8.10.9 Pastry

Contents - Previous - Next

Add insect flour to make pastry for a pie crust or empanadas, to which fillings can be added made of fruits or vegetables.

Mix all the dry ingredients well, then add the shortening and mix into a paste. Add the water slowly, to form a fairly dry dough but with all the flour moistened. Flatten the dough on a powdered suiface to a thickness of 3-4 mm and place in a baking form, pie pan or similar. Add a filling prepared according to your own recipe and bake. The baking temperature and time will depend on the filling and on the size and shape of the pastry.

Empress Barbara Tarts

Sift both flours and the salt into a bowl or break up any lumps manually. Cut in the butter with a pastry blender or by stirring with a fork. Stir in the cream with a fork until a ball of dough can be easily formed. Wrap in waxed paper or foil and chill for 2 hours. The cream can also be replaced by 2 tablespoons of butter and 1 tablespoon of milk or water.

Mix all the ingredients for the filling together. Roll out the dough extra thin and cut into circles of 8 cm diameter. Place a heaped teaspoon of filling in the centre. Bring opposite edges of the pastry to the centre and roll-up overlapping dough, sealing the edges well. Arrange on a baking sheet and cook in a preheated oven at 205 ⁰C for 15 minutes. Serve with hot mustard.

Cheese tarts

Biscuit dough sufficient for about one dozen biscuits is required. One example of dough can be prepared as follows:

Sift the first three ingredients into a large bowl or manually remove lumps, then add the butter by cutting it into the dry ingredients with two knives or a fork until the mixture has the consistency of coarse cornmeal. Make a bowl in the centre of the ingredient mix and add all of the milk at once. Stir until the dough comes away from the sides of the bowl. Place the dough onto a lightly floured board and knead gently and quickly for ˝ to 1 minute.

Roll or pat the dough until it is about 2-3 mm thick. Cut it into squares of 7 cm. Place in the centre of each square one teaspoon of the filling. Moisten the corners of the dough with water, fold up the corners and pinch them together to make a tart shape. Bake the tarts at 2200~235 ⁰C for about 10 minutes.

Other ingredients that may be added to the biscuit dough include grated cheese, chopped bacon, ham, onions, parsley and other herbs. The artichokes in the filling can be replaced by other chopped, leafy vegetables. The tarts can also be filled with fruit fillings.

8.10.10 Popmoth

Heat some cooking oil and drop fresh (live) or frozen wax moth larvae into the hot oil. Their skin will break and the proteins will expand, making them look like popcorn. Remove them before they become too dark, let the oil drip off them and salt or flavour them with other spice mixtures similar to popcorn, potato or banana chips. They might also taste good with honey, or quickly turned in the candy mix described below.

This product should be packaged attractively in clear plastic bags for sale in markets or stores. Once fried like this, it may be stored for some time without spoiling.

8.10.11 Bee sweets and chocolate coated bees

The following recipes can be easily adapted to accommodate various, similar ingredients and provide honey-based sweets, with or without bee and insect larvae. They are easily made in any pastry shop or home kitchen and preserve well for sale in markets and shops. Powdered pollen pellets can also be added. Neatly packaged, they provide an attractive and very nutritious snack.

Candybees

Mix the butter, sugar and honey. Beat until smooth, then stir in the insects. Place in a baking dish in the oven at 190⁰C for approximately 30 minutes. After cooling, break or cut into pieces. (See also candy recipes in Chapter 2.)

The butter can be replaced with another cooking oil; for an agreeable flavour try coconut, peanut or sunflower oil. Dark sugar gives a nicely coloured end product and is a little healthier than white sugar, but the latter can be used instead. With a little practice, the candy can also be made in a covered frying-pan over a low fire. Be careftil not to burn the sugar.

Carob Fudge

Place the honey, milk, butter and carob powder in a heavy saucepan or pot. Heat slowly until the mixture is well blended and then cook without stirring, until the temperature reaches 115 ⁰C (at this temperature, the mixture will form a soft ball when a drop is placed in cold water). Cool to 50⁰C and then beat until the mixture loses its glossiness. Add the vanilla and the insects. Pour into a greased pan of approximately 20 x 20 cm size. when set, cut into 5 cm squares or smaller.

The carob powder can be replaced with chocolate powder or instant cacao powder.

Chocolate larvae

In a saucepan or small pot, mix the honey, cream, chocolate and salt. Cook over a medium heat, stirring constantly until the chocolate is melted and the honey has dissolved. Continue cooking over low heat (stirring occasionally) to a temperature of 112 ⁰C or until a small amount of mixture forms a ball when dropped into iced water. Remove the mixture from the heat, add butter and cool to 50⁰C without flirther stirring. Then add the vanilla and beat vigorously with a wooden spoon until candy is thick and no longer glossy - about 7 to 10 minutes. Stir in the insects and spread the mix evenly in a buttered flat pan. Cool until firm and cut into 5 cm squares.

