Why Asians Eat Bugs and the West Doesn't 😨 #Evolution #History #Animation #Stickfigure #2danimation

This is a scorpion on a stick. It's about $100 bot or $3. It's deep fried, crunchy, and sold next to skewers of starfish and bugs kebab in the middle of Thailand. Thousands of miles away in London or New York, this same snack would clear out a restaurant in about four seconds. So what's going on here? Is this really about taste or is something bigger going on? Around two billion people eat insects regularly as part of their normal diet. Not because of a Mr. Beast challenge, but as lunch and dinner. The UN's food and agriculture organization has documented over 1,900 edible insect species eaten across more than 100 countries, most heavily in Asia and Africa. Which begs the question, why not the West eat bugs? Humans have almost certainly been eating insects since before civilization. Chimpanzees eat termites using tools, and evidence suggests early hominins ate insects more than a million years ago. And until now, most Asian countries still treat insects as a natural food source. And there are three reasons why. First, land, indensely populated countries such as Thailand, China, and Vietnam, livestock competed for valuable farmland, cattle need large areas for grazing and feed, while insects need very little. Crickets, for example, can be raised in stacked containers in a small backyard. Second, a culture of using everything available. In parts of China, a famous Cantonese quote, jokes about eating anything with four legs except a table. Behind the humor is a long tradition of making use of whatever food was available, reinforced during periods of war, poverty, and famine. Third, insects are surprisingly nutritious. Silkworm pupae, known as beondegi in Korea and commonly sold as a street snack, are rich in protein, often around 40 to 50% by dry weight. They also provide fats, minerals, and micronutrients, making a tiny insect a remarkably concentrated source of food. Crickets are especially efficient at turning feed into food. Producing one kilogram of cricket requires roughly 1.7 kilograms of feed, compared with about 8 kilograms for cattle. That means crickets can convert feed into body mass nearly 5 times more efficiently. Now let's tour the strangest stuff actually being eaten right now, and the story behind each one, tarantulas, Cambodia. In skoo on, vendors sell whole-fried tarantulas, crispy outside and soft inside. The dish dates back to the Khmer Rouge era in the 1970s, when starvation forced Cambodians to eat spiders for survival. Today, it's a regional specialty popular with tourists, Wichiti grubs, Australia. Aboriginal Australians have eaten these fat white larvae for thousands of years. Eaton raw or lightly cooked, they're often described as nutty and similar to scrambled eggs. Tamalok. Philippines. These mollusks are harvested from rotting mangrove wood, especially in Palawan. Often eaton raw with vinegar, chili, and calamansi. They have a slippery texture and briny, oyster-like flavor. Starfish. China. In some Chinese food markets, whole starfish are skewered and cooked until crisp. These crack open the tough outer shell to eat the soft interior, which has a strong, salty sea food flavor. So why did Europe and North America largely abandon insects as food? Well, Europe and especially North America had access to extensive farmland and established livestock industries. Beef, pork, and poultry became abundant sources of protein, leaving little reason for insects to remain part of the mainstream diet. Additionally, disgust toward eating insects is strongly shaped by what people grow up considering food. If insects are associated with dirt and pests rather than dinner, the reaction can feel automatic. But that perception can change. Research suggests that familiarity and repeated exposure can make people more willing to eat insects, particularly when they are introduced in familiar forms rather than served whole. So the divide is largely about what each culture learned to recognize as food. In 2021, the European Union approved dried yellow meal worms as a novel food. Since then, certain forms of house crickets and migratory locusts have also been authorized for sale. In North America, insect protein has moved beyond the novelty market. Cricket powders, protein bars, and snacks are being marketed as alternative protein sources alongside more familiar options such as Way and P protein. Sustainability is helping drive that shift. Insects can require far less land and feed than conventional livestock, while producing fewer greenhouse gas emissions under many farming systems. That makes them increasingly interesting as demand for lower impact protein grows. So the next time you see a stir fried cricket bowl and think, who would eat that? Consider that 2 billion people already do. It's more efficient than the meat in your fridge, and Europe's supermarkets are already stocking the powdered version. The real question was never why Asians eat insects. It's why the West stopped.