Nominated BEST BRITISH TRUE-CRIME PODCAST, 4th Best True-Crime Podcast by This Week, iTunes Top 25 Podcast, Podcast Magazine's Hot 50, The Telegraph's Top 5, Crime & Investigation Channel's Top 20 True-Crime Podcasts, also seen on BBC Radio, Sky News, The Guardian and TalkRadio's Podcast of the Week.

TRANSCRIPT OF EPISODE: Cannibalism (munching) “could you eat a whole human being? (munching) With the help of a doctor, a scientist and a chef, I set out to see if it’s possible. Cannibalism: part eighteen – waste”. (burp)

If a human was made only of meat, a cannibal could shave them like a rotisserie of tasty kebab meat and dine like a king. But they aren’t, as 46% of the body is used to process various forms of waste.

2013, Italy, Lino Renzi beat his mother Maria to death, cut her into pieces with a saw, froze the meat, and the neighbours only became suspicious when the intestines he’d popped on the grill caught fire. Being Italian, it was suggested, he was making the local dish - Torcinelli, a sausage stuffed with offal, tomato, onion, basil and parsley. Only this time instead of using lamb’s intestines, he used momma’s.

What parts of a corpse a cannibal eats is dependent on their culture, as although we may retch at an eyeball being burst by the Bedouin, they’d rightly retch at what we put in a haggis or a hotdog.
So, the waste? Excluding the skin, kidneys, liver, lungs and blood which we’ve covered, the excretory or urinary system includes the bladder and the intestines (as well as the rectum and colon). Delicious.

As a passive biological system, which unlike walking and talking, requires us to consciously do nothing, our excretory system expels waste products like solids, liquids and gases. Each day, the average person expels a minimum of 3 litres of sweat, 3 ½ pints of urine, 1500 millilitres of gas, and 400 grams of poo, so across the year that amounts to 320lbs or 145kgs – in effect, we poo the weight of an adult panda.

So, can we eat those organs which process our waste?

Weighing 3 ½ kilos, 15 to 20 ft long and made of a 3-5mm fibrous muscle and a layer of mucus whose wave-like contractions move food through the GI tract, the intestines could provide a cannibal with 6300 calories, enough for 2 ½ days. Described as “tender and fatty with a chewy resistance” and a slightly sweet taste, they have no urine or faecal smell, if they’re cleaned and washed properly.

Chitterlings, cow’s intestines stuffed with offal, herbs and vegetables, and boiled or fried are common across the world. So, with one human’s intestines enough to feed five cannibals for a day, if we made use of the 167,000 people who die daily, the dead could feed the citizens of Charlotte, North Carolina.

The bladder is a tough piece of protein to prepare, so most countries only use it as casings, and at just 32 grams with a wall just 1mm thick, it only contains 12 calories, unlike a cream cracker which has 15, and contains uric acid, ammonia and a parasitic worm which can be transmitted person to person. Or, if you want to go old school, from our annual dead, we could make 60 million 19th century footballs.

As for the rectum, with crispy pig’s rectum being a delicacy in South Korea, as “the red glistening tissue contains mucus glands”, oh yum, you could feed anus to the population of Seoul for 10 whole days. Which I’m sure they’ll love, as long as they ignore the fact that, according to a microbiologist Dr Gerba, even after the average human has wiped their anus, it still has a 10th of a gram of poo stuck to it.

Even in animals, rarely do we eat the waste system as part of our daily diet, so why should a cannibal?

Most unusable parts of an animal are turned into cattle feed, so although we balk at cannibalism, we’re okay with feeding dead chickens to live ones, cow corpses to active moos, and pig stiffs to their own relatives. But for the queasier cannibal, maybe enlisting a furry faithful friend isn’t a bad idea.

Humans are carnivores, whereas dogs are hypercarnivores, who produce 100 times the stomach acid we do, and as scavengers, they can rapidly digest the meat, bones and fat that we’d find impossible.

2018, Mexico, Juan Carlos Bejar & Patricia Martinez Bernal were convicted of 20 counts of torture and murder. With the bodies found in 20-litre buckets buried under concrete, many were missing organs, and although impossible to prove, the hearts were fed to their dogs and some said, other innards too.

But this is not uncommon, as dogs will eat anything. The inspiration for Mason Verger, Doctor Lector’s nemesis in Hannibal by Thomas Harris came from real-life. New York, 1970s, while high on PCP, a man known only as Michael smashed a mirror, sliced off the skin from his face, gouged out one of his eyes, and fed it to a German shepherd and her two puppies. The vet managed to get her to sick up his lips, nose and some of his face, but with her digestive system being so efficient, his face was beyond saving.

Phew! So, after all that grossness, you’re probably thinking “are we finished?” Nope. After the organs comes the waste products, as isn’t that part of a human too? Come on cannibals, don’t be cowardly.

The average human’s colon holds 8-25 lbs (or 11kgs) of faecal matter, and with the bowel never empty, every corpse has a little brown package in transit, containing bacteria such as salmonella and E. coli. If you think a cannibal wouldn’t eat poo, as an example, Mark Redwine of Colorado killed his 13-year-old son Dylan after he found photos of him dressed in a sexy red bra and eating faeces from a nappy.

