Japanese Airline Adds Insects To Inflight Menu As Eco-Friendly Meal Options
Image via Zipair
Will you have chicken, fish, or cricket?
Japanese low-cost airline Zipair has started serving inflight meals made with ground-up bugs as environmentally-friendly options that are also rich in protein.
The airline sources its edible insect powder, ground from two-spotted crickets (or gryllus bimaculatus), from local cricket producer Gryllus. The ingredient is mixed into two new dishes to not only boost their protein content but also encourage travelers to live more sustainably, the South China Morning Post reports.
The first menu item, the Chili Burger Topped with Tomato, sees the edible cricket powder incorporated into the burger buns, patty, and spicy tomato sauce.
The other option to set hearts aflutter is Pasta Pescatore, which comprises soft-shell shrimp, octopus, squid, and clams cooked into a cricket-powder tomato sauce.
The unusual ingredient, first cooked into the airline’s food in July, give meals “a shrimpy taste and nutty aroma” and extra umami flavor, says inflight catering chef Keita Masuda (via Mainichi), who developed the two meals. Both dishes contain 4.5 grams of crickets.
Gryllus justifies that edible crickets are rich in protein, vitamins, and minerals, and that they are great, nutritious alternatives for food shortages. They also grow faster than livestock, and require less food.
A spokesperson for the airline purports that there have been more than 60 orders for the meals since their debut.
The cricket-based meals are available on Zipair’s flights between Tokyo Narita and Bangkok, Singapore, Honolulu, and Los Angeles.
As part of a wider commitment to reduce food waste, the airline will also serve the insect-infused meals—as with all items on Zipair’s menu—to passengers who have reserved inflight meals in advance.
Would you trade buffalo wings for these wings?
