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Man Eating Bugs: The Art and Science of Eating Insects
The team behind the critically and popularly acclaimed anthropological photoessays MATERIAL WORLD and WOMEN IN THE MATERIAL WORLD make their debut on our list with this oddly tantalizing book about a subject that's creeping into insects as food for people. With the distinctive blend of thoughtful cultural inquiry, intrepid exploration, and sumptuous photography that has earned them worldwide renown, the authors document the practice and history of entomophagy around the globe, discovering that insects are a nutritious, plentiful, and varied food source. From Mexico, where people celebrate the annual Jumile Festival with bug hunts and beauty queens, to China, where whole families make their livings from scorpion ranches, over a dozen bug-eating countries (including the USA!) are profiled in MAN EATING BUGS. Each chapter examines a culture through a stunning array of location photos, interviews with locals, and highlights from the authors' field journals, as well as carefully photographed indigenous recipes. A colorful, beautiful, and intelligent book.
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ÌýAwards1999 James Beard Award Winner
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ÌýAwards1999 James Beard Award Winner
- GenresFoodNonfictionScience
192 pages, Paperback
First published September 1, 1998
2 people are currently reading
145 people want to read
About the author
Peter Menzel
24Ìýbooks45ÌýfollowersPeter J. Menzel is an American freelance photojournalist and author, best known for his coverage of scientific and technological subjects. His work has appeared in many national and international publications including National Geographic, Forbes, Fortune, Wired, Geo, Stern, Paris Match, Life and Le Figaro. In conjunction with his wife, writer/producer Faith D'Aluisio, Menzel has also published six books including Material World: A Global Family Portrait (1994); Women in the Material World (1996); Man Eating Bugs: The Art & Science of Eating Insects (1998); Robo sapiens: Evolution of a New Species ; Hungry Planet: What The World Eats (2005). He is the founder of Peter Menzel Photography and Material World Books.
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Displaying 1 - 16 of 16 reviews
September 7, 2020
I picked up this book for the Book Riot Read Harder challenge (Read a food book about a cuisine you’ve never tried before). This book inspires me to try out insects: the writing is engaging and the photos are incredible.
March 26, 2008
This book has fantastic photographs and first-hand accounts of eating bugs!
The husband and wife team behind this project give their accounts of not only eating bugs, but how they got in the situation to eat the bugs: where they went, who they talked to, who they met. It's really fascinating. The photographs (taken by the husband part of the team) are incredible, beautiful, National Geographic quality.
I thought I had an incredibly strong stomach, but some of the things these folks ate made me kind of queasy, even though I know that the foods we eat is so much based on our culture and upbringing. Hell, I'm Cajun, and I love me some boiled crawfish, but a lot of people look at crawfish like I look at cockroaches. Do you think that's going to stop me from eating and enjoying eating crawfish? Hell no.
Anyway, this book will bring home that what is "normal" to eat varies a whole lot from place to place.
Highly recommended.
The husband and wife team behind this project give their accounts of not only eating bugs, but how they got in the situation to eat the bugs: where they went, who they talked to, who they met. It's really fascinating. The photographs (taken by the husband part of the team) are incredible, beautiful, National Geographic quality.
I thought I had an incredibly strong stomach, but some of the things these folks ate made me kind of queasy, even though I know that the foods we eat is so much based on our culture and upbringing. Hell, I'm Cajun, and I love me some boiled crawfish, but a lot of people look at crawfish like I look at cockroaches. Do you think that's going to stop me from eating and enjoying eating crawfish? Hell no.
Anyway, this book will bring home that what is "normal" to eat varies a whole lot from place to place.
Highly recommended.
December 10, 2008
I'm not sure what category to put this in--it is a food book, and has a lot of amazing dishes in it, but probably none that most readers will ever try. This is more a book to gross yourself and others with--and to learn what diversity is out there in food choices. Shauri often reminds me that shrimp are "just ocean bugs" and that we only don't eat bugs because we've been conditioned not to think of them as food. I hope that most of my bug-eating days are behind me (Shauri and I met at a wilderness treatment program where we were both working, and bugs were a regular part of the menu), but it is always comforting to know that if times really got tough, we would have plenty to eat.
This was given to Shauri and I as a wedding gift by our Uncle John--thanks John!
This was given to Shauri and I as a wedding gift by our Uncle John--thanks John!
