Day Twelve Feasts and Country Food

Taste is one of the most fickle human senses. Have you ever noticed how different people’s taste buds can be? Some like it spicy, some like it salty and sweet while other people prefer it as bland as can be. Over the past two days we’ve had a couple chances to distinguish some cultural (and personal) taste preferences.



As a send-off celebration for the Global Warming 101 expedition team the community of Clyde River held a big feast in the community hall. This feast is an extreme understatement of the generosity present within Clyde River. Around the edges of the gym there were tables sagging under the weight of cut-up turkeys, heaping cooking-pans of mashed potatoes, pots of stuffing, and cans of gravy. And in the center were three humongous blue tarps piled with frozen mounds of caribou and char, complete with heads and tails.


We’ll cut to the chase—the taste!! Actually frozen char and caribou is pretty good. And, yes, it’s frozen; the food is considered to be very different when thawed or fresh from the kill. Char tastes a lot like salmon and raw it tastes like sushi without the sticky rice and kelp. Caribou on the other hand is like rich venison and I (Allison) actually prefer it thawed and raw to frozen and raw (the boys all think I’m crazy) because the texture is more pleasant without ice crystals. In all, these country foods are very high in protein and provide a lot of energy, which is greatly needed when living in the arctic.


We’ve also had a chance to eat some cooked country foods. Last night, Geoff Ivany, his girlfriend Amy, and the lovely ladies from the health center made us a meal. There was a hefty pot of seal stew, cooked caribou (“au ju” as Jeff said!), char with lemon and spices, some steamed veggies, mashed potatoes and the Inuit delicacy muktuk (i.e. whale skin with first layer of blubber.) It was fantastic! There was a unanimous cry of delight for the caribou and char which is excellent both cooked and raw and the vegetable dishes complemented the country food well. It was interesting to note the cultural differences in the preparation and serving, too.


Now we’ve gotten a few questions about the muktuk before so we will try to answer them all here. We were told that muktuk can be served raw or cooked and has a better taste the fresher it is. The muktuk we had was raw narwhal; it was an absolute oral riot! We discovered there are three distinct layers in the muktuk. The blubber, which is a light pink, is rather squishy and chewy like cooked squid but tastes like a strong canola oil. The mottled gray-white skin is chewy too but crumbles into little pieces like aged blue cheese; the taste is very mild. In the middle between the blubber and thick skin is a very thin and very tough layer that is like chewing on the bottom of a tennis shoe. Thankfully, it tastes better than a pair of Nikes.

And after dinner we had the immense pleasure of eating Al’s (the RCMP host of Jeff and Chris) splendid apple-raspberry and apple-strawberry pies as well as a gorgeous chocolate-cherry cake. Everything tasted great!! We’re all very grateful for the generosity of our hosts and community; the food was simply marvelous!


-Allison