Enjoy a bug buffet at the Maine Discovery Museum

Trudy Plummer, director of education at the Maine Discovery Museum, describes the main ingredient for a vegetable dip she is making for a workshop this weekend as crunchy and quite delicious. She can only buy the item at a pet store and must prepare it ahead of time, as it tends to jump around a lot.

If that hasn’t tipped you off already, the mystery ingredient is dry-roasted crickets that are frozen before they’re cooked, and the dish is one of several bug-tastic concoctions on the menu for the museum’s Bug Cuisine workshop at 2 p.m. on Sunday, Oct. 30. The workshop costs $3 plus museum admission.

Did you know giant waterbugs are eaten boiled or incorporated into a vegetable dip in Thailand? Or that red and white maguey worms are considered a delicacy in Mexico, where they are sauteed in butter and garlic?

“It’s an interesting idea, because bugs are a staple in many diets around the world, but we find them incredibly gross here,” Plummer says. “We wanted to use them because they are a gross and scary food, so it’ll be fun for Halloween, but it’s also about entomology and science and cooking.”

Plummer and Tony Sohns, the museum’s natural history director, will offer a bug buffet, complete with air popped waxworms, mealworm stirfry and crispy cricket vegetable dip.

“The kids will help us prepare some ingredients, but they don’t have to eat them. We’ll encourage them, but we won’t make them eat it,” said Plummer. “They can take the food home and force their parents to eat it, though.”

Plummer said the waxworms are full of protein and are quite nutritious, but they don’t have a strong flavor, so they’ll be covered in caramel and chocolate.

As for the veggie dip, children will grind up the dry-roasted crickets into a powder and fold it into a cream cheese and sour cream mixture. The insects are provided by the Crystal Clear pet store in Bangor, since area supermarkets have yet to stock live crickets on their shelves.

Plummer says many insects and worms are edible, even tasty, and it’s possible to cook with most insects available in pet stores. She says most creepy-crawlies you might want to cook with should be boiled or roasted first, in the same way that you’d wash fruit or cook meat properly. Crickets, especially, should be frozen first, so their metabolism slows down and they don’t jump all over the place.

“Nightcrawlers and maggots are edible, though you need to prepare them correctly. You’d be surprised how many bugs and larva are acceptable in certain foods,” she said. “People already know that if you buy berries or vegetables in the summer you’ll be eating a couple insects with them every time.”

Plummer confesses silkworms are a favorite of hers.

“Canned silkworms are quite good,” she said. “I put them on pizza. They look like little olives.”