Muktuk is the traditional Inuit/Eskimo and Chukchi meal of frozen whale skin and blubber.
Muktuk is most often made from the skin and blubber of the bowhead whale, although the beluga and the narwhal are also used. Usually eaten raw, it is today occasionally finely diced, breaded, deep fried, and served with soy sauce. It is also sometimes pickled. When chewed raw, the blubber becomes oily, with a nutty taste; if not diced, or at least serrated, the skin is quite rubbery.
Muktuk has been found to be a good source of vitamin C, the epidermis containing up to 38 mg per 100 grams (3.5 oz). Blubber is also a source of vitamin D. However, it also contains PCBs, carcinogens that damage human nervous, immune and reproductive systems, that originate from industrial sources and are concentrated in the marine food web.
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.