Mmmmmmmmuttonbird

I finally got a chance to taste well-prepared muttonbird last week. Muttonbird is a seabird that lives on a chain of rugged and isolated island that sit to the south of New Zealand. They are harvested every April and May and only by people who can prove through their lineage that they have a right to harvest their share of muttonbirds. Sometimes you can find fresh muttonbird but it's also pretty common to find it salted, as a traditional way of preserving it for a long time so it can be eaten months later.

One of the local grocery store chains, Pak N Sav, has recently started stocking muttonbird in the meat section, next to the corned beef and the lunch meat. The carcass looks flat, pale and greasy and reminds me a little of duck. For $14.95 each, muttonbirds aren't exactly a bargain.

This muttonbird pasta I ate was on the menu at a local place called Plato. It was delicious, unusual and satisfying. It's a dark meat, with all the greasy chewy complex flavor of duck, but it also tasted strongly of the sea. I think this muttonbird was salted, for sure, because its flesh was so salty but, even so, every mouthful was filled with the briny and fishy flavor of the sea. Like concentrated sea flavor, crossed with duck, on pasta.

Mmmmmmm.

I think.