David Gracer, in the chef’s toque, serves edible insects at an entomologists’ conference in New Haven recently. Gracer will present some of his specialties tomorrow at the Audubon Society of Rhode Island’s headquarters in Smithfield.

SPECIAL TO THE JOURNAL / KIM JASON

Giant water beetles, sautéed in butter, taste like a salty and sweet fruit explosion, one of the edible bug dishes made by David Gracer at an entomologists’ conference in New Haven.

SPECIAL TO THE JOURNAL / KIM JASON

PROVIDENCE — David Gracer cooked bugs for breakfast one day recently.

And I ate them.

In the kitchen of his East Side home, Gracer fried up some silkworm pupae, crickets, cicadas and a giant water beetle, a four-inch long bug with a Darth Vader head.

The breakfast was a preview of a presentation scheduled for tomorrow at 3 p.m. in Smithfield where he’ll serve a variety of cooked insects. On Halloween, he’ll prepare buggy bar snacks at Laiterie, a restaurant in Wayland Square.

A poet and writing teacher at the Community College of Rhode Island, Gracer became interested in edible insects in 1999 after he received a package of flavored mealworms as a birthday gift. His interest in bug munching piqued when he attended a presentation by David George Gordon, author of the Eat-A-Bug Cookbook, at Roger Williams Park.

Much of the world eats insects, Gracer said. They’re abundant in the wild, easy and efficient to cultivate, nutritious, and tasty. “Americans are in the absolute minority when it comes to eating insects,” he said. “We’re lagging behind.”

Gracer captures some of his insects in the wild, many of them right there on the East Side. (He is especially fond of katydids.) He buys other bugs in Asian markets where they come canned, dried, and shrink-wrapped on little Styrofoam meat trays.

Like crayfish, terrestrial insects are easy and efficient to grow. When a beef steer eats 100 pounds of feed it will gain 10 pounds, Gracer said. When a bunch of mealworms eat 100 pounds of feed, they will gain 40 pounds collectively.

In a bugs-to-burgers comparison, insects contain more protein and important trace elements with less fat, Gracer said.

Insects are kosher, even though their maritime cousins, lobsters and crabs, are unacceptable.

“It’s right there in Leviticus,” Gracer said. “They creep on the land, but they fly like birds.”

Flavor?

For breakfast recently, Gracer sautéed all of the insects, one species at a time, in butter without any seasoning, so each bug’s distinctive flavor would shine. When he appears in Smithfield tomorrow, he plans to create dishes that include vegetables and other ingredients, including chicken eggs with ant larvae, and veggies with house crickets.

Gracer’s silkworms were like tofu, with a similar texture and flavor, which is to say flavorless. They tasted like the butter in which they were cooked, with an earthy finish, hinting of potato. Gracer thinks they taste like cheese. I’d give them another try if they were cooked with black bean sauce, but I’d prefer crickets.

The house crickets were delicious, a cross between crab and peanuts, and buttery. We also had some dried mole crickets; they were deliciously nutty and earthy. They would have been scrumptious later in the day with a cold beer next to a trout stream where they’d also be great bait.

The cicadas, which Gracer caught himself, would be nice in a stir-fry with vegetables, and maybe some hoi sin sauce. They were pleasantly crunchy with an interior that was creamy.

To serve the giant water beetle, Gracer snapped off the Darth Vader head and placed it on the table where it glared at me. Then he split the bug down the abdomen with a knife, and cracked it open like a blue crab. The water beetle has muscles where pectorals would be on a mammal. Gracer pulled them out with a seafood pick and handed one to me.

It had the texture of tamale, the green stuff inside a lobster. The flavor was unlike anything I have ever tasted. It was salty and sweet. Like bananas and apples and mangoes all at once on the tip of the tongue. Farther back, there were the flavors of pear and melon and grapefruit. Amazing.

To get more people to try edible insects, Gracer has started a company called Sunrise Land Shrimp, online at www.slshrimp.com. His primary mission is educational, but he said he will also cater parties with insect snacks.

Tomorrow’s presentation “is about edible insects, but it’s also about inviting people to open their minds and have some fun,” he said. “Lots of folks have a psychological block about eating insects, and while that’s their right, a whole new world of taste sensations is waiting. And by the way, eating insects is a lot better for the planet, so there’s that to think about.”

If the weather cooperates, he may go outdoors and everyone can hunt their own bugs to eat, but, he warns:

“If you’re allergic to shrimp, you’re probably going to be allergic to insects, too.”

The event will be held at the Audubon Society of Rhode Island headquarters at Powder Mill Ledges, 12 Sanderson Rd., in Smithfield. Admission is $10 for Audubon Society adult members and $15 for others. Children’s tickets are $5 for members and $7 for others. Space is limited, and reservations are required. For more information and to reserve tickets, contact the Audubon Society at (401) 949-5454.