I know you know, but now there are official dates and now it is taking over my life, so I feel like there should be a blog here dedicated to it!

On May 26-28, 2016, a little more than a year from now, I will be hosting the Eating Innovation Detroit conference dedicated to exploring the culture of insects as food and feed.  Daily programming will occur on Wayne State University’s campus, and nightly events will happen across the city.  

What have I accomplished so far?

• Dates are confirmed!  Mark your calendars!
• Space on campus is reserved.  Check out our spaces here and here.
• I have an active website, Facebook page, and twitter account
• I have two grant proposals in the works to be submitted this summer that, if funded, will allow me to fund travel for international scholars from developing countries
• I have created different sponsorship levels that I will use to fundraise from university departments and other organizations
  
• I am working to secure a keynote speaker that I am pretty excited about but can't say anything yet
• Anthropology students are participating in a cricket flour back-off on April 7th of this year, which is helping me to build some relationships around the city, including Detroit FoodLab and Detroit Farm and Garden.  I am confident that we will do something cool together for 2016 as well
• I've been brainstorming a lot of program ideas including poster sessions, panel discussions, organized symposia, and maybe even pecha kucha

There is much still to do, like reserving a block of rooms at a hotel and figuring out shuttles and other transportation options, but it's coming along.  I will keep everyone updated here on the blog about how it's all going!  

Last week, I was visiting the Department of Entomology at the University of Georgia.  I was honored to have been invited to participate in their graduate seminar speaker series.  I had a blast spending a couple of days talking about bugs! 

In addition to giving my talk on entomophagy and evolution and the general discussions I had with faculty and students, I was interviewed by Nancy Miorelli of "Ask an Entomologist."  This blog and its corresponding social media presence are amazingly well-read!  I am very impressed by what Nancy and her collaborator are up to.  I was honored that they dedicated a week to "entomophagy" and included not only my interview, but also a rundown of my seminar talk.  Make sure to go check it out!

Additionally, Nancy drew this amazing picture of me pondering the role of insects in the diet over the course of human evolution.  This is my new favorite thing ever! 

So check out 

The food is definitely something I want to try! These students, hailing from Cornell University and York University, offer a solution to many of the problems associated with getting insects on the dinner table.  1) they are creating something that can be recognized as "food" in a culture where menus are full of hamburgers, tofu-burgers, black bean burgers, tempeh burgers, etc.  2) creating a product that may be easily packaged and easily prepared all over the world.  Part of the problem with cricket flour is that the products coming from it are more "meal replacers" (protein bars and the like), rather than meals themselves.


I am very excited for this project and I am so glad they are getting the opportunity to refine their idea and a chance at some good start-up funds.  I am hoping that we can make a little noise on their behalf.  


If you tweet, these are good handles and tags to use!
@tffchallenge (host of the competition)
@tffcornell2014 (C-fu team)
#bugmeat
#cfu

More than 3,400 attendees participated in Entomology 2014 in Portland, Oregon in November. The 2014 theme, “Grand Challenges Beyond Our Horizons,” was well-represented in two symposia on insects as food:

Insects as Sustainable and Innovative Sources of Food and Feed Production. Wednesday, November 19, 2014: 8:00 AM-12:00 PM Portland Ballroom 253 (Oregon Convention Center) Organizer : Marianne Shockley
Moderator: Marianne Shockley

8:00 AM Welcoming Remarks 8:05 AM 
1765 Latitude and attitude: The effects of biodiversity and evolution on entomophagy across the world
Julie Lesnik, Wayne State University 8:25 AM 
1766 Entovita
Daniel Thrasyvoulou, Entovita 8:45 AM 
1767 Setting the table for a hotter, flatter, more crowded earth: Insects on the menu?
Marianne Shockley, University of Georgia ; Sonny Ramaswamy, USDA - NIFA 9:05 AM 
1768 Cricket parantha: Creative restauranteurs incorporate insects into contemporary Indian cuisine
David Gordon, The Bug Chef ; Meeru Dhalwala, Shanik 9:25 AM Break 9:40 AM 
1769 Live insects as feed (or food): Feeding captive insectivores
Mark Finke, Mark Finke LLC 10:00 AM 
1770 An analysis of the current and emergent ento industry: Edible insects in the national marketplace
Harman Johar, World Ento 10:20 AM 
1771 Mealworms as Solomon's shamir: The table as a temple of peace in a densely populated world
Amy Wright, Austin Peay State University 10:40 AM 
1772 Small bugs, big gains: Improving food security in rural southern African communities through microlivestock farming
Valerie Stull, Mighty Mealworms ; Rachel Bergmans, Mighty Mealworms 11:00 AM 
1773 Open bug farm: Making insect farming accessible to everyone through an open source farm kit
Daniel Imrie-Situnayake, Tiny Farms 11:20 AM 
1774 Teaching with insects as food and feed: Incorporating entomophagy into sustainable agriculture education at the university and community level
Donald Sudbrink, Austin Peay State University 11:32 AM 
 Panel Discussion 11:52 AM 
 Concluding Remarks


