Cordon blargh!

I'm more than a little nauseated by the latest 'advance' (?) in baking ingredients.

Two scientists from the Federal University of Rio Grande in Brazil have developed a flour made of cockroaches that contains 40 percent more protein than normal wheat flour.

Food engineering students Andressa Lucas and Lauren Menegon discovered a new way of producing cheaper yet still nutritious food with the cockroach flour, since it contains a large amount of essential amino acids and some lipids and fatty acids as well—the keys for a balanced and healthy human diet.

The cockroaches in question are not the ones we see running (or even flying—AHHHHH!) in our houses, though. They are the species Nauphoeta cinerea, a different one than we find in city sewers or drains. Researchers buy the insects from a specialized breeder, where they are hygienically produced and fed on fruits and vegetables to meet all hygiene requirements required by ANVISA, the Brazilian health surveillance agency.

The study supervisor, professor Myrian Salas Mellado, says that ten percent of the cockroach flour could replace wheat flour in a given recipe, so cockroach flour bread loaves keep the same flavor as their non-insect counterparts.

There's more at the link.

I don't care who you are.  If you feed me anything containing cockroaches - ground-up or otherwise - and I find out about it, there's likely to be murder done . . . just as soon as I can stop throwing up, that is!  That's not cordon bleu - that's cordon blargh!




Peter