Meal Time!

Well! Doesn't this look nummy? Meal worms!This is my latest experiment, about which DH Matt is less than enthusiastic. Believe it or not, people have eaten these.

Hot Mealworm Appetizers

Ingredients:
5 ml (1 tsp.) cayenne
2.5 ml (1/2 tsp.) black pepper
85 ml (1/3 cup) mealworm larvae, slightly thawed
30 ml (2 Tbsp) butter or margarine

Place all ingredients together into a sauce pan. Sauté, stirring constantly, until the mealworms are golden brown. Drain and serve. Or, these may be added to a hot bridge mix available in many grocery stores. Or, one may add them to 'Party Mix' made from cold cereal squares, pretzels and nuts. The combination made at home to which one could add the mealworms for extra nutrition, fiber, and interesting texture is as follows: Melt 1/4 cup margarine in roasting pan in preheated 250°F oven. Stir in 5 tsp. Worcestershire sauce, l-l/4 tsp. seasoned salt, 1/4 tsp. garlic powder. Gradually add: cereals (2-2/3 cup corn squares, 2-2/3 cup rice squares, 2-2/3 cup wheat squares); I cup nuts and I cup pretzels. Stir to coat evenly. Bake I hour, stirring every 15 minutes. Spread on absorbent paper to cool. Store in airtight container. Makes 10 cups.
(Courtesy of the Food Insects Newsletter Editor and taste-tested by undergraduate and graduate students at Montana State University and various dinner guests at the Dunkel/Diggs home (thanks for the invite, Proff...I, um,already ate) : found at
http://www.hollowtop.com/finl_html/mealworms.htm)

Seriously, I would have to weigh half of my current body mass via starvation and have tried dirt first before I would eat meal worms. But, ducks love them. And little ducklings need to be introduced to healthy food early before they develop an unhealthy love for Frito-Lays. So, I have tubs prepared (so hard, throw corn meal in a plastic shoebox) to host the 5,000 meal worms which will be arriving shortly. DH Matt has now, suddenly, acquired a sore back which will necessitate his sleeping in his den at the other end of the house about the time the meal worms arrive to take up residency in the Master Bathroom. I should warn him not to do his usual leftovers search in the fridge...half the meal worms will reside there to be duck meal while only half will be breeding parents. He'll get used to them...I just can't imagine a parental moment when he'll be saying, "Oh, aren't they cute?" I do expect to see him sneak a Frito-Lay to the ducklings.