June 6, 2019
The book title is a misnomer. The pair of authors essentially outline a quest for bugs of all kinds to eat. Diary entries (very well written and engaging) serve as the backdrop for this wonderfully shot photo book.
The big take away: as you follow Peter and Faith (the authors) on their - er, Peter's - quest to eat bugs, you realize that Faith is spot on in her epilogue: bugs are not quite as unappealing a source of food as they may have once been.
Or, you're totally grossed out by the concept and couldn't possibly imagine eating something so horrifyingly gross as a scorpion! Who would dare eat an arthropod with creepy legs and a pair of claws! I mean, seriously! Disgusting. All this venting has made me hungry. I'm going to go eat some butter-dipped lobster...
The big take away: as you follow Peter and Faith (the authors) on their - er, Peter's - quest to eat bugs, you realize that Faith is spot on in her epilogue: bugs are not quite as unappealing a source of food as they may have once been.
Or, you're totally grossed out by the concept and couldn't possibly imagine eating something so horrifyingly gross as a scorpion! Who would dare eat an arthropod with creepy legs and a pair of claws! I mean, seriously! Disgusting. All this venting has made me hungry. I'm going to go eat some butter-dipped lobster...
April 29, 2025
Peter Menzel & Faith D’Aluisio did a wonderful job sharing their adventures around the world and their experiences with Entomophagy.
From Peru to China to the United States, the authors give a first hand account of the people they meet and the food they eat.
As an Entomophagy enthusiast, this book has inspired me to try more and experience more cultures.
From Peru to China to the United States, the authors give a first hand account of the people they meet and the food they eat.
As an Entomophagy enthusiast, this book has inspired me to try more and experience more cultures.
September 16, 2019
Entomophagy is underrated.
May 5, 2016
Man Eating Bugs
By Peter Menzel and Faith D'aluiso
Man eating bugs is a detailed recount of a pair of journalists travels across the world exploring the phenomenon of eating insects and arachnids. This practice is called entomophagy. They travel to Australia, Japan, Thailand, Indonesia, China, Mexico, South Africa, Uganda, Peru, Venezuela, and The United States sampling all the entomological cuisine. They share meals with everyone from every day scorpion farmers in China to people rumoured to be cannibals living in the jungle.
This food and travel book is perfect for anyone who has interest an expanding Western culture's relationship with food and insects. This book depicts the amazing variety of world cultures and how they each individually view insects as food. For instance when one of the journalists was digging for termites to eat with South Africans, he was talking to them about his experiences in China with people who raise and eat scorpions, they were disgusted by the thought of eating scorpions but they really had no problem with eating termites. This book offers a rich diversity of cultures and cuisines across the world which is very interesting to read about because you can see the differences in the cultures and their preferences in bug food.
There was no section of this book that I did not like. The topic of eating bugs has always been something that has interested me and something I have done experimentally. But every single page has images of these dishes that they were eating and places and people that were showing them how to find these bugs and cook them which makes for a very vivid depiction of this cuisine. They also give recipes which is fun to look at just in case you ever think of being adventurous and trying something. I particularly like the storytelling style of narration because it makes it a personal experience reading the book because you can relate exactly to what the person who is trying these dishes is feeling. There are also background stories of childhood experiences for the authors with your interesting to read to see how they have changed and widend their cultural lenses since they had some negative childhood bug/food interaction.
By Peter Menzel and Faith D'aluiso
Man eating bugs is a detailed recount of a pair of journalists travels across the world exploring the phenomenon of eating insects and arachnids. This practice is called entomophagy. They travel to Australia, Japan, Thailand, Indonesia, China, Mexico, South Africa, Uganda, Peru, Venezuela, and The United States sampling all the entomological cuisine. They share meals with everyone from every day scorpion farmers in China to people rumoured to be cannibals living in the jungle.
This food and travel book is perfect for anyone who has interest an expanding Western culture's relationship with food and insects. This book depicts the amazing variety of world cultures and how they each individually view insects as food. For instance when one of the journalists was digging for termites to eat with South Africans, he was talking to them about his experiences in China with people who raise and eat scorpions, they were disgusted by the thought of eating scorpions but they really had no problem with eating termites. This book offers a rich diversity of cultures and cuisines across the world which is very interesting to read about because you can see the differences in the cultures and their preferences in bug food.
