What creeps, crawls and tastes delicious? Bugs of course!
During the Cambodian civil war, there were food shortages and people were starving to death. Many were forced to look for alternative food sources like bugs in order to survive. The bugs were often eaten alive, because lighting a fire could reveal one’s location to the enemy. As a result, eating bugs has become a part of the Khmer culture.
While walking around downtown Siem Reap, we came across a few food carts selling the bugs and got excited at the thought of trying them. We found a class with Backstreet Academy taught by a man and his family who catch and prepare the insects. We learned that every night this family and a few others use a green light to attract the bugs so they are caught fresh for the next day.
We participated in this class with another Canadian family we met who are also travelling around the world for a year. They are a family of four, Chris, Nancy, Aran, and Eva, and the two kids are the same ages as Zoe and I. It was fun meeting up with them and doing the course together.
Our facilitator, Salmon, is from Cambodia and has a really interesting life story. He was a child during the regime of the Khmer Rouge, and since there was not a lot of food, he often ate insects. His dream was to go to school but his parents couldn’t afford it. One day, he met a Canadian family who decided to sponsor him and pay for all of his schooling. They wanted to continue paying for his university, but he told them they should give another child the same chance. The Canadians agreed and Salmon chose the child himself. Today, Salmon works with the Backstreet Academy and shows visitors how local people live in his country.
To prepare the insects, they were mixed with sugar, salt, spices, chicken stock powder, and tempura flour. We deep fried them in a wok of hot oil.
We ate four different types of bugs: crickets, grasshoppers, silkworms, and tarantulas.
Crickets
These are one of the easiest to eat; simply fry them up and pop it into your mouth whole. It’s like eating popcorn! Crickets also taste nice when eaten with green onions and beetle nut leaves.
Grasshoppers
Don’t eat the wings or legs, but the rest of the body is good. It’s just like eating shrimp!
Silkworms
These are the easiest insects to prepare. They only need to be fried up and eaten. Think of little Cheesies, except less crunchy. I have already eaten a boiled silkworm at the Silk Village in Vietnam, so it wasn’t a big deal for me. 🙂
Tarantulas
The tarantulas are fried like the others, but before they are eaten you need to remove the poison from the head. This poison is what tarantulas use to catch prey and kill predators. It is left in the arachnid while it is being fried because the oils make it taste better, but it still must be removed after frying. These were especially fun to make and they made for great pictures with the legs sticking out of our mouths!
Cooking the insects was really cool and tasty! It’s interesting to see how something used for survival is now popular and part of today’s culture. This class has left me with a great skill and a fun fact; none of these insects taste like chicken! 🙂
Comments
12 responses to “Fear Factor Cambodian Style!”
Hi Mikhaila,
You guys were sure adventurous!!! We can see that you had a lot of fun doing this, and how great it was to share this experience with another family!!! Awesome pictures and great commentary! Love, Baba
Hello Baba,
This course was a lot of fun to take! Doing it with the other family was great too!
Yep, all very interesting, but this time basically have only one word : eewwwwww!
Hello Herta,
You’d be surprised how tasty the insects are! You can’t say it’s gross until you try it! 🙂
Hmmm…..very interesting to see how they are prepared, but yuck….I will show the girls the pictures, this certainly was an “interesting” post…..not sure I would do it!!!!
Hi Nicole,
It was really cool learning how to prepare the insects. This would be a good idea for a home ec. class at school! 🙂
Hi, Mikhaila, great post, love the reporting and matching photos, very interesting and you all are very brave . . . . but I concur with my fellow commenters “yuck” and “eww”, Lots of hugs so, and I love the group photo with your fellow world travellers
Hello Oma,
It was a lot of fun to participate in this course. I really enjoy doing things like this, so I wasn’t nervous at all!
You are much braver than I would be Mikhaila! The picture of the tarantula legs is too much for me!!!!!!!!!!
Have fun. Travel safely….love Teta Doreen xoxoxo
Hi Teta Doreen,
I loved the tarantula legs! They were the best part of the whole insect! 🙂
No words except OMG!
Hello Kim,
Hee hee! That word really says it all! 🙂