At 4 calories per gram, we expel 1200 calories down the toilet daily, and although urine can be sterilised to remove its toxins, its unlikely child-killer Albert Fish did this when he drank piss. Sweat comprises of water, salt and electrolytes, but a cannibal would burn more calories trying to drink it. And although many mammals and birds regurgitate food, the Butyric acid we produce in our vomit is highly corrosive to our nose, throat, eyes and lungs. Thank God, as that would be a real bummer at family mealtimes.

But why doesn’t a cannibal (outside of the Aghori tribe) eat human waste?

As said before, the eating of flesh is a sexual practice, the same way as those with coprophilia get an intense sexual arousal from faeces and defecation, and those with urolagnia get the same from urine. People are weird, with it said that 32% of men have fantasized about sex with wee or poo, and women more inclined to queening, or – as a humiliating act against a male man – sitting on the Smother Box. (Note sure what that is, Google it).

Criminal cannibalism isn’t about food, it’s about power, sex and revenge, with many cannibals eating human flesh in retaliation for childhood abuse and trauma. For example; Ed Gein made a skin suit, Dennis Nilsen slept with dead bodies, and Robert Black took snaps of himself with a wine bottle up his ass. So is eating waste any more embarrassing? Maybe they are appalled by it, or maybe like poo fetishists, they keep quiet about their dirty habits, as even for a cannibal, some perversions are a step too far.

Join me tomorrow as we explore if a cannibal’s stomach can digest another person’s stomach.

Nominated BEST BRITISH TRUE-CRIME PODCAST, 4th Best True-Crime Podcast by This Week, iTunes Top 25 Podcast, Podcast Magazine's Hot 50, The Telegraph's Top 5, Crime & Investigation Channel's Top 20 True-Crime Podcasts, also seen on BBC Radio, Sky News, The Guardian and TalkRadio's Podcast of the Week.

TRANSCRIPT OF EPISODE: Cannibalism (munching) “could you eat a whole human being? (munching) With the help of a doctor, a scientist and a chef, I set out to see if it’s possible. Cannibalism: part seventeen – the liver”. (burp)

Like Hannibal Lector, could a cannibal eat a census-takers liver with a nice chianti? Maybe.

1990, North Korea, Park Myung-sik nicknamed The Organ Harvester scoured the farms of rural villages in search of fit young teens. Across 7 months, at least 9 of his 13 known victims were found stabbed, with their abdomens ripped open. Only this specific cannibal wasn’t a bit peckish, as being an alcoholic with chronic cirrhosis, he mistakenly believed that by eating healthy livers, it would cure his disease.

As the largest organ in the torso, the liver weighs 3lbs or 1 ½ kilos, and as a dark-red organ shaped like a cone, it sits on the right of the abdomen, under the diaphragm and above the stomach. But it’s not just there to filter the alcohol when we’ve had too much booze, the liver is a multi-functional organ.

Holding 13%, roughly a pint of your blood at one time, the liver stores nutrients, removes waste, filters chemicals, metabolises medications, produces bile for breaking down fats, and clotting agents for blood. Divided into two main lobes and subdivided into 100,000 smaller lobes, it regulates blood sugar levels, it produces heat to maintain our body temperature, it helps keep our mind healthy and toxin-free, and is the only organ which can regenerate itself, and you can survive with 70% of it removed.

In 1847, Jeremiah Johnson of Wyoming, known as ‘liver eating Johnson’ launched a vendetta against the native American Flathead tribe after the murder of his wife. For which he scalped 300+ Crow Indians and ate their livers. But as either a myth, rumour, or exaggeration spawned in an era where the barely literate got their facts from ‘dime novels’, it’s possible that this was a lie to induce fear.

With just 10% fat, 33% blood and not being a muscle but a gland, the human liver contains just 2500 calories, barely enough to keep a cannibal alive for a single day. As a source of energy, it’s poor, but being so nutrient dense – storing vitamins A, D, E, K, B12, iron and copper – the liver is a super food.

So, could a cannibal eat a liver with fava beans and a nice chianti? No… at least, not in one sitting.

If you ate another person’s liver, you’d receive half the toxic dose of Vitamin A in a single hit. Known as Hypervitaminosis, even palaeolithic cannibals knew the danger of liver toxicity, with too much eaten leading to vomiting, delirium, and death. So, I hate to be the party pooper Dr Lector, but with any more than 100grams of liver being too toxic for a human, a whole liver would take you 15 days to eat.

That said, by those guidelines, with 167,000 people dying each day, if we put our morals aside, 100 grams of liver a day would make a little over half a million pounds of half decent pate, enough to keep the entire population of Paris happy (or less miserable) for the rest of their baguette chomping lives.

Being bitter and sweet, like pig’s liver, human liver would be suitable for stews, or panfried with onions and bacon. With no gristle, little fat or sinew and no bone, it need little preparation or cooking, as being soft, silky and lean, anything more than medium-rare would make it taste like an old boot. And as a permeable organ, it also suits being smoked, or flavoured with chilli, red wine or peppercorn.

