By CHARLES FERRUZZA
I've never eaten a bug on purpose, although I suspect I may have unintentionally digested a few after peeking into certain restaurant kitchens over the years. But according to this recent article, bugs are making a comeback in some culinary circles. And who knew that chocolate-covered bugs were an "educational resource" for teachers?
This news reminded me of the family-owned supermarket a couple of blocks from my childhood home that my mother preferred to the less-expensive A&P supermarket that was right across the street. My mother liked the fact that the smaller market carried gourmet groceries and that local celebrities, like Frances Farmer, a 1930s movie star and alleged lobotomy survivor liked to shop there.
I still have dreams about that little store: mostly pestering my mother to buy a package of Hostess Sno-Balls or a candy bar. I was invariably pulling anything that looked like candy off the shelves. That was probably the reason I discovered, in the gourmet foods section of the building, a clear plastic box with foil-wrapped squares of chocolate with a very unusual label: Chocolate-covered ants.
I couldn't believe my eyes, but my mom insisted that was the highly sophisticated nature of "gourmet foods." They weren't for "our kind of people" -- whatever that was -- but for men and women with eccentric, unusual tastes. You know, people who eat bugs.
Call me an unadventurous eater, but I'm not just interested in snacking on bugs right now. Maybe after my lobotomy.
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