing many people in the Western world can agree on is that insects aren’t the most appetizing. In fact, many people wouldn’t even consider them food, but if you ask Joanne Techow, they’re really missing out.

The 30-year-old Johannesburg, South Africa native eats a diet rich in insects, including mealworms, ants, crickets, bamboo worms, and more.

According to the Metro, Technow claims, “Mealworms taste like chicken, ants are salty, crickets taste like nuts if they’re roasted – but if you fry them they taste like fried chicken and smell like popcorn. Bamboo worms taste salty but they are absolutely delicious. Oh my word, I could eat those like chips.”

Since getting her first taste of insects back in 2017, Techow has become obsessed with eating them. As the Metro reported, Techow’s dad returned home from Asia with some cricket powder and Techow fell in love with both the flavor and ingenuity of the product.

According to News 24, Techow claims that insects are not only a tasty, protein-packed snack, but they’re also good for the environment compared to other animal-based protein sources.

The American Heart Association backs up her stance, noting that consuming insects could go as far as to help address the pressing issues of food security. The AHA wrote: “One of the many ways to address food and feed security is through insect farming. Insects are everywhere and they reproduce quickly, and they have high growth and feed conversion rates and a low environmental footprint over their entire life cycle.”

Unlike cattle and poultry, insects can be farmed in small spaces. Techow, for example, started farming her own crickets at home in her garage and creates various products from them, including powders, cookies, brownies, and more!

While some people might be afraid of the insect taste, a 2020 study in the Journal of Insect Science revealed that participants involved in a blind taste test actually preferred cricket flour brownies over wheat flour brownies, though they could not consistently differentiate between the two brownie types.

As they say, don’t knock it ’til you try it. Bon appétit.