Muktuk

Muktuk

In Greenland, muktuk (mattak) is sold commercially to fish factories,^[4] and in Canada (muktaaq) to other communities.^[5]

When chewed raw, the blubber becomes oily, with a nutty taste; if not diced, or at least serrated, the skin is quite rubbery.^{[citation needed]}

One account of a 21st century

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. This poses a health risk to people who eat "country food" (traditional Inuit foodstuffs).^[17] As whales grow, mercury accumulates in the liver, kidney, muscle, and blubber, and cadmium settles in the blubber,^[18] the same process that makes mercury in fish a health issue for humans. 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.^[21]

Consumption of muktuk has also been associated with outbreaks of botulism.^[22]

Spellings

Transliterations of "muktuk", and other terms for the skin and blubber, include:

• Ikiilgin, Chukchi
• Maktaaq (ᒪᒃᑖᖅ),
  North Baffin, East Baffin, South Baffin^[23]
• Maktak (ᒪᒃᑕᒃ),
  Inupiat,^[24] Siglitun, North Baffin^[25]
• Maktaq, Inuinnaqtun,^[26] Natsilingmiutut (Inuvialuktun)^[27]
• Mattak, Labrador, Greenland^[28]
• Mangtak,
  Alaskan Yup'ik^[29]
• Mungtuk,
  Siberian Yupik
• Kimaq, Alutiiq/Sugpiaq

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.[26]^[30]

See also

• Nalukataq, spring whaling festival
• Marine mammals as food
• Chukchi cuisine

References

External links

Look up muktuk in Wiktionary, the free dictionary.

• Media related to Maktaq at Wikimedia Commons