Beyond Drinking the Worm: Linking Concept with Action to Save the World with Entomophagy. Wednesday, November 19, 2014: 1:30 PM-5:30 PM Portland Ballroom 253 (Oregon Convention Center) Organizers: James Ricci
Kim Hung
Adena Why
Moderators: James Ricci
Kim Hung
Adena Why


1:30 PM Introductory Remarks 1:35 PM 
1973 Eating bugs 101: Why, how, and the role of education in moving past mental taboos
Robert Allen, Little Herds 1:55 PM 
1974 Eat what bugs you: Entomophagy and its potential in American markets
Laura D'Asaro, Six Foods ; Rose Wang, Six Foods 2:15 PM 1974 Withdrawn 2:35 PM 
1975 Sustainable critters or delicious fritters? Consumer perceptions of edible insects in The Netherlands and Thailand
Catriona Lakemond, Wageningen University 2:55 PM 
1976 Toward maximizing efficiency of black soldier fly production for food and feed
John Schneider, Mississippi State University 3:15 PM 
1977 Insects as food: An overview of U.S. regulatory requirements
Ricardo Carvajal, Hyman, Phelps & McNamara, P.C. 3:35 PM 1978 Withdrawn 3:35 PM 
1978 Moving beyond the Bizarre Foods concept and tapping the 'foodie' culture to promote entomophagy
Adena Why, University of California 3:55 PM 
1979 Ento: The art of eating insects
Aran Dasan, Ento 3:55 PM 
1980 What are we actually eating when we consume witchetty grubs? 
Alan Yen, Department of Environment and Primary Industries ; Conrad Bilney, La Trobe University ; Susan Lawler, La Trobe University 3:55 PM 
1981 Entomophagy at The New York Entomological Society 100th Anniversary Celebration, May 20, 1992, The Explorer’s Club, Manhattan, New York
Louis N. Sorkin, American Museum of Natural History 3:55 PM 
1982 A market analysis of entomophagy in the United States
Stephen Bayes, University of California ; Virginia Emery, University of California 3:55 PM Break and Poster Viewing 4:10 PM 1983 Palm weevils: easy to farm and good to eat!
Mark S. Hoddle, University of California 4:30 PM 
1984 Importance of entomophagy in Madagascar
Maminirina Randrianandrasana, University of Illinois ; May R. Berenbaum, University of Illinois 4:50 PM 
1985 Act locally, reach globally: Marketing and promoting entomophagy begins at home
Jerome F. Grant, University of Tennessee ; Renee Follum, University of Tennessee 5:10 PM 
1986 Potential of insects as food and feed in assuring food security
Arnold van Huis, Wageningen University 5:30 PM 
1987 What entomophagy really means, and why it's so challenging
David Gracer, Community College of Rhode Island 5:50 PM 
 Concluding Remarks





The organizers did a great job at representing the range of topics and issues currently being discussed regarding entomophagy.  It was a great day.

Edit:   This past weekend I was part of the scientific programming at ConFusion, a regional science fiction convention.  The program director named my talk "Gotta eat 'em all!" allowing me to use my little grasshopper clipart in this fun way:

At the Eating Innovation conference last month in Montreal, I presented my reconstructions of insects in the hominid diet across all of the hallmark stages of our evolution.  For instance, it is likely that Homo erectus was foraging for resources in their environment similar to how we see foragers do so today. Therefore, insects were probably utilized in their diets the same as well.  I have uploaded a pdf of my entire presentation below. 

