Cicadas Infest Restaurant Menus: Would You Try These Dishes?

ACROSS AMERICA — The periodical cicadas aren’t for everyone, and cicada cuisine is appealing to many fewer still.

Their loss, foodies say of people who can’t overcome the “ew factor” and give a fair try to a tasty treat that only comes around every 13 or 17 years. Periodical cicadas are prepared in all manner of ways. They can be fried up like “the shrimp of the land”or infused in Malört, an already maligned Chicago-centric concoction.

2024 is a big year for cicada cuisine with the dual emergence of two broods. Experts said that between the two emergences, the 13-year Brood XIX cicadas and the 17-year Brood XIII cicadas, this year’s crop could yield trillions of bugs.

Although some cicada creations are whimsical, like the Malort drink made by Noon Whistle Brewery in Lombard, Illinois, some chefs are seizing the opportunity to introduce guests to an alternative source of protein that will still be available long after the cicadas are gone, and which may well be part of the solution to food and nutritional insecurity.

Chef Joseph Yoon, who founded Brooklyn Bugs, a group of edible insect ambassadors, told NPR his menu included familiar flavor profiles in dishes such as tempura-fried cicadas and cicada kimchi.

“If you think about it, they’ve been living underground, slowly feasting on plant and tree xylem for 13 or 17 years,” he said. “And so they have this really beautiful vegetal quality and a nutty quality as well. And so when you deep-fry them, they’re just so delicious and so special.”

Mike Raupp, an entomology professor at the University of Maryland, says eating a cicada is actually more palatable than eating an oyster or clam.

“It lives on the bottom of the bay and filters, you know what (feces),” Raupp told Lancaster Online during an earlier cicada emergence. “You'd eat this thing, but would not eat this delectable insect that's been sucking on plant fat for 17 years? I think it's weird.”

• Related: Cicada-Infused Malört? ‘We Were Just Winging It,’ Brewery Says

Cicada-Infested Menus

Menus at restaurants across the country were already are crawling with insects such as crickets, grasshoppers and ants before the cicadas started tunneling out of the ground. One of them is the Michelin Star restaurant Kie-Gol-Lanee, a family-owned Chicago restaurant that incorporates Chapulines, or crispy grasshoppers, in its Oaxacan cuisine.

Another, Bug Appétit, the Audubon Insectarium’s restaurant in New Orleans, offered its guests a seasonal treat of cicada salad and roasted cicadas along with the usual insect-infested menu offerings.

At Bar Sótano, a Mexican cocktail bar in Chicago, chef de cuisine Jackie Hernandez told Book Club Chicago the restaurant would “totally” put cicadas on the menu if they could find a supplier who “could guarantee the utmost respect to the animal itself and to the cleanliness we have in the restaurant.”

“We’re kind of dipping our toes into that world,” Hernandez said, adding that when customers are told they’ve just eaten insects, “they’re like, ‘Wow, I couldn’t even believe it.’

“That is what’s going to change the minds of everyone, especially knowing that insects have so much protein,” Hernandez continued. “Unfortunately, we’re not always going to have the main sources of protein — chicken, poultry, cows. So what is that next source that we’re looking for?”

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Insects And The Future Of Food

That’s a question researchers are pondering, with some suggesting that people disgusted by the idea of eating cicadas and other edible insects have precious little time to get over it. Some futurists suggest that we’ll all be eating insects and spiders in about 50 years as population growth and climate change make traditional foods more scarce.

Researchers in a study published in the journal Nature in January identified 2,205 edible insect species consumed in 128 countries, concluding these bugs “are a key component of the global food system, and could significantly address nutritional insecurities.”

Estimates put the number of people worldwide who eat insects at around 2 billion, although one study said “that must be an overestimation.”

Humans since the beginning of their time eaten bugs. Hunter-gatherers foraged for insects to provide protein-packed meals for their families, and examples of insect-eating are found in the tomes of the Christian, Jewish and Islamic faiths. Then, about 6,000 years ago, industrial agriculture shepherded a new era in which livestock emerged as a more efficient source of protein.

