Hah I remember as a 4 year old I discovered a tree crawling with ants, back where I was growing up in the middle of russia. I distinctly remember trying to eat them, as any self respecting 4 year old would, and discovered they were surprisingly tasty - sour-y, salty kinda taste.
Now this discovery was not totally random, I had heard “stories” that you can poke a branch into an anthill the ants attack it to defend their hive and after a while if you get the stick out and lick it, it would taste sour. Maybe someone was just messing with me as a kid.
Anyway I ran off to my parents to show them my new discovery and was immediately scolded and instructed not to do it again.
But it still stuck with me - ants in that part of the world have flavor, and it’s actually tasty.
I discovered the taste a bit later, while drinking some cola where an ant had fallen in and accidentally biting the ant - tasted very sour, despite the sugary drink...
A few select high end restaurants use ants for their sour taste. Why specifically ants? No clue. I do know that such restaurants like to switch it up and be a bit unconventional.
There is a set of techniques refined and published by noma that have been really influential in high end cooking the last decade. They use koji (the catalyst for miso and soy sauce, among other things) to break down protein and/or starch into sources of deep umami or complex sweetness.
The liquid forms of this are being called garum, though it's not a continuity of the ancient food by that name. The original book published a grasshopper garum, but recently I have seen much better ones based on bee brood, and a chicatana ant garum is one of the best things I've ever tasted. They are very complex and unique flavors, nothing is quite like them.
Yeah I think it's a good name for it. In the past when this has come up I've seen people be disappointed or hostile to it simply because there isn't an unbroken continuous european food tradition between roman garum and this. Which it may sort of imply, I guess. But I think it's a fun repurposing of a good word that was going unused.
I ate some in Oaxaca. Mine were fine, but nearly lost it from the intense flavor. Still don’t know if hers were actually different or just our tongues. Strangest thing.
The grasshoppers were fairly good, though only in moderation.
Every time I get ants around my desk I notice their strong, unpleasant smell (probably formic acid, but maybe some alkanes?). If I even brush a surface they've walked across, I can smell it. It's quite unpleasant and I can't imagine wanting to use it in cooking.
I almost want to leave peoples' minds closed about this kind of thing to avoid an increase in demand. I don't want my Sal de Gusano doubling in price either.
Me too, but eventually you just get so excited about eating the bugs that you can't help but to run around enthusiastically telling everybody you know about how great it is. I can't help raving about them even though I'm like you and tried my best not to blab. It's the secret that we're not supposed to let out!
It is published World Economic Forum propaganda to move the global population away from eating meat, to eating bugs, for 'sustainability' reasons. Similar to 'you will own nothing, and be happy'. Kinda interesting to see who dismisses it as a conspiracy theory when it's published on the WEF website:
You seem to believe that the 'sustainability' argument is a bogus smokescreen. Why do you think the WEF is actually publishing this article? Please explain the conspiracy I'm missing.
I do think sustainability (and the global warming concern in general) is a bogus smokescreen. I am of the opinion it is propaganda put forth by America's (and "The West's") economic adversaries to weaken our position on the global stage and make us a less capable, less successful/prosperous, nation. Articles like the original one starting this conversation thread strike me less as an organic "Hey, look how cool/new/tasty this is!" and more as a targeted "lets move the population's Overton window over to 'this is acceptable, please work past your natural revulsion to this and eat our bugs'".
As far as I understand it the people trying to push insect protein as a meat substitute are US entrepreneurs, the same kind of people trying to sell fake meat burgers with beetroot heme and the like. I think you got your sights on the wrong target. The people who are trying to sell you trendy liberal causes to take your money and the people who are worried about the environment are completely different groups of people with entirely disjoint priorities.
If anything, you'd expect 'globalists' would be, at least passively, on the anti-ant side; globalisation has tended to diminish regional cultural practices.
(As far as I can see, though, most people who use the term 'globalists' (vs globalisation) are actually using it to mean essentially a reheated version of Nazi conspiracy theories, so, well, who knows.)
It's a far right conspiracy theory about jews, of course. It always gets mentioned in this context because the other part of it is a fantasy about there being a plot to enslave people and force them to eat bugs.
They are researching the use of certain ants as flavor enhancers. Mexicans know a thing or two about making food delicious, and Chicatana ants are used in Oaxacan cuisine to add complexity to sauces. Rest assured, this is entirely based on merit of the price-to-flavor ratio and not a conspiracy to replace your steak.
We have a lot of green ants around our house (otherwise known as a weaver ant, mentioned in the article). They're a little aggressive but fascinating creatures all round and great for a nibble, tho I tend to only eat the bum ... tart but satisfying.
My toddler was amazed when I introduced him to edible bugs (grasshoppers in our case, but we have a jar of ants around as well).
His eyes lit up, it was like a toddler dream come true! Bugs he could eat!
Related, recently I accidentally ordered some blood soup at a restaurant[1], and when he asked what it was I was about to say "blood, icky" but I remembered to not let my cultural biases predetermine what he ate, so I let him try some instead.
tl;dr Toddlers love eating ants.
[1] The menu listed it as shrimp cake soup, blood was a major ingredient that was not mentioned. Given every soup above it did list blood cubes, I should have asked.
When I was a kid, I once diluted some dark raspberry syrup in a glass of water. After mixing I discovered there were tons of ants in there. I drank it anyway and the ants were really sour like lemon pulp when you bit on them. I think them steeping in the syrup helped. It was really tasty!
We're already talking about how great it's going to be to eat the bugs? That wasn't supposed to happen for years. Which one of you morons leaked the script?
Now this discovery was not totally random, I had heard “stories” that you can poke a branch into an anthill the ants attack it to defend their hive and after a while if you get the stick out and lick it, it would taste sour. Maybe someone was just messing with me as a kid.
Anyway I ran off to my parents to show them my new discovery and was immediately scolded and instructed not to do it again.
But it still stuck with me - ants in that part of the world have flavor, and it’s actually tasty.