Click below to download the pdf of the entire presentation.

Big things are already in the works for me in my new city!

Last week I attended the Eating Innovation Conference on Edible Insects in Montreal.  It was the first time I gave a talk to a group of people who were already entirely on board with insects as food!  MY Q&A portion did not include "have you eaten insects?" or "what do they taste like?" It was amazing!

I have been wanting to get involved with this community for some time now.  There are people very active on social media, so I have become acquainted with them in that way, but I was finally able to shake some hands, put faces to names, and have dynamic discussions with them for the first time last week.  One of the most notable things was the diverse crowd that was present.  In one of the sessions we listed off the disciplines that were being represented at the conference.  We came up with at least sixteen.  Specialties ranged from anthropology, entomology, and agriculture to marketing, advertising, and business start-ups to name a few. 

It was wonderful spending three days surrounded by people with such passion for making the world a better place.  Such innovators and forward-thinkers.  And then it dawned on me that those words are also often used to describe the people that are part of the revitalization of Detroit.  Urban gardens, permaculture, and resource sharing are all burgeoning in the city.  Entrepreneurs are making their homes here as well and creating wonderful food and drink culture in the area.  I think the D is ready for a big bug banquet of some sort, so I thought, why not bring the next edible insects conference to Detroit?! 

Dates will not be set for some time, but you can see that I am already brainstorming and making connections. 
In addition to the conference proceedings, we'll have public talks and tastings where everyone is welcome. I absolutely cannot wait.  If you are interested in more info or in helping out in some way, feel free to contact me here.

It has been awhile since I posted, but not for a lack of things to say!

I have a new position in the Department of Anthropology at Wayne State University in Detroit, Michigan!  I could not be more excited about the prospects that this city, university, and department have to offer!  I have spent my summer quietly moving and settling in, but I am now primed and ready for big things.

In the department, I have amazing colleagues.  I am especially excited to be a part of a program with strength in business anthropology.  I have so many thoughts on how an insects-as-food movement requires cultural knowledge in order to make it work as a commodity, and I have the exact people around me to help me articulate those ideas. 

The city of Detroit is in the midst of an amazing revival.  The revitalization happening particularly in the Midtown neighborhood makes me think they might be primed to embrace insects as food....  I am looking forward to talking more with Little Herds, an Austin-based nonprofit dedicated to making a marketplace for bug-eaters, about ideas on how to bring entomophagy to the people of Detroit.

Wayne State University is the right place to support me in these research and public outreach efforts.  As a large, public, urban, research institution, WSU is committed to excellence in both academia and the community. I know I am in the right place.

Exciting things, a couple years in the making, are finally afoot! 

One, I have an article now available online at the Journal of Human Evolution*.  It will be formally published as a part of a special issue dedicated to "The Other Faunivory," an endeavor of many biological anthropologists coming together to look at human evolution's lesser credited insect food sources.  I will be posting more on this when that issue is launched.  This special issue is based on a session held at the 2012 annual meetings of the American Association of Physical Anthropologists in Portland, OR.  At that session I had the honor of meeting a special guest, Daniella Martin, which brings me to number two..

Two, Daniella Martin's book Edible: An Adventure into the World of Eating Insects and the Last Great Hope to Save the Planet is now available on Amazon! 

An excerpt of the book related to human evolution is available here.  Daniella does a great job summarizing some of the big points of the evolution of the human diet (and its inclusion of insects) for a broad, popular audience.  The book I am currently writing takes the ideas presented here and details them out in academic form.

For instance, Daniella quotes the exact line in Backwell and d'Errico's 2001 PNAS article that inspired my work:
"Termites are a valuable source of protein, fat, and essential amino acids, in the diets of both primates and modern humans. While rump steak yields 322 calories per 100 grams, and cod fish 74, termites provide 560 calories per 100 grams."

Those numbers came from sources published in 1971.  We have covered a lot of ground since then and I made it my job to do two things: 1) update the numbers with more recently published data, and 2) make it clear that we should take caution when broadly generalizing the nutritional contributions of "termites," a clade that contains over 280 genera and 2700 species.

My now-available article, "Termites in the hominin diet: A meta-analysis of termite genera, species and castes as a dietary supplement for South African robust australopithecines," begins to address these issues.