When removing a cadaver’s liver, although possibly too drunk to know, ‘The Organ Harvester’ of North Korea could possibly tell if a liver was off, as a fresh liver is a rich reddish brown and is slightly firm, but an off liver is pale and slippery. And if the victim also has cirrhosis, their capillaries above their waist would be burst like small red spiders, the whites of their eyes would have a yellow hue (as they can’t process a pigment called bilirubin), the liver would smell of ammonia, and unable to regenerate itself, it would be scarred. And as human meat isn’t vetted like animals, there is no way to tell if it has blood diseases like Hepatitis, without prior medical knowledge.

1997 to 2000, in Ryazan, Russia, Igor Churasov nicknamed The Scavenger of Humanity murdered seven people with an accomplice in the wake of the collapse of Communism and the starvation of its people. Strangling his victims, on one occasion with a hose, he cut up their corpses, pulled out their hearts and livers, popped them in a frying pan, and ate them. But did he die of hypervitaminosis? No. As although hungry, they shared the livers between them, and ate it over a few days. They’re psychotic, not stupid.

Join me tomorrow to explore if it’s possible to eat a person’s poop-chute… the waste system. Oh, nice.

Nominated BEST BRITISH TRUE-CRIME PODCAST, 4th Best True-Crime Podcast by This Week, iTunes Top 25 Podcast, Podcast Magazine's Hot 50, The Telegraph's Top 5, Crime & Investigation Channel's Top 20 True-Crime Podcasts, also seen on BBC Radio, Sky News, The Guardian and TalkRadio's Podcast of the Week.

TRANSCRIPT OF EPISODE: Cannibalism (munching) “could you eat a whole human being? (munching) With the help of a doctor, a scientist and a chef, I set out to see if it’s possible. Cannibalism: part sixteen – the lungs”. (burp)

Are they as tasty and light as a Victoria sponge, or like chewing on a set of bagpipes?

2004, Sherman in Texas, Andre Lee Thomas murdered his estranged wife, Laura Boren, and their son Andre Lee aged 4 and 1-year-old daughter Leyha Marie. Believing they had demons inside of them, he cut open their chests, removed their hearts, threw them in a rubbish bin, and later, he gouged out his own eyes. But with no medical training, he initially removed part of his wife’s lung by mistake.

We know where our heart is as we feel it beat, but with the whole chest moving as we breathe, to the average person, the inside of the thoracic cavity would be an indistinguishable mess of bloody organs.

Weighing a kilo, lungs are 9-inches long or 10 ½ inches when expanded stretching from the collarbone to the sixth rib down, and as the 2nd largest organ in the chest after the liver, it’s hard to miss. As a key part of our respiratory system, lungs hold on average 1 ½ pints of air in its 6-litre capacity, and like the kidneys, our lungs are asymmetrical, with the right lung being larger and fitted with an additional lobe.

As a biological wonder, your lungs process 20,000 breaths a day, roughly 11,000 litres of air (the same as 2400 balloons), with each breath taking 12-20 minutes to process any noxious gases, convert it into safe breathable oxygen and expel it as carbon dioxide. Lungs are the only organs that float, you can live with only one, and we don’t consciously breathe as the medulla oblongata – part of the brainstem – triggers us to inhale, and although many believe that our chest expanding is due to it filling with air, inhalation caused by the diaphragm moving our organs to increase and decrease space for the lungs.

In animal terms, lungs are offal, and although there’s no guidelines by the NHS on how much lung is safe to eat, for palaeolithic cannibals, lungs could only provide 1600 calories, enough for 2/3 of a day.

In 2013, Abu Sakkar, a Syrian rebel commander cut out the heart of an enemy and ate it before his men. But when quizzed by the press, he later claimed it could have been liver or a piece of lung. Which is an easy mistake to make, as the lobe of the left lung is a similar size, shape and position in the chest.

In England, since the BSE Crisis of 1989, when meat infected with ‘mad cow disease’ entered the food chain, it has been illegal to sell the uncooked lungs of animals, as “fluids like phlegm may enter the lung during slaughter”. But let’s not forget, our respiratory system produces 1 ½ litres of mucus a day.

If prepared correctly by removing the fat and washing it out by inflating and soaking it in salted water, lungs can be quite elastic and chewy, with a spongy texture like firm tofu. They’re a pinkish red when raw (owing to 300 billion oxygen rich capillaries), but when cooked, they turn a sickly grey colour.

Given its texture and taste, many chefs choose to tenderise it, season it with strong spice, and slice up the bronchial pipe as it has the texture of rare steak.

With so many disgusting parts of a human to digest, if a cannibal simply opened a cookbook, added the lungs, heart and liver to some oats, onions, herbs and spices, in five hours they’d have a five-kilo haggis, and once they’d lubricated their pals with enough whiskey, linked arms, and sung a Rabbie Burns poem that no-one knows the words to, by dawn, all of the evidence would have been scoffed.

There’s a reason why – except in certain cultures – lungs are heavily disguised or disposed of, they are disgusting; the look, the colour, the texture and the flavour, not to mention what they contain. Lungs are one of our filtration systems processing harmful gases like carbon monoxide or fibres like asbestos.

And although few blood disorders are contracted by ingestion, if the corpse has died of a transmissible bacterial or viral infection like Bronchitis, Influenza or Tuberculosis would a cannibal eat it? And with 2.5 million people diagnosed with lung cancer a year, would they know what a tumour looks like?

