Silicon Valley Live / Field Visit / Hotspot Quest / In-depth Discussion
It's the weekend, what should I eat?
Do you still remember that the spy said that some companies have already started to make artificial meat? I didn't expect that there are still many readers who voted to try it!
If you're willing to try it, you might as well try a bigger one this time!
it looks like this...
Well, people with intensive phobia, please skip it automatically...
That's right, crickets! Eat? Still not eating?
Under the topic of researching whether crickets are delicious or not, Xiao Tan is dedicated to the article and tried to eat it himself! cricket! cricket!
But as a Cantonese scout, I really want to say, that Cantonese eat everything, and we really don't bear this pot. . Foreigners also eat worms, so why only we Cantonese people?
What? So do Americans eat bugs?
When it comes to eating insects, Americans are indeed weak. Not only can they not be as good as our friends in Southeast Asian countries, but also their neighbors, Mexico.
Do you know what kind of worms Mexicans eat? Like grasshoppers, bees, and wasps, they even love to drink tequila and put worms in the wine (this is not a bit like our medicinal wine...).
(tequila and worms)
But if the country that eats the most insects is, it is estimated that it depends on Southeast Asia.
Thailand is a well-known tourist destination. People there eat not only crickets, but also wasps, bee larvae, grasshoppers, silkworms, ant eggs, bamboo worms, etc. You can buy all kinds of bugs in the vegetable market...
(Street in Thailand)
A study by the Food and Agriculture Organization of the United Nations and Wageningen University in the Netherlands found that 2 billion people around the world currently eat insects, and 1,900 species of insects are part of their daily diets. That's right, 2 billion, 1900 species. . . So why can't Americans try it?
Tiny Farms COO Andrew Brentano told the spies that Americans are really starting to accept that "insects are edible". The Silicon Valley start-up company Tiny Farms visited by this little scout is a company run by a few Americans. They not only eat insects, but also devise automated farming of crickets.
Andrew still remembers that when the company was first founded in 2012, there was an article in the media asking: Have we reached the stage of eating bugs? Watch the news again a year later and the headlines become: Soybeans, crickets, mealworms, is this the protein of the future? In another year, the news is, good news, Cricket Protein Bars are coming!
(fried bread worms)
According to Global Market Insights, the insect protein market is small but rapidly growing in the United States, and the market is expected to exceed $50 million in the next five years.
Quietly revealed that Xiao Zha’s sister Arielle Zuckerberg is still an investor in their seed round. Does she like to eat? "If investors don't like our stuff, how can they put money into us?" Andrew told the scout with a smile.
Nutrition is almost the same as chicken breast
If everyone is really willing to eat insects, and there are so many insects in the world, can they really satisfy people's daily nutrition? Otherwise why eat it?
Just look at crickets. 100g of crickets contain 8-25 grams of protein, compared to 22 grams of chicken breast and 22 grams of sirloin beef. According to entomologist Zack Lemann, 100 grams of crickets have only 121 calories and 5 grams of fat. In comparison, 100g of beef contains nearly 300 calories and 20 grams of fat.
That said, crickets not only provide enough protein, but also contain no excess fat and carbohydrates, which is "lower in calories but higher in protein than beef. "
Andrew agrees, because nutritionists have shown that crickets have the same protein content as chicken breast, similar fat content to shrimp and salmon, and are rich in trace elements such as Omega 3. But the scout knows that you must still prefer shrimp and salmon. . .
The Food and Agriculture Organization of the United Nations reports that there are three reasons why humans should eat more insects :
High nutritional value, rich in protein and trace elements;
It is environmentally friendly, and insect breeding does not need to occupy arable land, which is a low-input industry;
The threshold for raising insects is low, and underdeveloped areas can also participate.
This is about the benefits of raising crickets, not just to fight for you!
(Street Fighting Cricket)
Raising crickets is more environmentally friendly than raising cattle
Everyone knows that the United States has developed animal husbandry. From raising chickens, raising pigs to raising cattle, it not only sells meat, but also sells eggs, milk and other by-products. So why keep crickets?
This refers to the resources consumed by animal husbandry such as raising cattle.
Raising cattle not only occupies a very high amount of land, but also consumes a lot of surface soil, and the large amount of methane (that is, farts and burps) emitted by steaks will inevitably cause air pollution. Some data show that the waste generated by raising 2,500 cattle in one day is roughly equivalent to the waste generated by 410,000 residents in one day.
Although the cost of raising chickens is relatively low, in the United States, chicken farmers do not own the chickens themselves. What does that mean? That is, after the breeding company has placed the chicks on the farmer's farm for 6 weeks, the chickens are purchased by their grown-up weight (about 0.5 cents per pound ). Compared with the cost input and land occupation of the chicken farm, the profit obtained by the chicken farmer is quite meager.