Here is the abstract*:

I create a model of how termites fit into the diet of our ancestors.  As of now, this is the best account of insects in the real "paleo diet."  They were valuable back then, they are still valuable for many people today, and it would be smart of the Western World to start utilizing insects more in our own diets.

*If you are interested in the full version of this article but it is behind a pay wall, please contact me here and I will gladly send you a pdf.

This August marks the first time that an international conference on entomophagy is being held in North America. 

The Eating Innovation Conference is going to be an amazing event, but they YOU! 

There is a call for papers and also a call for artists to display film, photos, or any media in the Entomophagy Discovery Room.

The Eating Innovation Conference is interested in uniting as many unique voices as possible on this topic.  They are not looking just for academics but also people in farming, cooking, food products, artists, marketers, etc. 

If you or someone you know has ever thought about insects as food and how we can make it more widely available in the future, consider contributing or just attending.  We need you!  If you have questions, you can use this link to send queries to the organizers of the Eating Innovation Conference.

I am very much looking forward in participating and hope to see you there!

Although I may be the first person to make a career out of discussing the role of insects in the diets of our hominid ancestors, I am by far not the first person to think of it.  One of the pioneers is Alan Mann, Professor of Anthropology at Princeton University. 

While I was in graduate school, I would see Alan at the annual meetings of the American Association of Physical Anthropologists and he was always happy to talk with me about how insects likely made an important dietary contribution to early hominids.  His big thing was always that I should dig for termite eggs.. I never dug for eggs, but the thought has never left my mind!  I can definitely say that newly hatched insects, or the larvae, offer higher amounts of fat than adult forms, so I am guessing eggs would be similar, although I have never seen any data on it.  Trust me, it is in my long-term goals to figure this out!

This April, I get to present some of my findings in a session honoring Alan's work.  Here's my abstract:

The full list of papers for the session can be found here.  I think what strikes me most about the session is the broad range of topics to which he has, in some way, contributed to our understanding.  The main thing all of this research has in common though is "the continuation of a perspective that places variation at the center of how our discipline conceptualizes human evolution."  Understanding variation is truly the primary goal of all biological studies.  For me it is in the dietary contributions of different insect species and castes, but for other biological anthropologists in this group it is in areas such as skeletal development, human/landscape interactions or survivorship across life stages, to highlight just a few.

I am looking forward to being in Calgary April 9th-12th.  I hope to see you there!  And I hope to see you at this amazing poster session!

The insects-as-food movement is a tricky one.  On one hand, there are many people who can be rallied to support sustainable food resources, but on the other, there is an immense disgust factor related to the idea of eating insects.  How do we get around this?  I think the answer lies in processed food.  We have long removed ourselves from what we eat.  We don't eat "cow" or "pig," we eat "beef" and "pork" from tidy little packages from the supermarket.  Many people get their daily vegetables in the form of Odwalla juice or something else similar instead of eating them in their natural form.  Why then would we expect people to open a can of insects - legs, antennae and all - and start chowing down?  I think the best way to get people to start eating insects is not to eat the insects, but eat the benefits of insects.  Cricket flour is opening that door.

Chapul is a small company with a wonderful mission who makes protein bars out of cricket flour. I had the chance to share these bars with a couple of friends and colleagues.  Here is a brief transcript of two of my friends trying the peanut butter chocolate bar:

M: Tastes good.  It's chocolate-y
D: Peanut butter chocolate-y
M: Maybe a little light on the peanut butter, but good.  It's more peanut -y        than peanut butter-y. *reads ingredients* You can definitely taste the             dates.
D: Can you taste the bugs?
M: No, of course not.  It's good.
D: The bars are dense and satisfying, not oily, you know?
M: Yeah, they're good.

                                                                                              END SCENE

There needs to be more people cooking with cricket flour in order to see the whole potential.  It is not something just for protein bars; it can be incorporated in all sorts of baked goods and main dishes.  Check out this video about Future Food Salon providing opportunities for people to try many of these foods.  They will be in Austin, TX next month and are looking to book in other US cities in upcoming months.   A great way to try these foods wherever you are is to sponsor the Austin event being thrown by Little Herds, North America's first charity dedicated to promoting edible insects.  Check out the great rewards in their crowd sourcing project!

