ジンバブエの珍味「クリスマスコガネムシ」　地方に残る昆虫食

【モンドロＡＦＰ＝時事】アフリカのジンバブエ中部の村で、一年のうち今の時期に多くなる「クリスマスコガネムシ」と呼ばれる甲虫が、今年も捕れるようになった。（写真はジンバブエ・モンドロで、揚げたクリスマスコガネムシを食べる男性）
　クリスマスコガネムシは、ジンバブエに生息する暗赤色の虫で、クリスマスの時期に増える。
　同国でも都市部の食生活は欧米化しているが、地方部では昆虫食の伝統が残っている。
　首都ハラレの南西約１００キロの場所にあるモンドロ村では、この虫を軟らかくなるまでゆで、さらに揚げて食べる。
　同村に住むある男性はクリスマスコガネムシについて、おいしくてヘルシー、オーガニックで、しかもただで手に入るという、貧しい同国では特にありがたい食材だと話している。
　また７２歳の女性は「神はこの虫が健康的な食べ物だと分かっていてつくられた。都会の子どもたちに嫌われているのは残念だ」と語った。【翻訳編集ＡＦＰＢＢＮｅｗｓ】
〔ＡＦＰ＝時事〕（2020/12/24-12:28）

Earnmore Chikavaza takes a mouthful of fried beetles and munches happily, downing the crunchy snack with a mouthful of water.
He runs out of superlatives to sum up the benefits of a food that is healthy, tasty, organic and -- a special advantage in a poor country -- absolutely free.
The delicacy is the chafer beetle, also called the Christmas beetle, a dark-red Zimbabwean bug which proliferates in the southern hemisphere country at this time of year.
You don't spend anything on the beetles. They are free relish, the slender 28-year-old miner told AFP.
All you have to do is to go out in the bush and shake them off or pluck them from musasa trees and they come in summer when other forms of relish are scarce.
In Zimbabwean towns, food tastes have become westernised, but in the countryside, there remains a time-honoured tradition of eating insects, mopani worms and white ants -- the bounty of rich soil and luxuriant vegetation.
Chikavaza lives in Mhondoro, a village about 100 kilometres (60 miles) southwest of the capital Harare.
Three weeks of heavy rain have made it too dangerous to venture into the mining tunnels, so he spends time with a bowl in his hands, shaking beetles out of the trees for food.
Chikavaza takes his harvest to a local lady, Winnie Chikaonda, 72, who helps him cook the insects.
The recipe is simple -- the beetles are boiled until soft and then fried until they reach the desired level of crunchiness.
As children, we used to go out in the bush to harvest them, Chikaonda recalled.
God created them knowing they were healthy to eat. It?s a pity children from the cities don?t like them. They regard them as creepy creatures that bite.