In one way, Big Cricket Farms is just what it sounds like, that is, a farm that raises crickets. But it’s also something that it might not sound like: a food supplier.
The Ohio-based startup, open since April, aims to bring Americans around to what two billion people worldwide already believe – that insects can be a delicious, inexpensive and environmentally friendly source of protein.
Founder Kevin Bachhuber is already working with several local businesses, including a burger joint creating an insect topping and a bakery using finely-ground crickets as flour in cookies. The farm is also supplying a Boston-based startup named Six Foods with the main ingredient for “Chirps” – baked snack chips made from cricket flour, beans and rice. Six Foods is using $70,000, which it raised on crowdfunding website Kickstarter, to produce and package sea salt, aged cheddar and hickory BBQ flavored Chirps, which it plans to deliver to US grocery stores in October.
