It was the 3rd day of November 2019, a day after I witnessed my first Korean wedding. The weather was in its best behaviour. Sun-kissed, bejewelled and serving legs, I headed out with my goons to one of the must-see beaches in the Sunburnt country, Bondi beach.
The goal was to chill with the flatties, do some people watching, make boomerang and slow-mo videos for the gram and basically relax cos #holiday. What I didn’t know was that afternoon would also present me with some exotic desserts.
If you know me, then you’ll know I’m adventurous with food. I like to explore new dishes because it helps develop my palate, which makes it easy when you love travelling.
So, when we arrived at Bondi beach and saw that the Economist magazine crew were handing out free ice cream, we couldn’t resist but join the queue. It’s ice cream after all, right?!
Yeah, correct, but unlike most free ice-cream queues, the line was smaller. “Line no long o, wetin happen? Abi dem dey do diet for this side?” I thought to myself.
Then the lady who invited us to try explained to us that the ice cream ain’t regular. These people decided to answer that question, “Can one put insects in ice cream and what type of insect?”
Yes oo, the free ice cream was laced with insects. It was a campaign to raise awareness for something I can’t remember again. But, I think it related to food sustainability???, so yeah, not sure.
Update: the insect laced ice cream was an experiential marketing campaign to attract readers. What a great first impression?! Odd to think that it worked, but it sure did because 2 years later, I still remember them. Superb marketing strategy.
This marketing was during the time when talks about replacing meats with insects, thereby improving food sustainability and thus food security, was popular. Their reasons? 1. Global population is on a steady rise, so more mouths to feed. 2. Climate change and agriculture are not the best of friends, and they think this friendship is heading downhill. So, why eating insects makes sense.
The flavours were Scurry Berry, fruity ice cream with a mix of insect bites, and the Choc Hopper, a smooth and chocolatey ice cream containing real grasshopper chunks. Here is my very professional, well-rehearsed review.
Well, we’ve been eating insects from way back and are still eating insects eg ndube, nten… Oh, so yum. So that’s not new to us. I just never thought it would be used in ice cream. The economist proved otherwise. So there I was licking away, hahahahaha.
Apparently, bugs in ice cream is a thing. Even CNN tagged it as “luxury ice cream with insects” in one of their 2019 articles.
They also had one with black ants (looked like those sugar ants). I had Choc Hopper but with crickets. . I loved it, but I couldn’t finish it.
It was too gritty for me. Regardless, it was a great experience.
What weird food have you tried that stood out for you? Share in the comments.
