Brian Lehrer: Brian Lehrer on WNYC. Now, call in on the question, "What do you eat or not eat with preventing climate change in mind, including, do you ever eat a meal that includes bugs?" 212 433 WNYC 433 9692. Here's the context. As some of you know, last Thursday, we debuted a feature here on the show that we will continue for the next six months, a climate story of the week, because the climate crisis is so important to our world, but it doesn't have fast breaking news, like an invasion of Ukraine or an election campaign. We're making sure we reserve room show to talk about something climate-related at least once a week.

Today's climate story of the week might seem a little light at first, even quirky, but it sets up this simple and important question about something we can do in our own lives day-to-day to help make a difference. A question about how we're eating for climate change. How we're eating climate change for breakfast, lunch, and dinner, or how we're not. You can start calling now to answer the question, "What do you eat or not eat with preventing climate change in mind, including, do you ever eat a meal that includes bugs?" 212 433 WNYC. Why is this our climate story of the week? Well, did you see the New York Times opinion video on why, to save the planet, we should think about eating more bugs. It's not a new idea. It's not even a new practice in a lot of places around the world where crickets, locusts, termites are human food. In that video called 'The joy of cooking insects', New York City-based chef Joseph Yoon is enthusiastic about the possibilities. Listen.

Chef Joseph Yoon: You could have everything from lemony, citrusy, Black ants, nutty crickets, cheesy super worms.

Brian Lehrer: Would you eat more cheesy super worms, more insects of any kind if you saw them for sale in the store? Or, if they're already part of your diet, we definitely want to hear from you at 212 433 WNYC, 212 433 9692. The idea behind eating insects is the promise that they could provide the nutrition we need while using less water and without as much greenhouse gas production as the cattle and chickens we rely on today for meat, milk and eggs. Sound good to you? Evidently, venture capital is taking an interest in insects as food. We may [unintelligible 00:02:40] them available as our food or in what we feed livestock or pets, and yes, insects, I guess, aren't vegan, but they may be good for the climate.

Are you going to try a new more sustainable food source? If bugs are a bridge too far, what changes have you made to your diet with the planet in mind? What do you eat or not eat with preventing climate change in mind, including, do you ever eat a meal with bugs? 212 433 WNYC. Now, before we dive into this, I always want to acknowledge when we do a personal behavior segment on climate and a lot of things that the fight against climate catastrophe does not and cannot solely rely on our individual choices, right? It'll take policies and technologies that prompt change on a large scale, but our individual choices matter, too, both for the little differences that we make and to set examples for broader change.

Let us know, if you change, what you eat, with an eye on climate change, what do you eat or not eat with preventing climate change in mind, including, do you ever eat a meal that includes bugs? 212 433 WNYC 433 9692. We'll take your calls after this.

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Brian Lehrer on WNYC with our climate story of the week, asking you if you have changed your diet in any way with preventing climate change in mind, including with a nod to that New York Times opinion video, do you ever eat a meal that includes bugs? Start with Rosella in Metuchen, who I'm told is in the Whole Foods parking lot there in Metuchen. Hi, Rosella, you're on WNYC.

Rosella: Hi, good morning, Brian. I enjoy your show, and I am sitting here literally feeling bad because I hadn't done my meal plan for the week, which I try to do as I go shopping. My whole family is very conscious of everything we do, what kind of trash we bring into the house, what can be recycled, packaging. I'm sitting here going into the Whole Foods and feeling like without a plan, I am prone to sometimes buy things that I regret, especially from the packaging perspective. In terms of the question of eating bugs, I have traveled in different parts of the world where I know that's common.

I was in Thailand. I saw street foods that looked an awful lot like deep fried beetles. I can tell you that this thought is a little bit horrifying and at the same time I'm trying to get open to it, because I also sometimes can be adventurous. I think it's a good path from a climate change perspective. What I would love to see more of, though, is for my supermarket chains like Whole Foods to help support me in making the right decisions, because it's really hard to be conscious. I have the means to purchase things that are organic and less packaging, et cetera, but my choices are pretty limited.

Brian Lehrer: Rosella, thank you for starting us off that well. Good luck checking out there. Let's see. You know what, Juliana, our board op, I'm going to need a little help because my clicker seems to have stopped working. I want to go next to Sonich in Newark on line 10, as we thank Rosella in Metuchen and let her go. Hey, Sonich, can you hear me yet? There we go. Let me tell our listeners, Sonich has called in a couple of times on the Ukraine crisis in recent weeks, because he's told us he's Ukrainian.

Sonich: I'm not going to say anything about Ukraine.

Brian Lehrer: No, I know. [crosstalk] Now, you're calling in on bugs. Go ahead, Sonich.

Sonich: Yes. I did try bugs in Thailand. I was with a group and I wanted to try them. I must say that I don't particularly care for beetles because they are too hard. You have to open the shell to get to the meat, I really like bamboo worms. They are nice and soft. They give you like a stick to-- they give you like a cup with them and you have a sharp stick to point them and put them in your mouth. When I came back home to Newark, I was thinking about starting a little farm to grow those things.

Actually, there is a company that sells, I think, crickets. I purchased them. It was a good kind of exercise to offer my coworkers during beer drinks and stuff. but they're not on the same level as what they do in Thailand. It's like really nothing in cheese or something like that. I would say that I'm totally for eating insects, but if they're in the proper form, like worms. I'm telling you, it was really delicious.