There was no section of this book that I did not like. The topic of eating bugs has always been something that has interested me and something I have done experimentally. But every single page has images of these dishes that they were eating and places and people that were showing them how to find these bugs and cook them which makes for a very vivid depiction of this cuisine. They also give recipes which is fun to look at just in case you ever think of being adventurous and trying something. I particularly like the storytelling style of narration because it makes it a personal experience reading the book because you can relate exactly to what the person who is trying these dishes is feeling. There are also background stories of childhood experiences for the authors with your interesting to read to see how they have changed and widend their cultural lenses since they had some negative childhood bug/food interaction.
January 2, 2014
This book is what it is. It's a food travel diary with some cool pictures. I enjoyed it. The writing was pretty entertaining, though fairly repetitive. Wish it had tried harder in terms of information, like an actual breakdown of the nutrients in various bugs or more about the statement made in the beginning that most people's food preferences are established by age 5 or 6. Where did he get that from? I would really like to know more about that. Would have liked to know more about the whole diets and health of different native peoples, rather than just who eats what bugs.
Loved learning that the clouds of locusts that traveled through the US were a wealth of food for the natives (rather than famine inducing like it was for the white folks). Interesting that both crawdads and lobsters are relatives of bugs... though still not really bugs I guess.
Super sad how most of the natives who eat highly nutritious bugs will always be happy to trade a month's worth of bugs for ramen. Fascinating how every different group of people things what other people eat is disgusting (and yet everyone can agree that ramen is delicious).
Loved learning that the clouds of locusts that traveled through the US were a wealth of food for the natives (rather than famine inducing like it was for the white folks). Interesting that both crawdads and lobsters are relatives of bugs... though still not really bugs I guess.
Super sad how most of the natives who eat highly nutritious bugs will always be happy to trade a month's worth of bugs for ramen. Fascinating how every different group of people things what other people eat is disgusting (and yet everyone can agree that ramen is delicious).
January 18, 2016
Confession: I have NOT read this book cover-to-cover. However I HAVE looked at every picture. My wife bought this cookbook many years back. She is a very strict vegetarian, so I had real fears as to where this cookbook was leading. However this was a good object lesson: what one culture considers to be a delicacy, might be another culture's taboo. So I had to think of how I love Marin County raw oysters, French escargot (cooked), and how addicted I have become to Unagi (sushi-speak = eel). Then how can I pass judgement on fried tarantulas, grubworms, and centipedes? Hmmm . . . still working on this concept! But the photographs are truly fantastic, mind-opening!
September 19, 2008
This book has been on my mind ever since I checked it out of the library a few years ago. I want to own it.
The photos are beautiful and terrifying. The stories are witty and personal, as if your good friends are flippin' through their travel photos and describing the scenes just for you.
I almost wish I couldn't imagine what a scorpion farm sounds like, but thanks to this book, I can. Forever.
The photos are beautiful and terrifying. The stories are witty and personal, as if your good friends are flippin' through their travel photos and describing the scenes just for you.
I almost wish I couldn't imagine what a scorpion farm sounds like, but thanks to this book, I can. Forever.
August 18, 2008
Absolutely fabulous. The pictures. The culture snippets. The recipes. The gross-out factor. The back-and-forth dialogue of a marriage. He loves it, she's a bit more . . . reticent. My favorite cookbook of all times. Not that I have actually been able to get the ingredients, mind you. One day, I am going to do a traveling pilgrimage to this book.
September 7, 2012
It's one a my favourite book about entomophagy.
You will learn a lot about new culture and the science of eating insect.
But more important you will travel and open up your mind to new cultures.
I found a book review:
You will learn a lot about new culture and the science of eating insect.
But more important you will travel and open up your mind to new cultures.
I found a book review:
September 24, 2008
I tried to read this all the way through--truly I did. But the topic of eating insects no matter how beautiful the pictures are....I'm beginning to feel nauseous just thinking about it. Like his other books, this one takes a pictorial look at bug-eating throughout the world.
July 6, 2009
This is a great book for anyone who ever thought about eating a bug! It helps you understand that many cultures throughout the world view entomophagy (bug eating) as 'normal' behavior. It is presented in a travelogue fashion with loads of gorgeous pictures (mostly of bugs).
February 15, 2013
Overview of world entomophagy. Great photography and short accompanying articles.
April 6, 2012
Fascinating! Makes me want to try tarantula!
Displaying 1 - 16 of 16 reviews
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