What does a cicada taste like?
I easily gathered eight cicadas while going about my morning
chores on Thursday, and I popped them all into the freezer so they
would perish quickly and then be ready for a lunch taste test.
You can eat cicadas raw, but I needed all the help I could get to
overcome the "I'm eating a bug" factor, so I sauteed them in a bit of
vegetable oil, salt, and pepper for about ten minutes until the
exoskeletons were pretty crunchy. Then I served the wildcrafted
treat up, four cicadas per plate.
I couldn't talk Mark
into eating a single one --- he said he might try a cicada another time
if I removed the wings. Adding the insects to a stir fry (and not
telling the recipients) 
might be another good way of
tricking non-believers into taste-testing cicadas. And, to be
honest, I had to look in the other direction while popping the bits of
invertebrate flesh into my mouth, a bit like what I do when I get a
shot. (If I can't see it, the scary thing isn't there and I can
focus on my real senses.)
So, what do cicadas
taste like? Actually, when I could ignore the fact that I was
eating an insect, they were delicious. Keep in mind that I
taste-tested what's known in culinary circles as "soft-shelled cicadas"
--- youngsters who have just popped out of their nymphal skins and
haven't yet hardened up their exoskeletons.
I didn't detect the
almond or pistachio flavor reported on the internet. Instead, the
texture (and flavor, actually) was like the flesh from the one lobster
tail I've tasted, but without that faint hint of fishiness, and with a
little crunch when my teeth hit the wings. (I really liked the
cicadas wings-on and don't recommend removing the appendages.)
Since there are several species of periodic cicadas, I wouldn't be at
all surprised if each one tastes a little different.
On a scale of 1 to 10, I'd
give these sauteed cicadas a 9. In addition to tasting good, the
insects also really agreed with me --- as I started writing this post,
my mouth watered and I snuck one of the cicadas I'm saving into my
mouth for a snack. On the other hand, it probably would have
taken all day to gather enough cicadas to serve as the protein source
for a whole meal, so I'll just keep snagging the delicacies as I pass
them by.
Which is all a long way
of saying --- I recommend them! If you've got cicadas crawling up
out of the ground, now's a perfect time to see if you like them as much
as I do.
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About us: Anna Hess and Mark Hamilton spent over a decade living self-sufficiently in the mountains of Virginia before moving north to start over from scratch in the foothills of Ohio. They've experimented with permaculture, no-till gardening, trailersteading, home-based microbusinesses and much more, writing about their adventures in both blogs and books.
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I have had "Inago-no-tsukudanii" here in Japan. Grasshoppers/immature locust that are boiled in a heavy mirin sauce. We eat it over rice, and it is great if you don't know/remember that it's bug. Crunchy.
Joey --- Interesting! Maybe you'll have some cooking advice when you come over to try out our new porch. I'll try to remember to put some in the freezer for us to cook up together.
Mona --- I feel like the ants I've eaten were lemony. But I'm not quite sure if that's true or if I'm just remembering the overwhelming scent the one time I caught a bunch of them swarming during a queen's mating flight.
Roland --- Don't worry --- I wouldn't slip cicadas to a vegetarian on the sly. I was thinking more along the lines of someone who agreed in theory that they wanted to try bugs, but were scared in practice. A bit like the way my driver's ed teacher got me in the car and, after about fifteen minutes, asked if I wanted to know when my driving test started. When I said yes, he responded that I'd just finished.
MamaHomesteader --- I'll bet the cicada is a lot like a cricket, but I could be wrong.... Pretty funny that your husband had to warn you off his pet crickets.
Eric --- I was hoping you would chime in! I'd heard that, in Asia, some insects are considered quite tasty.
Ikwig --- What, you never inhaled a gnat while working outside in the summer? They seem to like buzzing around my face and flying in my mouth when I'm out of breath. They're quite sweet...
Sounds like you're the epitome of a good guest.
I'm down for trying just about anything, but I think the only way I could eat a bug is if it were breaded, deep-fried, and covered in hot sauce!
~ Mitsy
In addition to about a half dozen other types of peppers, we really want to grow the Ghost Chili/Bhut Jolokia variety! I can't imagine life without Tabasco, lol.
~ Mitsy
I are bundaegi in South Korea - roasted silkworms stewing in a cauldron on the roadside -- sold in paper cups and eaten with a toothpick ...
I cringe at the memory -- they were vile.