Brian Lehrer: Thank you very much, getting so specific as to compare beetles and bamboo worms from a cuisine design standpoint. Thank you very much. Let's go next to Marilyn in Jamaica, on line eight. Maryland, you're on WNYC. Hi, there.

Marilyn: Hello. In Jamaica, Queens, and from Jamaica in the Caribbean.

Brian Lehrer: Ah, Jamaica times two.

Marilyn: [laughs] Yes. Unlike my three sisters, I'm very open to all different kinds of cuisines, as long as it tastes good, inviting and blessing the taste buds. I'm very open to eating whatever, but a thought I have is why don't they try to introduce them to children of a certain age who have started becoming curious about different things in the world? Wouldn't it be better or wouldn't it be good to introduce it to the children?

Brian Lehrer: It's a really good thought, because the things that we eat as kids can tend to feel normal to us when we're adults and even become our comfort food, right?

Marilyn: I am sure some of these things taste really good. It's just very different for this part of the world. They have stuff like Mopane worms, I think, they eat in Bostwana. They fry caterpillars in Zimbabwe. I've heard Jamaicans who've traveled there say that those snacks were delicious. Those fried caterpillars.

Brian Lehrer: Marilyn, thank you so much. Please call all us again. We're really glad you called us today, as we're taking calls on how you've adjusted your diet to be climate-friendly, including, have you ever eaten bugs? Which some people say could be a form of protein that's both affordable and climate-friendly relative to the agriculture that we generally have in this country and in this world. I think Pamela in Manhattan on line seven is calling about just that. Hi, Pamela. You're on WNYC.

Pamela: Hi, Brian. First, I'm really grateful for your show and your intelligence and your kindness.

Brian Lehrer: Thank you.

Pamela: Besides that, I think the animal agriculture is one of the worst polluters and use of our resources, and water especially. The cattle ranchers and stuff, they don't have to pay for water. I just think it's real abuse of our resources. I don't think anybody in this world should be hungry and so much food is grown as animal food.

Brian Lehrer: That's exactly right. Thank you very very much. Some people, maybe even Pamela, who go back long enough might have been influenced by the book by Frances Moore Lappé, Diet For A Small Planet, which came out back in the '70s and brought that idea, the very one Pamela was just talking about, to a lot of Americans' consciousness. Think of how much grain is produced in the world just to feed the animals that produce the meat to feed us.

There was a equity aspect to it, but of course there's also a climate sustainability aspect. Some things coming in on Twitter. Samuel writes, "There's a spider market outside Phnom Penh in Cambodia. I tried several bugs and scorpions. They were surprisingly good. Intuition says on Twitter, writes, "I gave up meat seven plus years ago strictly for climate change. The funny thing about quitting something, it opens your mind to trying something new. Yes, I have eaten crickets and scorpions." Darren in Longmont, Colorado. You're on WNYC. Hi, Darren.

Darren: Hi, Brian how you doing?

Brian Lehrer: Doing great. What you got for us?

Darren: Basically, we were just having this conversation with our neighbors. We were over there for dinner last night. I've been vegetarian for 20 plus years now. We have kids and we're talking about the New York Times article. My wife and I have been actually introducing flowers made from bugs and stuff into our children's-- some of their bake stuff. They don't really know [laughs]. It all tastes great and we've been discussing this dietary plan for years now. It was just funny that this article came up and then your show came up and you were talking about the same thing.

Brian Lehrer: Bugs for the kids, but you didn't--

Darren: We tell our kids that bugs are in their cookies and everything, too. People don't realize how much bug matters in their makeup and baked goods and canned goods [laughs].

Brian Lehrer: First, you'll give them the chocolate chip cookie and then later you tell them what insects were in them, right?

Darren: Maybe, something like that.

Brian Lehrer: Maybe eventually. Darren, thank you very much. We're going to move on to line nine. Ethan in Queens, you're on WNYC. Hi, Ethan.

Ethan: Hi, thanks for having me on.

Brian Lehrer: Thanks for making the call.

Ethan: For my personal diet, I've pretty much eliminated most meat for climate change purposes as well as, and this is surprising to a lot of people, quinoa. Just the transportation on quinoa alone makes it horrible for the environment, not to mention, removes a staple food source from indigenous cultures in places like Peru.

Brian Lehrer: I'm going to have to look into that. I did not know that about quinoa.

Ethan: I also wanted to make the point on micro proteins. I have tried micro proteins from around the world, but I wanted to make the point that if you're importing your crickets from South America, you're not helping the environment because of the transportation costs. All of these types of micro proteins have to be local, and for Jewish people like me, cannot actually be part of the diet.

Brian Lehrer: Wait, bugs are not kosher?

Ethan: Most bugs are not kosher. The only Jewish community that has retained knowledge of which locusts are actually allowed in the Torah is the Yemenite Jewish community, where every other Jewish community bugs are pretty much off the menu in all forms.

Brian Lehrer: That is so interesting, but Ethan, it sounds like you're a very conscious eater with respect to sustainability. Thank you for putting those items on our table, and listeners, that's our climate story of the week for this week. Again, with thanks to the New York Times opinion video on eating bugs as sustainable food. That's the Brian Lehrer Show for today, produced by Lisa Allison, Zoe Azulay, Amina Srna, Carl Boisrond and Ryan Wilde. Our interns this spring semester are Anna Conkling, Gigi Steckel and Diego Munhos. Zach Gottehrer-Cohen edits our daily politics podcast. Tell your friends around the country to subscribe. Megan Ryan is the head of live radio and we had Juliana Fonda putting those callers on the air when I couldn't at the audio controls. I'm Brian Lehrer.

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