To Eat or Not to Eat, part 3

“You can eat crickets here,” Spencer said.

We were walking through a flea market in Mexico City and there were food vendors scattered throughout.

“I’m not sure I would eat that,” I said.

“You wouldn’t?” He asked, surprised. “It is the thing to do here.”

“Okay, maybe,” I said. After all, I did pride myself on eating basically everything, even if I didn’t like it (see previous post on Mexican food).

Sure enough, crickets (among other critters) were offered to me on the food tour I took the very next day. I tried one of the insects offered to me, and passed on the others (including a scorpion) because I had to pick it up with my fingers. If they had chopsticks I would have been more inclined to try it, but the thought of touching the insects grossed me out.

Later, I treated myself to a massage (it’s hard work going all over the city to eat delicious food), and met up with a friend for dinner at a slightly upscale place in the expat neighborhood. We both ordered some tacos to share, and when his pork belly tacos arrived, I noticed some…unusual ingredients in the taco. 

“What is that?” I asked. Dave had ordered those particular tacos, and I didn’t pay attention to the description on the menu.

“Crickets I think? You can set them aside if you don’t want them,” he said.

I nodded and decided that when in Rome, do as the Romans do. So I ate the taco, and savored the contrast between the crispy critters and the succulent pork belly. “Delicious,” I thought, patting myself on the back for embracing the local cuisine.

We chatted for a while and walked around the area, and I got back to my hotel a few hours after dinner. Suddenly, my mind wandered back to the pork belly taco I had. “Wait a minute,” I thought, “…are crickets really that crunchy?”

I scrolled through my photos from dinner, zooming in on the mysterious crispy bits, and realized they probably weren’t crickets…but what were they? I found the menu online, and saw that in addition to pork belly, there were “cocopaches” in the taco. A quick Google search revealed the unsettling truth: “cocopaches” were a variety of cockroach.

My mind was blown: I HAD EATEN COCKROACHES AND ACTUALLY ENJOYED IT!

Part of me was tempted to try the tacos again so I could better remember the flavor, but my rational side quickly decided that was disgusting.

Lesson learned: sometimes, ignorance is truly bliss, especially when there are mystery ingredients in your food.