It’s time to make a bug:

We bought this at a grocery store in Beppu after seeing an article about it on TV. At the time this was apparently the best-selling candy making kit in Japan, and the article documented the challenges the company overcame bringing it to market, such as convincing stores that it wasn’t a bad thing having a bug-based food item on shelves 🙂

It’s a fairly simple kit and includes an impressively strong mold for the rhinoceros beetle pupa it makes.

The two packets are combined with water to make a lemon-soda flavoured jelly. It seems impossible that the tiny amount of water the instructions require will be enough, but the powders dissolve quickly and the little tray ended up full of a gelatinous goo which was then poured into the mold:

We’d done a similar step once before in a candy kit but the material was more fluid and leaked out the mold. This wasn’t a problem here:

Next it cooled in the fridge for a half hour and then was ready:

Or at least it was supposed to be! Ours didn’t seem to set correctly and while it popped out of the mold easily it quickly disintegrated when touched. At least it tasted good.

Fun to make, but apparently something went wrong 🙂