May 31, 2014

"Invasive species: envisioning the future of food in America."

A photo series.

Via NPR, which says: "Scientists have said that one way to deal with these creatures is to eat them up. The problem is, they don't seem very appetizing. While some of these critters might be perfectly edible, they can't really compete with hamburgers or cupcakes."

Just make them into hamburgers... and cupcakes.

Frankly, I'm not buying "lemon curd tart in chocolate and earthworm crust, with a crispy earthworm topping."

The "envisioning" really should come in the form of putting things out of our vision, which is what hamburgers are already doing. Grind it up. Make it disappear. You don't think about the insects (and excrement!) that have taken their place inside your food.

30 comments:

Illuninati said...

Phil Robertson's wife of Duck Dynasty could probably help out here. Not only does she love squirrel brains but she has also published a cookbook with her favorite recipes.

Fernandinande said...

Text from wikipedia.

1st pic: Gray squirrel or grey squirrel may refer to several species of squirrel indigenous to North America:

2nd pic: Littorinimorpha, commonly known as periwinkles and found worldwide.

3rd pic: Lionfish

Finally an "invasive" species.

Sorun said...

Regardless of how it tastes, the Soylent people found out that you won't win food critics over unless it looks goods and is somehow "fun."

The Crack Emcee said...

I was thinking, yesterday, of how nice it would be to eat what I wanted - as opposed to what I could afford. I eat shit now.

Soylent? Insects?

Old wine, new bottles,...

dbp said...

Other than the worms and jellyfish, all the other critters look like they could be made into really nice dishes. The lion fish, wild boar and canada goose look pretty nice actually.

Wince said...

How about expanding the circumference of the 'circle' so invasive species aren't eaten directly.

Grind invasive species into organic fertilizer.

Some Seppo said...

Al Gore served Patagonian toothfish at his daughter's wedding. No reason not to change the earthworm's name to protect the gag reflex.

MadisonMan said...

Sausage made with carp. Wonder what it would taste like.

I (heart) sausage.

rhhardin said...

Eating something does the opposite.

If you want to preserve something, eat it. People will raise flocks of it to sell it to you.

I'd say just export the stuff to the Chinese.

They have very different ideas about edibility.

traditionalguy said...

I take it this elite writer wants us to imagine how much fun it is going to be roughing it in a dark and violent famine land out upon us by Obama's EPA Agency that is now ordering the tripling of energy and food costs, supposedly to save the world from non-existent CARBON POISON.

The brain dead who still believe in the UN's tour du force Global Warming fake science hoax deserve to eat insects while they slowly starve to death.

Carbon dioxide is a molecular compounded gas that is super beneficial to life on earth, and it is no more Carbon than the super beneficial compound NaCl (salt) is Chlorine.

rhhardin said...

Somebody long ago suggested the solution to the disposal of nuclear waste was put it in hamburger.

There are no standards for nuclear waste levels in hamburger.

lemondog said...

Note to MO: protein for school lunches.

Will said...

Or use it for pet food...

Michelle Dulak Thomson said...

Earthworms are the reverse of an "invasive species." They're valuable soil-tillers and cause no harm to anyone or anything.

Squirrels aren't invasive either. Pesky I'll grant you, but they were here a long time before we were.

Now, some of the others -- nutria, lionfish, wild boar -- are legit.

Sunslut7 said...

ANN,

Think: LION FISH!

Travel to the Caribbean Islands.

See the LION FISH.

Catch the LION FISH.

Grill the LION FISH.

Eat the LION FISH.

Mission Accomplished.

Kudos, thanks and props to Glenn Harlan Reynolds for this timely idea.

khesanh0802 said...

Are any of these "invasive species"? Well, Wikipedia says the Nutria is, so that must be. Everything else is a naturally occurring species.
Have the authors never heard of Brunswick Stew, roast goose? I am surprised these guys didn't include white tail deer and for those in New Jersey the Black Bear. Angelenos would include coyote, I think.

A culinary commitment to invasive species should certainly include recipes featuring Asian Carp, Fire Ants, Burmese Python, Killer bees, Kudzu, Zebra Mussels, and the Emerald Ash Borer.

Phoney baloney!

Richard Dolan said...

Nice photos. His two narratives on the Catskills and Montauk were even better.

As for eating the invasive species, no one really wants to know that they're eating bugs or rodents, so by all means grind them up, and don't be stingy with the sauces.

Freeman Hunt said...

If you had "mealworm flour" like almond flour, people would buy it if it had good nutritional stats. Better, just make something like that out of gross-looking animals and call it "paleo flour" or "high protein meal" or some other euphemistic name.

Deirdre Mundy said...

How is eating Wild Boar edgy and cool? Part of the reason they exist is b/c people WANTED to hunt and eat them!

chuck said...

Slow roasted NPR commentators with pepper sauce. Yum!

Mike said...

Do squirrels and earthworms really count as invasive species?

Unknown said...

Companies using these animals in pet food could get a tax break, enough to pay for the bounty-based harvest.

FleetUSA said...

Will any worms be left for, Red Robin?

sykes.1 said...

Every human being in the Americas, every crop and farm animal in the US and Canada is an invasive species.

We live in a Lysenkoist age of scientific corruption and delusion.

geokstr said...

Invasive species as food?

I'm sorry, but I couldn't bring myself to eat a Leftlingus Marxicali, even if it looked like Kirsten Dunst, Scarlett Johannson or Christina Applegate. Besides, all that silicone can clog your arteries and kill an alarming number of brain cells.

We'll just have to live with their infestations and the political infections they cause.

Paco Wové said...

"Do squirrels and earthworms really count as invasive species?"

Gray squirrels are an invasive species in the UK. Apparently they bully the shit out of the little faggy European squirrels.

Earthworms are a more complex story. They were native to N.America before the last Ice Ages, which eradicated them from much of the northern 2/3rds of the continent (hard to be an earthworm under a glacier). Given enough time and a lack of new Ice Ages, worms would have dispersed back north and re-colonized, but dastardly Europeans short-circuited the process by accidentally importing Old World worms to N.A.

Technically, the worms are invasive, but you could also argue that they are just restoring the pre-Ice Age norm.

Paco Wové said...

"mealworm flour"

I've eaten oatmeal - mealworm cookies. If I'd eaten them in the dark, I wouldn't have been able to tell them apart from oatmeal cookies.

Rusty said...

Ebbers Palomino I said...
Companies using these animals in pet food could get a tax break, enough to pay for the bounty-based harvest.


Asian carp have infeasted the lower Mississippi and Illinoise river basins. Soon to invade Lake Michigan. Put a bounty on them $1000.00 per ton. They'll be extinct in our country in 5 years.

SGT Ted said...

"Invasive species" is an anti-evolutionary notion that assumes eco-systems are fixed and unchanging. It is an artificial and moralistically based value judgment of what is "good" and what is "bad" for nature that ignores the reality of how nature actually operates.

Fritz said...

In Maryland, we have the infamous "Frankenfish", the Chinese Northern Snakehead, that as probably imported and released by Chinese because like to eat them. Surprisingly, perhaps, they do actually taste fine.

http://fritz-aviewfromthebeach.blogspot.com/2013/08/snakeheads.html