My friend, the unnamed GP, suggested eating a vape smoker, as they’ve pre-flavoured their lungs with strawberry, chocolate and vanilla, which is more preferrable than a cigarette smoker who - with just one pack of 20 a day – filters 250 milliliters (or 8.5 fluid ounces) or tar through their lungs every year, as well as lead, acetone, ammonia, hexamine, and poisons like formaldehyde, arsenic and cyanide.

As dangerous vectors for disease, animal lungs are often destroyed, or cooked at high temperatures and used in cattle food. So, unless a cannibal wants to risk getting sick, prepare it well, slice is finely, tenderise it, give it a strong seasoning, and deep-fry it, as it’s spongy texture will make it like crackling.

There are few cases of cannibals willingly eating lungs. In April 2002, Antron Singleton, a US rapper known as Big Lurch killed his roommate and ripped open her chest. His teeth marks were found on her face and her lungs, and although undetermined, human remains were later found in his stomach. But having been on PCP (a mind-altering drug), it is uncertain if he knew what he was doing, or why.

Join me tomorrow to explore the organ which a cannibal might savour with a nice chianti… the liver.

Nominated BEST BRITISH TRUE-CRIME PODCAST, 4th Best True-Crime Podcast by This Week, iTunes Top 25 Podcast, Podcast Magazine's Hot 50, The Telegraph's Top 5, Crime & Investigation Channel's Top 20 True-Crime Podcasts, also seen on BBC Radio, Sky News, The Guardian and TalkRadio's Podcast of the Week.

TRANSCRIPT OF EPISODE: Cannibalism (munching) “could you eat a whole human being? (munching) With the help of a doctor, a scientist and a chef, I set out to see if it’s possible. Cannibalism: part fifteen – the kidneys”. (burp)

It’s odd that cannibal will eat hearts, brains and eyeballs, but you rarely hear of them eating a kidney.

It was in the mid-19th century penny dreadful series ‘The String of Pearls’ that Thomas Prest unleashed the seemingly fictional account of the Demon Barber of Fleet Street, Sweeney Todd. As a typical British story of class, poverty and money, Todd slit the throats of his wealthy customers, robbed and flipped his barber’s chair so their bodies slid into the basement where Mrs Lovett made them into savory pies.

Nicknamed ‘the pie eaters’ by Germans, British people love pies, especially when topped with a thick crust, made of off-cuts of offal, sprinkled with a stingy assortment of six peas, and drenched in gravy. And yet, you rarely hear of a cannibal, especially a British one, turning the victim’s kidneys into pies.

Located below the rib cage on either side of the spine, the kidneys are two bean-shaped organs about the size of a fist, which remove waste from the blood, produce urine and help control blood pressure. Although relatively small, they filter 50 gallons / 200 litres of blood a day, roughly 2 ½ baths, and able to generate Vitamin D, when your skin and liver fails to process it, your kidneys will finish the job.

In Steve, our average UK male, it’s normal that his right kidney weighs 130 grams, and the left one is heavier as it’s slightly higher and closer to the heart. According to the study of paleolithic era cannibals, the kidneys are ranked among the least calorific body parts with just 375 calories each, barely enough for a single meal. Dr Jim Stoppani, a Yale nutritionist said “kidneys are filled with waste so best to avoid those”, and yet they are incredibly nutritious, as a single kidney would fulfil a cannibals recommended daily intake of vitamins B1, B2, B6, B12, copper, niacin, folate, biotin, iron, zinc and selenium, helping to provide greater energy, lesser risk of cancer and heart diseases, and a stronger immune system.

In 1963, Czechoslovakian child-killer Josef Kulík lured two young boys - Vladimír (aged 6) and Oldřich (aged 9) - into a car, attacked them with an axe, cut their stomachs open, masturbated over the bodies, roasted their intestines and offal over a fire and ate it. Later found wrapped in a handkerchief was the boy’s kidneys, as well as a spleen and a heart. Like others, this cannibal derived a sexual thrill from the killing and ingesting of body parts, but for whatever reason, neither kidney was eaten.

Lacking the heart’s symbolism, kidneys are unfairly lumped with other offal like the intestines and the tongue. In the brutality against the Taiwanese Formosa tribe by Chinese Army in 1981, having killed a tribesman, “the head was severed and exhibited.... the body was either divided among its captors and eaten, or sold to high officials… with the kidney, liver, heart, and soles of the feet considered the most desirable portions, and they were cut up into small pieces, boiled, and eaten in the form of soup”.

So, why don’t cannibals tend to eat the kidneys if they’re so tasty and nutritious? Possibly the smell, as kidneys have a pungent aroma of urine, and when the urine crystallises, they form kidney stones.

Also, like the heart and other offal, kidneys require preparation, which as consumers we don’t realise as when purchased they are pre-prepared by a skilled butcher to remove the membrane, the filament layer, the fat lobe, the connective tissue and are soaked in salt water and lime to remove the stench.

Chef Delia Smith wrote “provided they’re cored and washed, they should have no trace of urine”, and being flavoursome, “they make a superb meat for curries”, or if flash-fried, “they have a tender texture and a deep, slightly gamey flavor” said to be “silky and rewarding”, but only if prepared properly.