Toffee

Butter a baking pan (about 20x20x5 cm). Heat the sugar and butter in a saucepan or small pot, to boiling. Boil over medium heat for 7 minutes, stirring constantly. Remove from the heat, stir in the bees and pour into the pan. Sprinkle the chocolate over the hot mixture and cover so that the contained heat will melt the chocolate. After a couple of minutes, spread the melted chocolate over the candy. while still warm, cut into 3-4cm squares. Refrigerate until firm.

This toffee can be sold easily as it is, but unfortunately the chocolate will hot climates or, if left in the sun.

Banana Sicle

Place the peanut butter, powdered milk, honey and cream in an electric blender and chop until smooth. Roll the bananas in the mixture and sprinkle with the insects. Freeze. This makes a very nutritious popsicle.

If cream is not available, use regular whole milk and boil slowly until it is reduced to ˝ or ¹A of the original volume.

Popcorn Crunch

Blend the butter (or vegetable oil substitutes) and honey together in a saucepan and heat gently. Mix the popcorn with the insects and pour the butter-honey mixture over

it. Mix well. Spread on a cookie sheet in a thin layer. Bake at 175 ⁰C for 10 to 15 minutes or until crisp. Break into bite-sized pieces. Vanilla flavour can be added to the honey-butter.

Peanut butter squares

Combine all the ingredients in a large bowl and mix until they stick together. Press into a flat, buttered pan. Cut into squares and serve, or wrap squares in clear plastic (or waxed paper) for sale. A Ľ cup (?f dried, powdered pollen can also be added. The brewer's yeast is not essential and the nuts and seeds can be replaced by others (see also Chapter 2 recipes).

Peanut butter or any other oil-rich nut butter can be produced nuts and stirring the mixture well, in order to avoid separation of oil

Bee-Oatmeal Cookies

Warm the butter until soft, and vigorously stir in the eggs and vanilla. Add the honey and the water. In a separate bowl blend all the dry ingrediends exept the oats. Join the liquid and dry portion, stir and add the rolled oats. Place heaped teaspoonfuls of the mix 5 cm apart on a lightly greased baking sheet (makes 70 to 80 cookies). Bake for 8 to 10 minutes at 175° C. This recipe is enough to make 70 to 80 cookies.

Honeybee granola bars

Mix the dry ingredients, except the raisins and pollen. Mix the honey and oil separately, then combine the wet and dry mixtures. Spread the granola mixture on a lightly greased cookie sheet, frying pan or flat metal sheet. Bake at 160⁰C for 35 minutes, stirring often for even baking. when partially cool, mix in the pollen, raisins or other dried fruits and press together into a layer about 1 cm thick. Allow to cool completely and cut into squares or strips.

These bars can be packed easily and will keep for several weeks in cool storage. Rolled oats can be replaced by other grains, e.g. puffed rice. To make rolled grains, soak whole grains in water for a few hours and/or briefly boil and drain them and then carefully pound or squeeze them under a heavy rolling pin or grinding stone.

Bee Bars

Mix the honey, sugar, milk and salt in a small pot. Boil over medium heat, stirring occasionally until a small amount makes a ball when dropped into cold water (or the candy thermometer reads 112 ⁰C). Remove from the heat and mix in the butter. Cool the mixture to 50⁰C, without ffirther stirring. Add the vanilla and beat with a wooden spoon until the mixture becomes thick and is no longer glossy. Shape the candy into a 30 cm roll, then roll it in the finely chopped bee brood. Wrap in waxed paper and chill until firm. Cut into 5 mm slices.

8.10.12 How to raise and harvest wax moth larvae

The requirements to raise wax moth larvae are minimal: several 3 - 4 litre containers (preferably glass), a diet medium, i.e. food, and a few wax moth adults to lay eggs.

The adult wax moth can be collected from any beekeeper. Several larvae or cocoons are suitable too if they are kept in a small breeder jar, a small ('A litre) glass, metal or plastic container with a screened hole in the lid, covered with paper or cloth. The breeder jar should have some crumpled or folded paper in the bottom on which the moths can lay their eggs.

500 to 1,000 eggs can be placed into one of the larger 4 litre "growth" container. The "growth" container should have a lid with a 3-5 cm hole which is covered with fly screen and a thin cloth or paper towel, the latter to keep the dirt out and the former to keep the larvae in.

The eggs and the diet medium for the larvae are placed in the large "growth" jar and maintained at 30° to 34⁰C, away from direct sunlight. At the lower temperature, cocooning begins after 6 weeks and at the higher temperature after 4 weeks, but wax moth larvae will survive well between 25° and 37 ⁰C.

