All 30 MLB teams across the nation offer a wide array of mouthwatering foods for fans to savor during games. Recently, Detroit Tigers on-field reporter Daniella Bruce expressed her unfortunate reaction after trying one of the more peculiar delicacies available at an MLB stadium: chili-lime chapulines, or roasted grasshoppers, while the Tigers faced off against the Seattle Mariners.
This was highlighted during Friday’s Tigers-White Sox broadcast when Andy Dirks, who mistakenly referred to the grasshopper dish as crickets, asked Bruce about her experience with the chapulines.
“Daniella Bruce, our intrepid reporter, went hunting for some food in Seattle,” said Dirks. “I don’t know what was better, that ice cream or the crickets. Those cilantro-lime crickets. Daniella, did you try them?” Bruce didn’t seem thrilled about the snack, responding, “I did taste one. One. I told you I would do it right. And then I got this little cup of crickets. I thought they might be fried, you might not know that it’s a cricket right away, but it just looked like dried crickets. They were okay.”
“They got that nice little pop.” – The Detroit Tigers broadcasting team shares their thoughts on eating crickets 🦗 pic.twitter.com/rV78cAiYf2
— Awful Announcing (@awfulannouncing) April 4, 2025
Dirks further repulsed viewers by detailing how he used to eat crickets without any cooking or seasoning, reminiscing about the pop they made when bitten into. “Did it pop in your mouth?” he asked, to which Bruce replied, “Yeah, it was a weird crunch.” “When I used to eat crickets, that’s what I used to remember, the pop,” Dirks added.
When Bruce inquired if he ever cooked the crickets, Dirks mentioned he did not, as he would catch them in his childhood home basement and eat them raw. “Maybe don’t want to talk about that… I mean, I didn’t know you needed to cook a cricket,” he said, recalling how his mom would hear them and send him to track them down when their chirping kept her awake at night.
“Well, that one probably didn’t have the cilantro-lime flavor,” Bruce quipped, to which Dirks replied, “It did not.”
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Dirks likely doesn’t indulge in crickets or grasshoppers much these days, but knowing that her on-air partner had a worse experience may at least ease Bruce’s discomfort regarding her culinary adventure.