Only in fiction do we hear of cannibals with a refined enough palate to know how to cook a delicate and flavoursome piece of meat as the kidney, as often being nothing but uncouth yobs, they might as well munch on a Big Mac. And although in Britain we traditionally put kidneys in pies, stewing makes them tough and leathery, so again, if prepared properly, a kidney is best served flash-fried in clarified butter, or with cayenne pepper, cream and a bit of paprika, you’ve got yourself a devilled kidney. Yum.

The nearest we get to a real-life Sweeney Todd & Mrs Lovett is Dmitry & Natalia Baksheeva ‘The Krasnodar Cannibals’, who killed dozens over 18 years, which they documented in videos, kept detailed recipes of and boasted that they baked the flesh and offal into pies which they sold to cafes.

Having feasted on human remains for two decades, it’s no surprise that in 2020, Dimitri died of type one diabetes, as (although hard to prove) it was suspected that with kidneys being high in cholesterol and likely to cause hemochromatosis, that (ironically) it was their victim’s own offal which killed him.

Join me tomorrow as we explore another delicacy among the offal… the lungs.

Nominated BEST BRITISH TRUE-CRIME PODCAST, 4th Best True-Crime Podcast by This Week, iTunes Top 25 Podcast, Podcast Magazine's Hot 50, The Telegraph's Top 5, Crime & Investigation Channel's Top 20 True-Crime Podcasts, also seen on BBC Radio, Sky News, The Guardian and TalkRadio's Podcast of the Week.

TRANSCRIPT OF EPISODE: Cannibalism (munching) “could you eat a whole human being? (munching) With the help of a doctor, a scientist and a chef, I set out to see if it’s possible. Cannibalism: part eleven – the yummy bits”. (burp)

Thighs and buttock are the go-to hunks of meat that all cannibals love, which makes sense.

Joachim Kroll, known as ‘The Ruhr Cannibal’ was a serial killer, paedophile and necrophile who savaged at least eight women and girls in the Ruhr region of Germany from 1955 to 1976. Slicing off ‘steak sized’ cuts from each of their buttocks and thighs, with girls some being as young as four, he claimed it was “a tender meat”, and serving them with carrots and potatoes, he did it he said “to save on grocery bills”.

As a sadist, it’s likely his motive wasn’t financial but sexual, but with thighs being packed full of calories (13,300 for those on Steve our average UK male), it has the second highest calories of the main muscles, with roughly 15,500 for the buttocks, 7400 for the biceps, 4500 for the calves, and just 1700 for both forearms.

But what are the tastiest parts of a human body?

As seen with ‘The Ruhr Cannibal’, the buttocks known as Gluteus Maximus are the largest and heaviest muscle in the body. Said by Ugandan warlords to be “flavoursome” owing to the intermuscular fat, it has a balance of “tenderness and texture being rich and gelatinous”, and ideal for a slow cooked stew.

But as Heriberto Lazcano, kingpin of the Los Zetas cartel knew, stressed meat makes for bad meat, as stress increases its pH level, making it darker, firmer and drier. As a mad Mexican who loved roasting his enemy’s buttocks, before being murdered, he made them bathe for two hours, gave them whiskey to reduce their adrenaline, and then served thin slivers of their backsides as tasty tamales on toast.

The tongue is said to be “soft, tender with a luxurious taste” according to a Ugandan vendor in Lugazi where human meat is sold. As a 3 inch long by 1 inch wide muscle weighing roughly 100grams, the papillae and mucous membrane are said to give it a light crackling when seared, and although a favourite of Russian serial killer Andrei Chikatilo who severed his victim’s lips, nipples and tongues with his teeth, there’s no solid proof that he ate them.

Famously, fictional serial killer Hannibal Lecktor preferred a person’s liver and their sweetbreads, and many chefs agree. Sold in high end restaurants, sweetbreads refer to the thymus gland, a vital part of all immune systems as it trains T-cells. Called ‘sweet’ in calves as they have “a mild, less savoury flavour than lamb or beef”, in human’s it weighs just 40–50 grams, and situated between the lungs and behind the breastbone, it is suggested “it is really creamy, with a smooth and velvety texture” like oysters.

An unnamed surgeon suggested the face, as being used for eating and emoting, unlike our skeletal muscles, they are “thin, soft, rarely tear, have a low fat-content” and with 30 muscles on each side of the face, the best could be around the jaw. Back in 2012, Rudy Eugene, dubbed ‘The Causeway Cannibal’ was shot and killed by police officers as he ate the face (including the eyebrows, nose, cheek, some of the forehead and the left eye) of fellow homeless man Ronald Poppo. With drugs ruled out as a cause, and with no known motive for his cannibalistic crime, hunger was ruled out as – unlike with most supposed cannibals - an autopsy determined that Rudy had no human flesh in his stomach.

The cheeks are said to be the meatiest parts of a sheep or cow’s face, having evolved for grazing, but with human cheeks being between 30 and 65 mm thick, they would hardly make a sufficient meal.

