This year’s cicada brood will be huge. Good news: They taste like shrimp.
This year will be a big one for cicadas as Brood X, by some measures the largest population in the United States, emerges from its multi-year slumber. Cicadas are famous for emerging from the ground just once every 17 years, leaving behind intact exoskeletons, and emitting an actually-quite-pleasant-if-a-little-loud chirping noise—but they’re also edible, Inverse reported. Like soft shell crabs, they’re best eaten before their shells harden, right after they emerge from the ground. This particular batch was born in 2004, back when Facebook (then “Thefacebook”) launched as a college-only networking site. They’ll have a lot to catch up on! Here’s hoping the next time Brood X emerges in 2038 we’ll have figured a few things out.
