Tea bugs

There’s a culinary twist to the increasing number of bear attacks on humans happening in Japan the past several months.

Japanese authorities allowed the killing of the large animals to curb the maulings that have taken the lives of a record 13 people in the country since last year. Some of the culled bears were not buried and instead their meat was eaten like that of deer and wild boar.

Restaurant owner Koji Suzuki, who is also a hunter, serves dishes with bear meat at his eatery in Chichibu as curious customers want to taste it. One of the diners, Takaaki Kimura, found grilled bear meat so juicy and tasty, Agence France-Presse (AFP) reports.

Another restaurateur, Katsuhiko Kakuta, has been serving bear meat at his village eatery since 2021 but orders have spiked and his stock was sold out last month, according to AFP.

Meanwhile, 29-year-old Japanese entrepreneur Tsuyoshi Maruoka’s company Chu-hi-cha in Kyoto sells a unique tea made through a natural process with liqueur mixed with one of the product’s flavors. The liqueur has the aroma of a sakura mochi or rice cake wrapped in a preserved cherry leaf.

The tea is produced by plucking tea leaves which are then steamed, hand-rubbed, fermented and dried.

Maruoka accidentally discovered in 2021 the processing technique that he now uses to make his unique tea that is available in 50 flavors, The Asahi Shimbun (TAS) reports.

While studying at Kyoto University’s Graduate School of Agriculture, he received leftover larvae from a research group member and fed the tiny caterpillars cherry leaves from the campus.

The larvae later pleasantly smelled like sakura mochi. Maruoka realized the aroma came from the bugs’ small, black droppings, according to TAS. He brewed the poop and drank the “tea” which tasted good.

Maruoka produced the other caterpillar poop flavors of the Chu-hi-cha tea line by feeding the butterfly larvae apple, persimmon, and peach leaves.