A List Of Things Thrown Five Minutes Ago

AS SOON AS POSSIBLE AFTER THE TAIL STOPS TWITCHING: If there's one thing readers of this blog have come to expect, it's having the finest muktuk coverage of any blog in the lower 48.

But I'm sure you've been wondering, lo these many months, just what does raw whale blubber taste like?

Mike Dunham of the Anchorage Daily News had a muktuk party last Sunday, and here's the answer:

Muktuk, sometimes spelled "maktak," is whale blubber, the rubbery black skin (if from a bowhead or other dark-skinned whale, but white if from a beluga) and the adjoining fat.

Eating cetaceans is somewhat out of favor in certain circles nowadays. Rejection met just more than half of my solicitations, from polite demural to "Don't even come near me with that stuff" and "No, no, God no."

But other colleagues plunged the sliver-size morsels into their maws and reported a wide range of reactions. "Kinda like sushi," said the first adventurer. "But it chews like leather."

That's why it's cut so thin -- to make mastication possible.

"It's the chewiest food on the planet," said one veteran of the cuisine. Think calamari on steroids. A big chunk, say the size of a thumb, can occupy the diner for many hours as he or she grinds out the many nutrients in the flesh. These include iron, thiamine, riboflavin, niacin, antioxidants and lots of calories. It's the ultimate energy food. Best of all, no cholesterol -- zero -- which makes a refreshing switch from pork rinds for snackers on the Atkins-style high-protein diets.

"Slightly nutty. It reminds me just a tiny bit of clams," said a relinquishing muktuk virgin. "Creamy," reported yet another. "It must be the fat." "Octopus" said others, and "bacon." I'll assume they don't fry their bacon crisp and like it with the rind on.

One member of the panel declared, "It chews like wood and tastes like Scotch tape." I also got a "Yeccch," a "That's nasty" and one "Never mind the napkin; I'll just spit it in the trash."

None of this surprises me. If you like sushi, you're probably OK with muktuk. If you can't stand fish, you probably won't like whale.

Keep reading, and find out what wine Dunham thinks goes best with muktuk and what the title of this post refers to, via this link.