The eating of another person’s face is likely to be more symbolic than a culinary choice, like in 1995, when Marinaldo de Alcântara Silva, a Brazilian farmer shot his own mother following a long and bitter dispute, he then decapitated her, ripped off her eyes, lips, nose and tongue, and then ate the pieces”.

What’s lacking within cannibals is class. Jeffrey Dahmer ate his meat with ketchup. Isakin Drabbad the Skara Cannibal of Sweden murdered his girlfriend and ate the flesh of her arms and legs, which he pan-fried with salt and home-grown cannabis. And Nathaniel Bar-Jonah, the prolific child molester and suspected cannibal was said to have served the meat of a child at a neighbourhood barbeque.

But eating human flesh needn’t be so uncultured. According to Damien Casten of Candid Wines, there are suitable wines for each piece of meat, stating; "I'd guess that uncooked face is chewy. If there’s no time to braise, I'd need a ton of acid to cut through the 'meat,' so I'm going to pull a young grand cru Riesling”, for the delicacy of the brain “the grey matter is best paired with a Chenin Blanc”, a liver wouldn’t suit nice Chianti as Hannibal Lecktor suggests “as it’s a little too light for the fattiness of the liver… so a Barolo would be better choice", with the sweetbreads suiting “the Lopez Malbec owing to its cherry flavours and aromas”, whereas other sommeliers suggested “pinot noir for the cheeks, shiraz for the tongue, and beer for the nose and lips”. Interestingly, Nic Pelaez of Saltbox Dining suggested for the flesh “I would pick a meaty person, a smoker, someone who enjoys berries”, basically “the lazier the better - they’re more tender. So I’d stick to couch potatoes and video-gamers".

But when questioned, many medical experts agreed that the best human meat to eat was the Psoas, known as the loin muscles. Situated inside the pelvis, they connect the legs to the vertebrae, and being almost fat-free, once the tendon is removed, they are soft, tender and are regarded as the “human filet mignon”. And with only 40% of humans having a psoas minor, for cannibals, that muscle would be a rare delicacy.

So, you were wrong Jeffrey Dahmer, the filet mignon of meats wasn’t the thigh, and being a scumbag, he probably threw away the best bits, and washed a thigh down with a god-awful beer like Budweiser. Yuck.

Join me tomorrow to uncover what are the worst parts of a human body to eat.

Nominated BEST BRITISH TRUE-CRIME PODCAST, 4th Best True-Crime Podcast by This Week, iTunes Top 25 Podcast, Podcast Magazine's Hot 50, The Telegraph's Top 5, Crime & Investigation Channel's Top 20 True-Crime Podcasts, also seen on BBC Radio, Sky News, The Guardian and TalkRadio's Podcast of the Week.

TRANSCRIPT OF EPISODE: Cannibalism (munching) “could you eat a whole human being? (munching) With the help of a doctor, a scientist and a chef, I set out to see if it’s possible. Cannibalism: part twelve – the yucky bits”. (burp)

So, if a cannibal has dined on all the best bits of a human, what’s likely to be scraped into the bin?
In 2007, writer and serial killer José Luis Calva murdered his girlfriend, and was captured tucking into a plate of the pan-fried flesh from her forearm, which he had seasoned with lemon. To his side was a half-written book titled Cannibal Instincts, with a doctored image of Hannibal Lecktor on the cover.

That is how we imagine a cannibal to be, listening to opera as they nibble the finest cuts of a foe, or like Rudy Eugene, with feverish relish they gorge on a raw face with not even a napkin under his chin.

But not every cannibal can be so choosey, especially if their life depends on it.
So bits should be avoided?

Dr Jim Stoppani, a Yale certified nutritionist said “eyes contain an acid which can make humans sick, fingers and toes are filled with cartilage which won't digest, and penises - as German cannibal Armin Meiwes discovered having sampled a tiny tit-bit of dick – “are spongy and have little nutritional value”.

Now, you’re probably thinking the worst bits to eat would be the eyes, the privates, the gut and the bum hole – which I assure you we’ll get to – but there are parts of the body which are worse to eat.

Many cannibals imagine the person they’d eat being clean, but who truly is? The average human has 39 trillion bacteria in and on their bodies, with the most infected areas being the nose, nails, behind the ears, the mouth (with 600 different species of bacteria), the belly button (being warm, it has its own microbiome of 2000 species), the armpits (with shaved pits having less than the average 80,000 bacteria), and the forearms with 44 species of bacteria, as it’s the area most people forget to wash.

I mean, there’s a good reason why Heriberto Lazcano, the kingpin of the Los Zetas cartel had his victims bathe first, as yes, it de-stressed the meat, but can you really trust someone to wash correctly?

A common part of an animal to eat in Cambodia and Thailand is the trachea, the airway leading from the larynx to the bronchi of the lungs, also called windpipe, which one intrepid explorer described as “there is no end to chewing a trachea, it’s like a rubbery length of hosepipe, but less flavourful”. You’ll notice I have no stories of cannibals happily chowing down on a human trachea. Hmm, funny that?

In 2023, Thandolwenkosi Ndlovu of Zimbabwe crushed the skulls of five homeless men with a brick, severed their genitals, and having removed their intestines using glass, he grilled them on a fire, before eating them. Said to be “soft but very chewy”, with the intestines being the final stage of digestion and not being a trained chef, it’s unlikely that he removed all (if any) of the pre-digested food or faeces.  

