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Muktuk (transliterated in various ways, see below) is a traditional food of Inuit and other circumpolar peoples, consisting of whale skin and blubber. A part of Inuit cuisine, it is most often made from the bowhead whale, although the Beluga whale and the narwhal are also used. It is usually consumed raw, but can also be eaten frozen, cooked, or pickling.
When chewed raw, the blubber becomes oily, with a nutty taste; if not diced, or at least serrated, the skin is quite rubbery.
One account of a 21st-century indigenous whale hunt describes the skin and blubber eaten as a snack while the rest of the whale meat is butchered (Flensing) for later consumption. When boiled, this snack is known as unaaliq. Raw or cooked, the blubber and skin are served with HP Sauce, (2025). 9783030784836, Springer. ISBN 9783030784836 a British condiment, or soy sauce.
Proceedings of the Nutrition Society stated in the 1950s that:
Contaminants from the industrialised world have made their way to the Arctic marine food web. This poses a health risk to people who eat "country food" (Inuit cuisine). As whales grow, mercury accumulates in the liver, kidney, muscle, and blubber, and cadmium settles in the blubber, the same process that makes mercury in fish a health issue for humans. Whale meat also Bioaccumulation carcinogens such as PCBs, chemical compounds that damage human Nervous system, Immune system and reproductive systems, and a variety of other contaminants.
Consumption of muktuk has also been associated with outbreaks of botulism.
In some dialects, such as Inuinnaqtun, the word muktuk refers only to the edible parts of the whale's skin and not to the blubber.
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