Re-creating a Long-Ago Feast

January 4th, 2009 by David Gracer · News

As I’ve said, I’m trying to make progress in several directions: insect farming; international product acquisition; education and publishing. Yet another involves exploring the past, whether ancient or recent, to find models from which to proceed. This leads to a certain amount of research.

The broad landscape of DeFoliart’s magnum opus is full of little gems. This is one of my favorites; though a bit long, I’m including the whole thing for sake of thoroughness:

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Cool new acquisition: Nsenene!

December 19th, 2008 by David Gracer · cooking methods, exotics, grasshopper, katydids

A couple days ago I drove about an hour and bought nine bags of African grasshoppers.
I’d learned in October that a Ugandan community gets a shipment of grasshoppers in December. I knew that I’d want some of them, but I didn’t want to drive all that way for nothing. Since I’d lost the business card from my first visit, it was time for some internet research to find the right number to confirm that the product was available. As usual the calls were circuitous, amusing, and ultimately successful. [Read more →]

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It’s pretty much winter, so….

December 4th, 2008 by David Gracer · history, progress, speculative

I won’t be hunting insects for a while. I got less this past summer than I had in 2007; some ants and a few interesting things in Louisiana, but not as much as I’d have liked. I spent two very intense months filming a TV program, did roughly 35 library presentations, taught a summer composition class, and had other responsibilities. I stopped posting entries partly because I felt overworked and stressed. Not that I’m complaining, really — I like being busy.

Future entries will likely continue the different directions my company is going in. I haven’t decided whether it’s better to expand my stock of exotic edible insects or to increase supplies of the species that can be more easily cultivated. Whether to concentrate on developing the educational aspects or product generation. What about that whole ‘office space’ idea, can that possibly be smart? And then there’s the important progress toward gathering the literature and creating a community.

All of these have great potential value, and as I’ve mentioned I’m just one guy. Figuring out how best to spend my energies isn’t easy. New development frequently arise, any of which could bring great success. It could be communication with someone in China or Mexico who says he wants to export insects and is looking for sources, or a journalist writing an article [I just found a new one today], or something else. But I’m not going to include every lead when the vast majority of them end up going nowhere.

Got to get the camera back out; more pictures needed.

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