We’ve discussed fat, but one thing we forget is lipomas, rogue fat cells which grow in odd places. Said to be harmless and painless, they have a doughy or rubbery texture, and although most are tiny, some can weight 200 grams and one was 14 kilos. But the largest was in 1894 when a 26-year-old man had a one on his shoulder weighing 22.7kg, the same as 4 ½ gallons of paint.

It’s only fat, but would you eat it?

Similarly, cysts are pockets of tissue full of fluid, blood, hair, bone and sometimes pus. Over 1 million people have cysts, and although many are benign, some contain infections, tumors and parasites, with the largest recorded being an ovarian cyst with 37 litres of fluid - that’s the equivalent of half a bath.

And although, unsurprisingly, I have no tales about cannibals (knowingly) eating cysts, when mothers eat their placenta, a common complaint is getting a vein, said to be ‘quite stringy’ between their teeth.

Cannibals eat thighs, hearts, livers and kidneys for a reason. Because they eat it in animals, they can be certain that it’s not going to kill them (as some seemingly innocent body parts can do – more on those later), or that they’ll taste utterly foul. But what about the invasive species within us?

Tapeworms exist in 20 million people worldwide, and as ribbon-like worms in the intestine, although they are often 12 to 36 feet in length, the longest in a human was 82 feet long (that’s two double decker buses). And given that a cannibal’s meal is the meat from corpses, unless it’s killed, cut up, and eaten or frozen quickly - depending on the climate - maggots may appear just 24 hours after death.

Cannibals are as choosy as we are, so it’s unsurprising that Issei Sagawa ‘the Kobe cannibal’ consumed only the tastiest (and in his case, the sexiest) bits of a beautiful young girl, rather than the diseased entrails of an unwashed shut-in, stating "I wanted to know the taste of the young beautiful girl's flesh". 

Many cannibals do likewise… but does only eating (or occasionally the nibbling of a morsel of a limb) mean they’re not a true cannibal? Shouldn’t a real cannibal eat everything, not just the best bits, or is a meat eater not a real meat eater unless they’ve eaten a pig’s sweetbreads, eyeballs and anus? Food for thought.

If this episode wasn’t too unpalatable, join me tomorrow for diseases and hygiene.  

Nominated BEST BRITISH TRUE-CRIME PODCAST, 4th Best True-Crime Podcast by This Week, iTunes Top 25 Podcast, Podcast Magazine's Hot 50, The Telegraph's Top 5, Crime & Investigation Channel's Top 20 True-Crime Podcasts, also seen on BBC Radio, Sky News, The Guardian and TalkRadio's Podcast of the Week.

TRANSCRIPT OF EPISODE:  Cannibalism (munching) “could you eat a whole human being? (more munching) With the help of a doctor, a scientist and a chef, I set out to see if it’s possible. Cannibalism: part nine – hair”. (burp)

Whether you’re blessed with a bouffant or as bald as a coot, you won’t be shocked to hear that hair isn’t the kind of tasty treat that even the most famished cannibal would consider chowing down on.

2016, Blake Leibel, the director of a horror film unironically called Bald, beat and tortured his girlfriend, Iana Kasian over six hours, drained her body of blood, dismembered her, scattered her limbs, and with a razor blade, he scalped the long dark hair from her head as well as half of her face and her right ear.

Scalping, like skinning has been symbolic of domination as far back as 5000 years BC. For the Ancient Greeks, hair had long signified a person’s status, rank or tribe, as well as breeding, wealth and brains. But as wars ravaged the world, seeking to humiliate our foes, whereas once body parts like the heads were taken to be paraded as war trophies, the skulls were scalped solely to make them easier to carry.

For a cannibal, the scalp is nothing but a souvenir or a byproduct, as even when they are tucking into a face, a bicep or a thigh, the last thing they want to be munching on is a mouthful of hair. Therefore, you won’t be surprised to hear that we have no dietary guidelines by the NHS on hair consumption, nor any data on its calorific value by paleolithic era cannibals, as rightly, when it’s on meat, they would either skin it or burn it off.

Hair is a remnant of our long-forgotten past, when as hunter gatherers, our fur kept us warm.

Made of layers of a hardened protein called keratin, most people should have 100-150,000 Terminal hairs on their head and 5 million shorter Vellus hairs over their body, with each follicle able to last up to 7 years as they have their own muscle, nerve and blood supply. And although hair seems to continue growing, once the follicle is visible, it is dead, along with our nails, most of our skin cells and parts of our teeth.

Canadian serial-killer Bruce McArthur kept photographs of his victim’s deaths and how he humiliated their corpses. In a motive known only to him, he posed their bodies wearing a fur coat, a black leather hat, smoking a cigar, and symbolically he shaved their heads and beards, keeping the hair in Ziploc bags. Oddly, although he wasn’t a cannibal, it was actually an alarming post by a fantasist going under the alias of Chefmate50 on the cannibal fantasy forum Zambian Meat which led to McArthur’s arrest.