Additionally, if you or someone you know is interested in trying to incorporate crickets into a dish, get in touch!  I will get you in contact with the right people.  Who knows, your recipe may be used in an upcoming Future Food Salon! 

The AAA meetings are starting tomorrow here in Chicago!

I launched my insects-as-food survey at the end of last week just in time for these meetings.  I am hoping that people will be interested in talking with me more about the project and will help by participating and by spreading the word. 

To facilitate participation, I am planning on:

• Wearing the button pictured below.  The button is of course a conversation-starter for those who have not heard of the survey, but for those of you who might be looking for me, I should be relatively easy to find.  Even if you are not necessarily looking for me, the button serves as a reminder to go and take the survey!

• I will have a tablet with me ready to access to the survey.  You can take it then and there with me available to answer any questions. The whole thing takes about 5 minutes, 10 tops.

In addition to talking research, I hope to talk more about the prospect of insects featuring more prominently in our Western diets.  I will be bringing with me a limited supply of Chapul bars.  Here is a description of the company and their product from their site:

Just from their description you can tell why I am very interested in their efforts.  I will have all three of their flavors: 1) Peanut butter, chocolate, 2) Dark chocolate, coffee, cayenne and 3) Coconut, ginger, lime.

If you are interested in trying a bar, contact me here and we will arrange to find each other at the meetings! 

I am looking forward to a great conference!  Hope to see you there!

A nice piece about University of Wisconsin professor, Gene DeFoliart (1925-2013). 

DeFoliart started his insects-as-food work back in 1974 and has been the leading researcher on the topic ever since, taking his work beyond academia in effort to promote a change in attitude in the Western World.

Furthermore, DeFoliart believed in open-access research and was publishing his latest book for free on his personal website.  Although he was unable to finish the project, his bibliographic account remains one of the most comprehensive sources on the use of insects as food by people across the world.

October 16th was world food day, so I thought I would share this map showing insects consumed around the world.

Jongema Y. 2012. List of edible insects of the world. Wageningen University.

As someone who studies the role of insects as food over the course of human evolution, I am faced with a dilemma not faced by many:  When to use 'entomophagy' and when to use 'insectivory.'

Entomophagy is defined as the practice of eating insects, usually reserved for people.  Insectivory is "feeding" on insects, usually reserved for animals.

In my dissertation and subsequent work on our hominin ancestors, specifically South African robust australopithecines, I chose to use insectivory regarding their behavior, following the vernacular of primatologists whose work was essential in creating my models.  Although the suffix -ivore is meant to imply specialization such that over half of the diet comes from that resource, primatologists discuss the degree of folivory, frugivory, insectivory, etc. across species that do not specialize on those resources, blurring the lines of the definitions.

One of my next projects, which I will be presenting at the AAA meetings in Chicago next month, investigates patterns of insects-as-food across different human populations of foragers and horticulturalists.  When referring to their insect consumption, I obviously use the word entomophagy.

I am now working on a book project that includes a theoretical reconstruction of the role of insects across all of human evolution.  In order to fill in the gap between australopithecines and people today, I am going to pay particular attention to Homo erectus and Neandertals.  I actually do not think Neandertals ate many insects due to the lack of biodiversity in northern latitudes (which is also an interesting extra piece to the puzzle as to why entomophagy is not favored in the United States and Europe..).  However, I would readily credit any insects consumed by Neandertals as entomophagy, likely due to my stance that Neandertals are are not a distinct species different from modern humans.  Neandertals are people, too!

That leaves Homo erectus, a species with hallmark increases in both brain and body size which make them seem much more human-like.  Is it the degree of insectivory or the degree of entomophagy that I am trying to reconstruct for these hominins? 

In all honesty, I dislike the term entomophagy.  It reminds me of other –phagies, such as geophagy and coprophagy, which are terms that describe the inclusion of things in the diet that would not generally be there under normal circumstances.  In this light, I believe entomophagy retains stigma.  Although insectivory reduces the practice to animal-like feeding, it is at least a normal behavior and one that is often critical for receiving adequate nutrition at that.

I have not settled on an answer for Homo erectus.   On one hand, using insectivory allows me to prolong the use of my preferred term and I do not think there is any offense to be taken through implication that Homo erectus are not people.  On the other hand, removing stigma from entomophagy, the word and the practice, is necessary in promoting insects as food, so the more it is used, the more “normal” it may seem.

