Blood: History’s Superfood

The ancient Spartans ate it widely, as do many cultures today, from the Scots and Irish to the Maasai warriors of Africa. But most people won’t touch it. Blood as a food has played an important cultural role throughout history, and has great health benefits. Let’s talk about it.

In ancient Sparta, “black soup” was made from blood, pork fat, salt and vinegar, and was revered by figures across history, ranging from Founding Father of the United States Benjamin Rush to Adolf Hitler, who endorsed the Spartan diet despite his vegetarianism.

In many western countries now, blood is perhaps most commonly eaten in the form of blood sausages such as black pudding, where it is made with pork or beef blood and fat, mixed with oats or barley, along with some different herbs and spices depending on which region it’s made in.

Different regional kinds of blood sausage can be found all throughout the different regions of Europe, being made in similar fashions to other distinct regional varieties of sausage, being historically tailored to use locally occurring ingredients.

One of the key nutritional benefits of blood sausage, naturally, is iron. From a 100g serving of typical UK black pudding, you can get up to 12mg of iron, which is around 25% more than the typical amount required by an adult male in the UK.

Many different population groups suffer from iron deficiencies, especially women of childbearing age who need more than anyone else. The iron in animal products is much easier absorbed than iron coming from plant foods, so black pudding is great to avail of.

Black pudding is also high in protein and fat, which can be great for bodybuilding purposes. 100g of black pudding can contain 7.5g of protein which, although not as high as beef or chicken, is certainly a good addition for a taste and textural difference.

Scandinavia, too, has a rich tradition of eating blood. One of their breakfast foods, blood pancakes, are a staple of Nordic cuisine, so much so that you can even buy pancake mix with blood in it in supermarkets in Finland.

Not only is consuming blood beneficial for health, it’s also great for reducing food waste. Animals have a lot of blood, at least 4.5kg per pig. If most of this constitutes edible matter, it would be very wasteful and simply unkind to the animal to simply discard it.

Of course, there are some cultures in which the opposite is the case, such as Muslim and Jewish traditions which forbid the consumption of blood entirely. However, if you have the opportunity to try it, you shouldn’t reject the idea because it seems unconventional or gross.