For our first batch, we decided to do things very simply - we bought some frozen crickets from a pet shop, ground them in a food processor after thawing and dry-frying them, and added them to a cookie mix. We walked around selling them at the Kushihara cultural festival and managed to sell all 40 bags in under 2 hours! People are always interested to try new things, and it was an unexpected surprise at a festival that normally has known, local products for sale.
But particularly, people were interested in them as a healthy product. And they said they couldn't taste the insects, perhaps because of the strong vanilla flavouring used in the cookie mix. So for our second batch, we used a really simple no-sugar vegan cookie recipe, and we bought fresh, live crickets.
And, it did! We broke a single cookie in three pieces after taking them out of the oven, and, laughing at our own hesitation, all took a bite in unison. Everything about it was a nice surprise - they really did have a 'cricket' flavour, and, combined with the sweetness of the maple syrup, this made for a very nice cookie!
Now we just need to figure out if we can farm them…