Cecile’s latest batch of students watched attentively as she launched into the last step of the dish — swirling grasshoppers around in a frying pan before setting them on the coucous.

In their bid to find an environmentally-friendly alternative to meat, Richard, 41, Mariet, 53, and Seppo, 43, are looking to insects.

And they are counting on Cecile to show them how to cook a menu of couscous, hamburger and baklava pastries with mealworms, grasshoppers or other insect larvae as key ingredients.

“The point is to find an alternative to meat. Not necessarily to replace it, but to reduce it,” said Mariet, who has paid 50 euros ($68)for tonight’s course.

“It’s easier if someone teaches you,” she said, at Cecile’s kitchen in southeastern Netherlands’ Sittard.

A smiling Richard confesses that, for him, insects offer a perfect middle-path between being a carnivore and a herbivore.

“I want to live in a healthy way, but being vegetarian is a bit too hard for me,” said Richard, who acquired a taste for creepy crawlies while traveling in southeast Asia.

With the meat industry stricken with problems, from horsemeat labeled as beef to the environmental impact of growing animal feed, protein-rich and fat-poor insects are increasingly seen as a viable alternative.

Ten times more feed is required to grow the comparable weight in cows than in insects, according to the Netherlands’ Wageningen University, which has a special insect department and was a pioneer at promoting their consumption.

Insect eating has not yet won mainstream acceptance in Europe, although around two billion people elsewhere in the world consume them regularly.

Most Europeans remain reluctant to bite into a grasshopper, grub or other insect even if they are dry, clean and disease free.

“Seriously, I don’t understand why people are so disgusted by insects,” said Seppo, sprinkling a handful of grasshoppers over his steaming couscous dish.

“Frankly, I know what I’d prefer if I had to choose between an insect or seafood such as an oyster or mussel,” he said.

Meanwhile Mariet is mixing mealworms with minced beef to make burgers, renamed here “hambuggers,” a potentially problematic name in English-speaking countries, while Richard browns some grasshoppers marinated in soya sauce in the frying pan.