Scientists say insect farming leaves a lighter environmental footprint than conventional livestock production, which is associated with greenhouse gas emissions.

Many cultures around the world regularly eat insects, Gaye Williams, an entomologist with the Maryland Department of Agriculture, said in a 2004 interview with the Baltimore Sun.

“Americans are the only ones around who are grossed out by eating insects,” Williams told The Sun. “For most people around the world, insects are a major food source or delicacy.”

Convincing people to give up their steak and pork chops for a protein source that revolts them isn’t an easy climb, though.

Yoon, the Brooklyn Bugs founder who spoke with NPR, said most people wouldn’t know they were eating insects if the ingredients weren’t disclosed.

“They don't know what an insect tastes like,” he said. “And so they’re expecting to be somehow disgusted. And that realization — it’s like a light bulb moment where they’re like, ‘Oh, my gosh. This tastes like food and it tastes delicious.’ ”

DIY Cicada Cuisine

With cicadas copious now in some parts of the country, why not give cicada cuisine a whirl in your own kitchen?

The best time to harvest cicadas is just after they emerge when they are molting — that is, shedding their skin. Evening or early morning hours are best, because that’s when cicadas are their softest. Newly emerged cicadas are green, and will harden after a few hours. They’re still edible after hardening, but crunchy.

“Cicada-Licious: Cooking and Enjoying Periodical Cicada,” a cookbook created by former University of Maryland student Jenna Jadin and her fellow “Cicadamaniacs,” is filled with creative recipes. No matter how you cook them, an important first step is to blanch the cicadas in boiling water to remove any soil bacteria and also make them easier to work with. Some recipes call for dry roasting the cicadas for about 8 minutes in a medium oven.

• Related: The Dual Emergence Of Two Periodical Cicada Broods Is Cool Science

If you don’t want to go to the trouble of cooking something fancy, a quick and easy way to prepare cicadas as a main dish is to sauté blanched cicadas in butter and garlic, top with a couple of tablespoons of finely chopped basil and serve over pasta. Cooking time is about five minutes, until the cicadas begin to look crispy and the basil is wilted.

With a little more effort, you can put together a cicada stir-fry. You will need:

1 minced onion
2 tablespoons chopped fresh cilantro
1 tablespoon minced fresh gingeroot
¾ cup sliced carrots
¾ cup chopped cauliflower and/or broccoli
¾ cup bean sprouts
¾ cup snow peas
1 can water chestnuts
40 freshly captured cicadas, blanched for 1 minute

In a wok or other suitable pan, heat a couple tablespoons of vegetable oil. Add ingredients in the order listed above when those in the most recent addition are partially cooked.

Serve the stir-fry over rice and season to taste with soy sauce. The recipe serves about 4 people.

Bakers aren’t left out. Jadin gives thanks to her mother for the basic recipe she altered as Southern Cicada Tartlets.

Crust, mix well and chill overnight:
2 cups sifted flour
2–3 ounces softened cream cheese
2 sticks butter

Filling:
3 eggs well beaten
2 cups brown sugar
2 tablespoons melted butter
2 teaspoons vanilla
1/2 cup dry roasted cicadas, chopped

In ungreased tart tins, shape 1 teaspoon of the crust dough into the shape of a pie crust, fill halfway with filling and bake at 350 degrees F. for 25–30 minutes. Immediately after removing from the oven, place a single dry-roasted cicada in the center of each tart.

If all this makes you want a drink, try Jadin’s cicada craft cocktail, called Red Eyes, shared with National Geographic in 2013 ahead of the emergence of Brood II of the 17-year cicadas. You will need:

2 shots vodka
½ shot Campari
½ shot extra-dry vermouth
1 shot fresh orange juice

Shake the ingredients in a shaker with ice and strain into a chilled glass. Garnish with a couple of candied cicadas on a stick.

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