That's what Tiny Farms CEO Imrie-Situnayake and partner Andrew Brentano think: Why can't there be a better way to feed the eater and benefit the breeder?
That's right, raising insects is indeed more environmentally friendly than raising cattle and other livestock, and it is more profitable.
Judging from the current price of protein powder in the US market, a pound ranges from 10 to 20 dollars, which is an average of 60 yuan per pound. But do you know how much a pound of ground cricket powder costs? About $25 a pound. The main reason for the high price is that keeping insects is too unautomated, and it is an industry that consumes a lot of labor, and 75% of the cost is labor.
Techcrunch has reported that the cricket farming industry has not changed since 1940, and farmers need to spend a lot of time researching what kind of farming method will ultimately bring the highest percentage of protein content.
Tiny Farms started out with the intention of making food made from crickets, but found that the raw materials were too expensive. How can we reduce the cost of raw materials and scale up quickly? After doing research and consultation on some farms, Tiny Farms decided to build a high-tech farming system by itself.
How high-tech is it? Currently, Tiny Farms has only four full-time employees, and only one full-time employee oversees the farm in Fresno, California's Central Valley.
In Tiny Farms' breeding system, crickets take about 6-8 weeks to grow from eggs to adults, and they are fed 100% non-GMO grain-based feed. When it needs to be processed, the system automatically freezes the crickets (because the crickets will automatically go dormant at low temperature, which is similar to the treatment of lobsters), and then heat treatment to remove the water and kill the microorganisms on the crickets, and finally enter the grinding and packaging.
(The picture comes from Tiny Farms, the copyright belongs to the original author)
After eating crickets, won't you eat all kinds of disgusting things, such as stomach and so on? Andrew said that if the crickets were known to be handled a day earlier, the crickets would be stopped for a day. (It may be understood as emptying the intestines, but like small shrimp, because the body is too small, it can't actually eat anything)
In order to ensure the quality, the employees mainly screen the color, texture and taste of each batch of crickets, and sample them for testing.
Currently, a patent application for the breeding system is pending. Andrew revealed that after the patent application is successful, it will be licensed to the farm as a technology, allowing farmers to breed crickets by themselves. Tiny Farms will repurchase the farmed crickets to make cricket powder and sell them to merchants.
Since insects are used as food, what do the US food regulators think? Andrew told Xiaotan that the cricket powder produced by Tiny Farms has passed the FDA (US Food and Drug Administration) certification, and it is guaranteed that cricket farming is carried out in accordance with GMP (US current drug production management standards). Yes, there seems to be no insects sold by street stalls here in the United States...
Today, with the help of an efficient automatic farming system, Tiny Farms can mass-produce the raw material - cricket powder, about every ton of live crickets can be turned into 500kg (about 550 pounds) of cricket powder, and the price per pound ranges from $17 to $20 not wait.
Today, Tiny Farms produces cricket powder mainly for food companies that use crickets as an ingredient, but interestingly, some dog food manufacturers also buy cricket powder as an ingredient to make dog food. Andrew said with a smile that this was first discovered on his own dog, because if you sprinkle cricket powder on the dog food, the dog will be very excited and eat very delicious...
(Dog food made from cricket powder, the picture comes from Tiny Farms, the copyright belongs to the original author)
Another difference from raising pigs, cattle and sheep is that cricket manure is dry rather than wet, which is easier to handle and has a higher nitrogen content. Because of this, cricket poo is now a very popular by-product of the company, with some private gardeners and some commercial growers buying it as fertilizer.
According to the company's current vision, Tiny Farms hopes to achieve 4,000 square feet (about 380 square meters) of space in the future, and can produce 1 ton of crickets per day.
So, back to the original question, are crickets delicious?
Xiao Tan thinks that the cricket powder has no special taste, just like eating a bunch of coffee powder, the most powerful is the five-scented dried cricket! The first one, because of fear, Xiao Tan almost swallowed it, and there were only five flavors left in his mouth. The second one began to "chew" seriously, and found... uh... crispy, with a bit of sweet soil. taste....
When the Tantans in the whole office tried hard to try this little thing, everyone said it was a love-hate relationship...
Go away... I won't eat it!
Umm... it smells so good! another one!
So, who have raised children's shoes that have eaten insects? Let's talk about how you feel! Leave a message with the most likes, come, Xiaotan invites you to eat crickets!
By the way, Andrew also revealed that Tiny Farms is financing. Interested investors, hurry up and contact the spy! Take you to eat crickets too...
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