HORRIBLE DELICACIES.

Waikato Times, Volume XLIII, Issue 3501, 1 December 1894, Page 11

HORRIBLE DELICACIES.

Ants stewsd in bntyer are quite a luxury in some parts of Africa, and are said to haveths great advantage of possessing two distinct flavours, the taste of the front part of the body being quite unlike that of the abdomen. According to Humboldt, certain South American tribes, by way of sauce with these, insects, prefer resin to butter. Even in Europe ' antvinegar'is not altogether unknown, the bodies of the insects being steeped in boiling water, and their charac;eristic acid afterwards extracted, While the wily Swede, not above availing himself of'adulteration's artful aid,' distils ants together with rye to flavour his inferior brandy, Here we are reminded of the Mexican Indians, who, in default of other intoxicants, prepare a stimulating and agreeable liquor from crushed tiirerbeetles! yet we have not come to the end or man's gastronomic experiments with members of the insect world. Termites, or'white, ants,' as they are commonly but wrongly called, are deemed excellent by the Hottentots, who get as fat upon them as they do upon locust*. The correct way of preparing termites is to parch them in iron pots over a gentle fire, stirring them about as though one were roasting coffee-berries. They are ther, eaten hot, without sauce-or condiment, and are said in flavour to resemble sugared cream or almond paste. Hindoos also eat these insects,.but prefer to make them, up with flour into a kind of pastry. . The Chinese, who eat all sorts of odd things, have a taste for the chrysalis of the silkworm, after the silk has been wound,off, and are also fond of the caterpillar of a hawk-moth. B?es are, or were, eaton in Ceylon ; while the natives of New Caledonia think nothing nicer than spiders, which, however cannot strictly be considered as insects. Reamer tells us of a young lady who could never bring herself to pass a spider without picking it up and eating it alive, another, of Dutch nationality, used to devour spiders like nuts, which, she declared, they much resembled in flavour; and a German, immortalised by a con.temporary writer, used to spread them on his bread and butter like preserve !- Answers.