Angelina Jolie Feeds Her Kids Bugs!

Remember drinking “bug juice” at summer camp? We knew it wasn’t literally bug juice, right? Well Angenlina Jolie and Brad Pitt‘s brood actually do eat bugs, but they’re crunchy not juicy.

While shooting her Louis Vuitton ad in Cambodia, Angelina revealed that she and her kids love to eat insects, specifically crickets. “It’s their favorite thing, ” Jolie said. “They ate them like Doritos and they wouldn’t stop. But they’re good. They are like a potato chip.”
Actually, Angelina prefers cockroaches to crickets, she told New York Magazine, but “There’s this very pointy bit on their stomach you just can’t eat. You have to kind of pop that off.”

People who eat insects actually have a name — they’re called Entomophagists. It is actually quite common in cultures around the world, such as North, Central and South America, Africa, Asia, the Middle East, Australia and New Zealand.

Angie’s infamously strange eating habits may be good for her kids. Insects are lower in fat, higher in protein, and have a better feed to meat ratio than beef, lamb, pork, or chicken.

3.5 ounces of crickets contains 121 calories, 12.9 grams of protein, 5.5 g. of fat, 5.1 g. of carbohydrates, 75.8 mg. calcium, 185.3 mg. of phosphorous, 9.5 mg. of iron, 0.36 mg. of thiamin, 1.09 mg. of riboflavin, and 3.10 mg. of niacin. That’s a bargain compared to ground beef, which, although it contains more protein (23.5 g.), also has 288.2 calories and a whopping 21.2 grams of fat!

With our epidemic of childhood obesity in the U.S., maybe swapping bugs for burgers isn’t such a bad idea. Then again, I don’t see McDonald’s offering them in their Happy Meals anytime soon, except maybe in Thailand or Cambodia.

What are your thoughts? Would you eat insects? Would you let your children do it?
——————-
This is the first article by our new contributing editor, Petra Herzog.

Ms. Herzog is a former producer and assignment editor for ABC affiliate WLOS News 13 in Asheville, North Carolina and currently works in Health Policy and Management at the Harvard School of Public Health.

We’re thrilled to have Petra on our team. Stay tuned for new and exciting stories under her byline in the days and weeks to come.