Harvesting can begin as soon as the larvae start cocooning. Then, every three days, the cocoons are removed from the jar walls. Removing the larvae after cocooning ensures that they will have eliminated all faecal matter and other wastes (this is true for honeybee pupae and all other pupating insects). At this stage, i.e. before pupating, but after cocooning, the wax moth larvae can be kept alive for over a year at 15 ⁰C and 60% relative humidity. In order to perpetuate the culture, a few cocoons are allowed to pupate and hatch inside another breeder jar. Sixteen days after setting up the breeder jar, the eggs can be transferred into the larger, "growth" containers. After a few generations, a few newly collected females or males should be introduced into the breeder jar.

The survival and growth rate depends very much on the diet. Since wax moths are very adaptable in regard to their diet and since they are used worldwide in laboratories for all kinds of tests, there are many simple and more sophisticated diets. According to Eischen and Dietz (1990), however, have shown that even a good artificial diet can still be improved by adding a mixture of pollen and wax and (preferably) even honey. Adding of propolis However, reduces growth rate and survival (Eischen and Dietz, 1987). The following are a few diet recipes:

Diet recipes

1) After Taylor and Carter, 1976:

A technical diet medium is made up by boiling together ˝ cup each of sugar, glycerol and water. when cool, mix quickly with Ľ teaspoon of a vitamin mixture (Meads Deca- Vi-Sol) and five cups of dry Pablum (Mead-Johnson mixed cereal). Survival rate on this diet is approximately 50% and 110 to 170 g of larvae can be grown on one cup of this diet.

2) A standard diet after Jindra and Sehinal, 1989:

Ingredients (in parts by weight):

The cereal flour should ideally consist of a mix of wheat flour and maize and wheat meal in the ratios 1:2:1. The dry components are heated to gether for sterilization for 2 hours at 80 ⁰C and mixed with the pre-heated wax, glycerol and honey. Once cool, 200 ml (or 250 g) of the mix is poured into each "growth" jar. If the diet cannot be refrigerated or frozen, a new batch has to be made every week.

The same amount of the diet (250 g) is fed to the larvae on day 1 and again, according to need, on either day 7 to 9, 13 to 15, 18 to 20 and 23 to 25 i.e. total of 1250 g per 1000 eggs. Different feeding regimes (such as supplying all the food at once) may be more practical, but this can only be done if the feed has been sterilized properly. Optimal growing conditions for Galleria larvae are also ideal for most microorganisms. Therefore, under most circumstances, frequent replacement of food is usually better than one large feeding.

According to Eischen and Dietz (1990), it should be possible to improve most standard diets by adding a mixture of honey, pollen and wax. The pollen might function also as a feeding attractant and perhaps stimulant. Eischen and Dietz have improved the survival of larvae from 27.4% on a standard diet to 89.6% with only honey, pollen and wax. However, adding only 5 % of the honey, pollen and wax to the standard diet increased survival to above 80%. Survival to pupation was even better. Addition of propolis and very old brood combs should be avoided, since it strongly reduces survival and growth rates (Eischen and Dietz, 1987).

3) The honey/pollen/wax diet of Eischen and Dietz (1990)consists of:

63% pollen (dried or fresh trap collected bee pollen pellets) from different plant species and 37% of honeycomb (wet cappings from harvesting). The cappings contained about 50% honey and 50% new wax. The mix was not heated, but kept frozen until use. The economics of this diet were not considered and a compromise between maximum survival and growth, and an affordable diet will have be determined for a commercial grower.

4) A sufficient diet for which any beekeeper has the ingredients:

Take some comb (but not too old or black) break it into small pieces and measure about three to four times the amount suggested in the second diet recipe above. New comb or uncappings are better because they contain less propolis and a weight equal to the one required in the second diet recipe would be sufficient. Replace the milk and yeast powder with 20 parts of pollen pellets, or use extra broken comb with bee bread. Use 30 to 40 parts of any cereal flour or flour mix and 20 to 30 parts of honey or concentrated sugar syrup. Glycerol may also be added. Make small amounts fre quently, since the pollen should not be heated for steralization. Store all the ingredients dry and separately.

Keep the growing larvae in the dark and start harvesting when the first larvae start spinning their cocoons. Larval faeces still contain considerable amounts of nutrients and may be added to the feed for other animals.

Adapt the proportions of any of these diets to local ingredients and test for survival and growth. A survival rate from egg to pupation of above 50% is acceptable, above 80% is very good. Final weight per larvae should be above 150 mg each. Larvae eating the second diet during their last 4.5 days reached an average body weight of 200 mg (from 50 to 65 mg per larvae at the beginning of the last instar). The diet for the earlier instars was a semi-artificial diet. An oversupply of proteins or carbohydrates does not increase growth. An optimal diet during the last instar made a difference of up to 35 % in body weight. Feeding the more expensive honey, pollen and beeswax diet only during the last instar, may therefore be more economical.

Contents - Previous - Next