This year's international Hult Prize goes to McGill University's team Aspire for their "Insects feed the world" project.
 
The Hult Prize is the largest student competition aimed at solving the world's social challenges.  In partnership with the Clinton Global Initiative, the 2013 challenge was proposed by former President Bill Clinton for student groups to create solutions for the "Global Food Crisis."

Key issues of the Global Food Crisis highlighted by the program:

1. Nearly one billion people in the world are hungry and suffer from malnutrition. That’s one out of every four children
2. There are more hungry people in the world, then the combined populations of the US, Canada and the EU.
3. A poor family in a poor country spends over 70% of its income on food, leaving very little to spend on energy, education, housing, healthcare and other critical needs
4. Global demand for food is expected to double in the next 25 to 50 years. Existing modes of food production and patterns of consumption cannot meet this demand
5. The global economy actually produces enough to feed everyone. Yet more than one-third of the food generated for human consumption is lost or wasted
6. Hunger is one of the world’s most solvable challenges
7. The global food system needs to be redesigned to yield more, healthier food, while reducing cost and ecological footprint
8. New business models are required around food security. These must yield greater access to markets, new approaches to distribution, and especially local sourcing. More locally produced food would bolster its quality and its workers’ livelihoods, while reducing waste and improving resilience to extreme conditions
9. Agriculture accounts for 70 percent of the world’s use of increasingly scarce water supplies
10. Deforestation for food production generates more greenhouse gases than all forms of transportation combined

Six regional finalists (London, Dubai, San Francisco, Boston, Shanghai, and online) competed for the one million dollar prize.  The ultimate winner was McGill University's Aspire.  Here is their mission in their own words:

"Apsire learned through research during the summer that food insecurity is not an issue of lack of food. The vast majority in urban slums do not go hungry. But they lack access to affordable nutrition. Many suffer from malnourishment and nutrient deficiencies despite being overweight or obese. Therefore, the problem of food security in urban slums is not one of food being expensive per se, but of nutritious food being unavailable or overpriced compared to cheaper, less nutritious offerings.

Our disruptive social enterprise, Aspire, aims to improve access to edible insects worldwide. We develop and distribute affordable and sustainable insect farming technologies for countries with established histories of entomophagy, or insect-consumption. Our farming solutions stabilize the supply of edible insects year-round, drastically improving and expanding the economic ecosystem surrounding insect consumption in the regions serviced. Not only do our durable farming units create income stability for rural farmers, they have a wider social impact by lowering the price of edible insects. This is central to our mission of increasing access to highly nutritious edible insects amongst the poorest, and therefore neediest, members of society."

Other projects included creating idiot-proof paper strips for planting seeds, but the other standout was Sokotext, a project that uses the power of mobile phones to aggregate demand in the slums and unlock wholesale prices for micro-entrepreneurs.

This is a big win for the McGill team and for the insects-as-food movement.  To win such a prestigious award, and in the face of tech-savvy competition, is especially encouraging to me.  I believe this group will do well and go far.

Edit 02/24/2023:  The link to the packaging is now behind a paywall. I don't remember what it looked like, but I obviously was not happy! Lesson learned to take screenshots!

I am not sure how regularly I will be posting on the blog.  I expect that I will write one or two pieces a month, but one can never predict when something will come along that just elicits comment.  Today is one of those days.

I found an article with the title "Can sleek packaging normalize insect snacks?  Designers try to make the idea of eating a bug more appealing in anticipation of a growing global population."  I was excited.  YES!  That is exactly what we must do!

I imagined that they would be taking pointers from Apple iphones or Voss water.  I was told once that the key to Apple's design success that many other companies now utilize is a focus group of 30ish year old women.  As a 30ish year old woman, I thought, that makes sense.  We have great taste.  We are going to want things to look classy and grown up and be innovatively functional.  So in my head, these insect snacks are going to be just that.  Man, was I wrong.

Yes, I waited till now to give you the link.  Now you can go and check it out for yourself.

There is no way a focus group of adults was consulted on this design.  That packaging only evokes memories of terrible generic food from our childhoods.  Even generic product packagers today have come to realize that the simple black lettering on a white label is a horrible idea.  Why would you try to promote a risky product that way? 

Terrible, terrible marketing.