Well-Known Burger Restaurant Adds Crickets to Milk Shake

Customers rave about the taste of Wayback Burgers’ shakes and hand-crafted burgers.

The secret ingredient to one offering: crickets. As in insects. Ground up into a protein powder – really.

Wayback Burgers will begin selling an Oreo mud pie cricket protein milkshake made with Peruvian chocolate-flavored cricket powder July 1. The chain has 95 locations nationwide from California to New York, and as far south as Florida, plus a store in Buenos Aires, Argentina.

The cricket-infused shake is touted to have extra protein from farm-raised insects, an alternative to other animal products that carry a bigger carbon footprint, CNBC reports.

“There won’t be big pieces of cricket floating in your shake or anything,” Gillian Maffeo, director of marketing for Wayback Burgers, told ABC News. “We use a protein powder that looks very similar to whey powder. … You wouldn’t even know the difference if you were drinking it, quite honestly.”

According to the restaurant chain’s website, each Oreo Mud Pie shake has 24 grams of protein in it. Another limited run shake – the Slim Jim Jerky – has 20 grams of protein.

What began as an April’s Fool’s joke received rave reviews when Wayback tested shake on Long Island, so the chain added it to the menu through Sept. 30.

The company first known as Jake’s Hamburgers was founded in 1991 in Newark, DE, and is based in Cheshire, CT. There are more than 95 Wayback Burger locations, including an Annapolis location at 2625 Riva Road, Suite D.

Other Maryland locations are in Bel Air, Elkton and Salisbury.

»Photo of company promotional material from Wayback Burgers website