Just got done reading this OP. And it got me to wondering, do we taste like anything? Maybe chicken? If not, what’s the closest animal that we taste like. I guess that would really depend on what part the cannibal is eating. Was the question ever posed to those from the true story of the movie Alive?
chic- dammit!
Well, I believe, cannibals refer to humans as ‘Long Pig’ so I guess we either taste like pig or the meat is pork like.
But I’m going to take a WAG and say that it’s very likely to depend on the lifestyle and diet of the human in question – not to mention which part of the meat you’re eating.
IANAC(annibal) so I clearly don’t know.
Well, of all the domestic animals commonly eaten by humans, pigs have the highest portion of DNA that is similar to ours (or something like that, IANAGenetecist), plus pigs, by and large are fed on humans’ leftovers so…
Figure we’d taste like pork.
Did you hear about the cannibal that dumped his girlfriend?
IIRC from the book “Alive” (the plane crash in the Andees, eating the dead people to survive - was also a movie thing) the taste was described as ‘pork’ like.
Well, atleast we’re a tasty species!
However, this was by cannibals in Oceania, whose only other experience with mammalian meat was with pigs, rats, dogs and maybe bats. So perhaps we just taste more like pig than the other choices.
In this article, Cecil mentions the (tongue-in-cheek) theory of travel writer Paul Theroux that the liking of Oceanians for Spam dates to their cannibal past:
I’m not sure I’m comfortable with that. I’d feel better if we tasted like poo. Cos, you know, then all the animals would go “oh, no, I’m not going to eat you, you taste like poo.” And so would the cannibals I suppose.
According to this “travel show”, humans taste like ostrich. Recipe: cover in sago flour and banana leaves, simmer between hot rocks until the meat is tender.
G. Gordon Liddy related on his show one time a story about a covert operation in Africa. Liddy claimed that there was a tribe of cannibals in the area where this operation was going on and periodically they’d snag somebody involved in the operation and have them for dinner. Somebody involved in the operation noticed that none of the Italians who were helping out on the operation ever got kidnapped and eaten, so when they captured one of the cannibals, they asked them why they weren’t eating the Italians. The cannibal replied, “We tried one once, but they taste terrible.” Naturally, everyone wanted to know what it was that made the Italians taste so bad. Eventually, they figured out that the Italians were heavy smokers, so everyone in the operation quickly took up smoking.
No idea if the story’s true or not, but it’s damned funny to hear Liddy tell it.
Well, even though it took three reads to get it, I applaude you. Great one! 
A friend of mine was unfortunate enough to watch an aircraft crash which in volved a fire. He still (it was well over 10 years ago) can’t stand the smell of pork. Seems that we at least smell like pork. Probably a good indicator of taste.
It does really depend on the diet, but human tastes VERY much like pork and often has a much more savory flavor. Like humans, piggies are omnivores, and like humans, they are insdiscriminate omnivores. Better than piggies, however, adult veal humans are much easier to come by and so in general the quality of the meat is far superior. Lastly, while it is important to correctly bleed a human, this is done with a minimum of stress to the creature in the mass slaughter formally referred to as the “blood drive.” For those of you not familiar with this harvesting technique, humans are led to a chamber, often a mobile unit, and voluntarily allow their blood to be drained from their bodies in exchange for an offer of cookies and/or juice. As the stock are exsanguinated, they slowly lose consciousness and so never struggle or alert the rest of the herd. The meat is then processed and sold to certain fast-food restaurants under the label “FREE RANGE PORK” to account for the slightly unusual qualities of the meat.
At the end of the day, the slaughterhouse technicians enjoy the traditional feast of cookies & juice.
A while back, Bizarre Magazine published an interview with a French cannibal; I believe he may have briefly mentioned what human flesh tasted like, but I can’t recall for sure. I do know he spoke about which body parts he preferred. Unfortunately, I can’t find the specific issue–I guess I have it packed away somewhere.
[hijack]
On a side note, however, I did run across a copy of the Fortean Times that indicated that there really was a 1920s-style death ray, whose only drawback was that it didn’t work.
Link to IMDB entry
[/hijack]
:tongue in cheek:
Well I wouldn’t say my girlfriend tastes of pork. More fishy than pork.
I read Congo kitabu by Jean-Pierre Hallet. IIRC, he was visiting a tribe of sometime cannibals. They weren’t expecting him, but they invited him to dinner. After they ate he started to suspect that it had been a person, which they confirmed.
He said it tased like turtle. I don’t know what turtle tastes like, either.
From what I have read about cultures who practiced cannibalism, they have been seriously over estimated in number and not really understood in terms of when and why they ate human flesh, ie they wouldn’t have just grabbed a human because they were sick of chicken or pig, it was about ritual and gaining the power of the warrior they had killed, and eating specific body parts etc.
So any account that doesn’t take this into consideration, is probably dodgy.
You mean that didn’t give them a full bodied smoked flavor? 