On Fri, 10 Feb 2006 12:49:19 +0000, Kate Dicey
> wrote:

>Almost, though. It swam up the Themes and disrupted central London for
>a while. Unfortunately it was unwell and died later.

I don't think I would eat the meat of that one. it's the same as
eating meat from suddenly dead pigs and oxes/cows, dying of some
diseases.

As a child, we had whale meat for dinner quite often. Well treated it
tasted very good. But, it easily started tasting rancid fish oil if
mistreated. :-(

And when in military in 1970, we had fried whale cakes at least once a
week. Never tasted it since. It tastes almost like hamburgers, but a
kind of sweetier tang. (And, I did dislike hamburgers also for the
same reason afterwards. Tasted too alike whale meat cakes :-) (But, a
well made "medisterkake" or "karbonade" made of pure ox meat, I still
like. But, those sold as "hamburgers" containes far too much soy
proteins to make them cheap. :-(
("medisterkaker" and "karbonader" people has to make themselves at
home. Premade are just soy protein cakes with meat alike taste. :-(

On Sat, 18 Feb 2006, Alf Christophersen wrote, apropos the whale that
died in the Thames recently:

> I don't think I would eat the meat of that one. it's the same as
> eating meat from suddenly dead pigs and oxes/cows, dying of some
> diseases.

Lucas Bridges would agree. His view was that bulk and blubber kept a dead
whale too warm for too long, so that it putrified quickly and would be
toxic before you found it. Eating beached whales, he reports, was a
known cause of death among the natives of Tierra del Fuego. He is also
interesting on such culinary delights as guanaco brains, and the use of
seal gall in infant nutrition. If you want to know more, seek out his
"Uttermost Part of the Earth".

JW
Edinburgh

> On Sat, 18 Feb 2006, Alf Christophersen wrote, apropos the whale that
> died in the Thames recently:
>> I don't think I would eat the meat of that one. it's the same as
>> eating meat from suddenly dead pigs and oxes/cows, dying of some
>> diseases.
> Lucas Bridges would agree. His view was that bulk and blubber kept a dead
> whale too warm for too long, so that it putrified quickly and would be
> toxic before you found it. Eating beached whales, he reports, was a
> known cause of death among the natives of Tierra del Fuego. He is also
> interesting on such culinary delights as guanaco brains, and the use of
> seal gall in infant nutrition. If you want to know more, seek out his
> "Uttermost Part of the Earth".

Which has been reprinted, but look around for the 1960ish Readers'
Union book club edition, still quite common in charity shops in the
UK; they didn't reprint the photos in the paperback and they add
a lot.

The Fuegians had worse problems than food poisoning.

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