Muktuk

Muktuk[1] (transliterated in various ways, see below) is a traditional food of Inuit and other circumpolar peoples, consisting of whale skin and blubber.

[14] Blubber is also a source of vitamin D.[15] Proceedings of the Nutrition Society stated in the 1950s that: The most important item of food of the Polar Eskimos is the narwhal (Monodon monoceros).

[...] The skin (mattak) is greatly relished and tastes like hazel-nuts; it is eaten raw and contains considerable amounts of glycogen and ascorbic acid.

The White whale (Delphinupterus leucas) is almost as important...[16]Contaminants from the industrialised world have made their way to the Arctic marine food web.

Whale meat also bioaccumulates carcinogens such as PCBs, chemical compounds that damage human nervous, immune and reproductive systems,[19][20] and a variety of other contaminants.

Sliced and prepared muktuk
Canadian Inuit elders sharing muktuk, outside their summer tents, 2002
Expedition team of German photographer Ansgar Walk eating muktuk in celebration of a young hunter's catch in the Canadian Arctic , 1997