[Excerpts from “The Northern Cookbook” - a now out-of-print 1967 Canadian government publication of backwoods recipes from native & non-native peoples in Canada’s far north…]

Baked Skunk
Clean, skin, wash. Bake in oven with salt and pepper. Tastes like rabbit (no smell).

Bear Fat Pastry
1-1/2 cups flour, ½ tsp. salt, 1/3 cup bear fat (from a little black bear that was eating berries). Makes rich white pastry.

Boiled Bone Grease
Boil whatever bones are left after all the meat has been cut off. Boil them all in a big pot for two hours. Then let the grease get cold in the pot. It is easy to pick the grease off. Keep the grease to eat with dry meat or add to pounded meat.

Boiled Lynx
Cut up the lynx and boil it until it is soft and well cooked. Good to eat with muktuk.

Boiled Porcupine
Make a fire outside and put the porcupine in it to burn off the quills. Wash and clean well. Cut up and boil until done.

Boiled Reindeer Head
Skin and wash the head well. Then chop it in quarters, splitting it between the eyes with an axe. Cover with cold water and boil until soft. One can also roast in an open pan in an oven very slowly.

Boiled Reindeer Or Caribou Hoofs
Put hoofs (skin still on them) in a large pot. Cover and boil for a couple of hours. The skin will peal off easily. The muscles are soft and very good to eat. The toe nails also have some soft sweet meat inside them.

Boiled Reindeer Tongues
Boil tongues until thoroughly cooked. Potatoes and vegetables are good with this.

Boiled Smoked Beaver
Smoke the beaver for a day or so. Cut up the meat and boil it with salted water until done.

Dry Fish Pudding
Pound up 5 to 6 dry fish. Throw away skin. Add sugar, a little grease, and cranberries.

Frozen Fish Eggs
Take fish eggs out and freeze them. They are good to eat like this.

Grizzly Bear Steaks
Cut up meat as for frying and fry in deep grease in frying pan.

Jellied Moose Nose
Cut the upper jaw bone of the moose just below the eyes. Boil in a large kettle for 45 minutes. Remove and chill. Pull out all the hairs (like plucking a duck) and wash until none remain. Place nose in a kettle and cover with fresh water. Add onion, garlic, spices, and vinegar. Bring to a boil, then reduce heat and simmer until meat is tender. Let cool overnight. When cool, discard the bones and cartilage. You will have white meat from the bulb of the nose and dark meat from the bones and jowls. Slice thinly and alternate layers of white and dark meat in a loaf pan. Let cool until jelly has set. Slice and serve cold.

Muktuk (meat inside skin and fat of a whale)
After taken from whale, leave 2 days hanging up to dry. Cut into 6” x 6” pieces. Cook until tender. After cooked, keep in a cool place in a 45-gallon drum of oil, in order to have muktuk all year.

Muskrat Tails
Cut off the tails and dip them into very hot water. Pull off the fur. Either cook them on top of the stove, turning them on top of the stove, turning them after a few minutes, or boil them. (This is the same method as for beaver tails. Both are very sticky to eat.)

Oven-Roasted Lynx
Wash and clean the hind legs of the lynx and roast it with lard and a little water.

Steamed Muskrat Legs
Cut off the muskrat’s legs, dip in a bowl of flour with salt, pepper, and other strong seasoning. Put grease into a large frying pan. Put in the muskrat legs. Cover and cook for a long time as they take long to become tender. The strong seasoning takes away the actual taste of the muskrat.

Stuffed Muskrat
Clean the rats well and put them in a roaster with bread stuffing on top. Roast until the muskrats are soft.