Hearing words such as coniferous spruce, maple syrup and snow immediately takes one to the country called Canada. However, Canada is also quite famous for its oddities. Among those oddities, the category of bizarre food indeed takes its shining place with its unconventional menu choices. Therefore, this article’s bizarre food takes us to Northern Canada and Alaska. These regions are commonly known for their freezing weather, where summer lasts for less than two months. In other words, most of the lands in these areas are frozen and uninhabitable.
Now one would say, how does the climate relate to the choice of bizarre food? The answer is that there is a link between the environment and the food choices available to people under the said climate.
Thus, today’s choice of bizarre food, the Jellied Moose Nose, is very much linked to the icy weather of Northern Canada and Alaska because moose, due to their large size and insulating fur, are limited to cold climates.
The Origin of Jellied Moose Nose
In the 1830s, as Americans continued exploring regions like the northern and western frontiers, settlers decided to migrate to the open trails to seek a new beginning and opportunity. However, settling in northern territories came with its challenges, including a food crisis. Whenever those settlers or hunters could hunt big games like an entire moose, they would try to utilize every part of the animal so that their whole families’ ration could be covered for weeks. In other words, indigenous people of the northern part heavily depended on the hunted games for their food. Therefore, the hunters’ wives tried not to let anything go to waste.
For this reason, this bizarre food recipe was also included in the Northern Cookbook, which the Canadian government published in 1967. It is said that this book offers, to those “wilderness wives” who live in the backwood of the far north, tips on cooking. Hence, it can be said that this dish, jellied moose nose, is the result of those wilderness wives’ experimentation.
Recipe of Jellied Moose Nose
Anytime you boil something with a lot of cartilage, it will become jello. As there is a lot of cartilage in a moose’s nose, no artificial gelatin is used or given to make the jellied moose nose. Therefore, the simplified steps of creating a jellied moose nose include:
- Separate a moose’s nose from its head
- Then remove the fur by boiling it in water. It would help ensure that the outside and inside skin were removed entirely.
- After getting the smooth meat, fill a kettle with fresh water and put the whole nose. Yes, you do not need to cut the nose into bits or pieces.
- Then add onion, garlic, spices, and vinegar into the water. After that, boil and cook it over a reduced flame until the meat is tender.
- Then cool it overnight in the liquid and the next day, take out the nose and cut it into pieces while discarding the bones.
- After that, again reheat the broth and pour it over the meat pieces.
- Finally, let it cool so that the jelly will set, and then slice and serve it cold.
Taste of Jellied Moose Nose
It is said that the taste of a jellied moose nose is almost like the taste of a beef stew or corned beef. The nose meat inside the jello has a lot of flavours and a nice texture, which is not rubbery at all. Furthermore, the jello or the gelatin has the taste of pâté or, in other words, like solid soup.
In the early days, it should be noted that natural gelatin was considered a pocket soup by travellers. The reason behind this name is that they could put the gelatin in their pocket and when hungry, they could quickly eat it by boiling it in water or simply eating the gelatin raw.
Health Benefits of Jellied Moose Nose
There are no notable health benefits of a jellied moose nose. However, it should be noted that this dish does come with tags such as low-calorie, fat-free, saturated fat-free, and cholesterol-free.
To sum it up, the jellied moose nose is a delicacy in Canadian cuisine, especially Northern Canadian cuisine. However, because of its unconventional nature, it has been labelled as bizarre food in the eyes of the world. Nevertheless, for the adventurous people out there, this bizarre food can be a way to challenge themselves and their palates to a new experience.
