Would you considering tucking into bug chocolate this Easter?

We all love a visit from the Easter Bunny, but what if you woke up to discover your chocolate treat came with a creepy crawly twist?

For some brave Sydney-siders, that might just be the case this Easter, because there’s a new confectionary range on the market that’s jumping with surprises.

The Edible Bug Shop is Sydney’s largest insect breeding farm and retailer, and they’re hoping the combination of chocolatey goodness and a six-legged secret ingredient will help Aussies bite the bullet when it comes to bugs.

Some Sydney restaurants have already jumped on the trend by serving bug-based dishes, but could you bring these culinary critters into your own home?

A quick browse through their online catalogue might turn a few stomachs, but once you swallow your fear you could soon be swallowing a bug in a variety of forms.

You might struggle to decide between a block of crickets on white chocolate, or ants on dark, and with six legs per piece it’s no surprise if the chilli and garlic cricket snack tickles your fancy, or maybe a bag of mealworms is your bug of choice.

An industry for the future

Food scientist and entomologist Sky Blackburn is the founder of the groundbreaking venture, and says her passion for bug food was sparked after she tried crickets for the first time in Thailand in 2007.

“I sent away some crickets for nutritional testing,” she tells Yahoo Lifestyle. “When I got the results back I was really shocked that no-one was eating them as a source of food.”

Skye is using her food and bug expertise to spread what she believes is an important message: we should all be eating bugs.

It turns out Australia is tailing the rest of the world in this department.

In 2013 the Food and Agriculture Association of the United Nations reported that 2 billion people worldwide were already eating bugs regularly at it turns out they have the right idea.

Your skin might be crawling just looking at these unusual treats, but try to shelve your hesitation because these bad boys are insanely good for both you, and the environment.

A tick for the environment

Bred in converted urban warehouses by Skye and her team, the crickets create only 1/100th of the greenhouse gas emissions compared to beef production.

You can also save four swimming pools of water a year by tucking into one insect-based meal a week, and they use a fraction of the feed that traditional breeding does.

Even their feed is made of recycled fruit and vegetable waste, and you won’t be missing out on any nutrition by swapping a steak for a cricket.

Skye says the main ingredient she wants to see in the pantry’s across Australia is a cricket protein powder that can be incorporated into virtually any recipe.

A win for your health

A roll-call of the goodness stuffed into our buggy friends is admittedly pretty compelling:

A cricket protein powder contains three times more iron than a serving of spinach, four times the calcium of a glass of milk, and three times the amount of omega-three as a piece of salmon.

Add to this plant-based and meat-based amino acids, and a host of essential vitamins and minerals and even the most bug-adverse will admit we might be doing it all wrong.

“It’s all about education,” Skye says. “With any kind of new food, it’s all about helping people understand how to use it, what the flavours are like and how you can cook with it at home.”

“20 years ago in Australia sushi was considered weird or unusual because it was raw fish. Now, sushi is widely accepted,” she says, predicting a similar future for bugs.

“I don’t think it’ll be very long before you’ll be seeing edible insects in a powder or a paste in supermarkets.”

Looks like we should all be swallowing bugs for the future of food.

Bon appetit.

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