Great grub - Oswestry chef to dish up creepy crawly cuisine at Llangollen food festival

Scrumptious crickets, meal worms, beetles and other bugs will be on the menu at the Llangollen Food Festival that’s being held on Saturday and Sunday, courtesy of Jack Hatley, the head chef at the town’s Gales Wine Bar and Hotel.

He has taken his inspiration from the hit TV show I’m a Celebrity... Get Me Out of Here, in which the contestants are challenged to tuck into a whole host of creepy-crawlies.

According to Jack, who lives in Oswestry, some of the world’s top rated Michelin-starred restaurant are now serving up insects in their culinary masterpieces.

He said: “Insects are seen as a staple source of protein to many people around the world yet we seem to have a real hang up about eating them.

“A restaurant called Noma, in Copenhagen, which has two Michelin stars and has been voted in the world’s top 50 restaurant list for many years, is using insects in some of their dishes and they forage for many of their ingredients.

“Insects are a fantastically healthy food source and are very abundant and breeding insects as food has a range of environmental advantages. We just need to have a cultural change to make insects more acceptable as a food source.”

Jack who in the past has worked at Chester’s Grosvenor Hotel and a top Jersey hotel, added: “This will be my third year demonstrating at the Llangollen Food Festival.

“I want to get members of the public up to try these insect dishes and gauge the reaction.

“The plan this year is to make a grass hopper guacamole, cricket cookies and a meal worm arancini – deep fried balls of rice packed with meal worms.”