So, why don’t we eat hair? We don’t because we can’t digest it. Even in our stomachs which contain 1 ½ litres of gastric juice with a pH level of 1.5 and made of a lethal mix of hydrochloric acid, potassium chloride and sodium chloride - so powerful it can dissolve most metals - it can’t dissolve keratin. And with our acid averaging 98.6 Fahrenheit (37 Celsius), Keratin doesn’t break down until 230C (450F).

If we swallow an occasional hair, it wouldn’t do us any harm, as it will pass harmlessly out of the gut, But anything more can cause Trichobezoars (also known as hairballs) which can become lodged in the gastrointestinal tract resulting in vomiting, anemia, obstruction, bowel perforation and even death.

As scavengers covered in fur, cats and dogs have evolved to cope with hair balls, and with the pH level of their stomach swinging from 7.3 (neutral) to 1.5 (similar to battery acid), although still toxic, they can cope, whereas – being almost hairless humans - coughing up hair balls is a skill we have lost.

That said, hair is also a haven for bacteria, fungi and yeast, as well as a wealth of hazardous chemicals that many of our scalps are subjected to, such as peroxide, sulphates, parabens and formaldehyde.

So, it seems that unless a serial killer with cannibal tendencies has developed the skill to hack up a fur ball, it’s unlikely they’ll have a penchant for eating human hair. Most victim’s hair is scalped, binned or kept as a souvenir, but given that its DNA can last for centuries (in the right conditions), if cooked at above 230C in an oven, hair becomes as brittle as a powder, and most of its DNA will be destroyed.

Hair can be deadly, but without you knowing it, you may be ingesting hair daily. L-Cysteine is an amino acid used in the mass production of bread. Often made from duck feathers to give your loaf a soft and bouncy texture for longer, according to the Health Freedom Alliance, having first been dissolved in acid, “most of it is extracted from a cheap and abundant natural protein source - human hair”. So, think about that the next time you tuck into a sliced white, a pizza, a tortilla, and even (gulp) a cake.

Join me tomorrow for the vampire’s source of energy – blood.
 

Nominated BEST BRITISH TRUE-CRIME PODCAST, 4th Best True-Crime Podcast by This Week, iTunes Top 25 Podcast, Podcast Magazine's Hot 50, The Telegraph's Top 5, Crime & Investigation Channel's Top 20 True-Crime Podcasts, also seen on BBC Radio, Sky News, The Guardian and TalkRadio's Podcast of the Week.

TRANSCRIPT OF EPISODE: Cannibalism (munching) “could you eat a whole human being? (more munching) With the help of a doctor, a scientist and a chef, I set out to see if it’s possible. Cannibalism: part ten – blood”. (burp)

Supposedly, vampires sustain their immortality by drinking human blood. But what about cannibals?

From 1977 and 1978, Richard Chase, the spree killer, cannibal and necrophile nicknamed the ‘Vampire of Sacramento’ ate his victims’ remains and drank their blood. As a sadist, he raped their corpses, cut off nipples and (on at least one occasion) stuffed dog faeces down their throats. With blood spattered up the walls, floor, fridge, cups and cutlery – like a vampire – he said his motive was the belief that his organs were crumbling to powder, and the only way to restore his health was to drink their blood.

But did he? And if so, how much?

Blood is a fluid which delivers oxygen and nutrients to our cells and transports metabolic waste away. Comprising of 55% plasma (which carries platelets, cells and antibodies), 44% red blood cells (carrying oxygen) and 1% white blood cells and platelets (to help fight infection, disease and control bleeding), we make 2 million new red blood cells a second, with roughly 3 to 5 million in a single drop of blood.

With plasma made up of 90% water and 10% proteins, electrolytes, vitamins and nutrients like glucose and amino acids, it makes sense why someone would consider drinking blood as a life-giving fluid.

Across countless war zones are tales of soldiers drinking the blood of their foes, like the Croation death camps of the Ustasha fascists who (it is claimed) drank from the slashed throats of prisoners, and among the Colombian paramilitary who drank blood believing it would make them better killers.

From Steve, our average UK male, with blood making up 8% of his body mass, a cannibal could syphon off 9 pints. According to both the Red Cross and the Mayo Clinic, each pint of blood contains roughly 625 calories per pint, which at a total of 5625 calories, it could keep you alive for just over 2 days.

But it won’t. It’ll kill you.

Having shot Teresa Wallin, it was said that Richard Chase the ‘Vampire of Sacramento’ had severed her carotid artery and using a yoghurt pot, he had drunk her blood. But it’s uncertain how much blood.

It’s odd, as although it envelops almost every part of our bodies, even our own blood is toxic to us.
But it’s not the diseases or pathogens found in our blood which is the problem, as our stomach acids can destroy almost every form of bacteria, with the exception of e-Coli and Salmonella which adapt.

The biggest risk is the nutrients it carries, as just a milliliter of blood contains 0.5 milligrams of iron, and while iron is necessary for life, high doses can cause haemochromatosis resulting liver damage, fluid in the lungs, vomiting, dehydration, and even death. And although 1000s of people claim they drink blood regularly as the oxygen-rich fluid gives them energy, even if it is pathogen free, scientists state that its unsafe to swallow anything more than a few teaspoons, or roughly 20 millilitres of blood,

The reason why other mammals like the leaf-nosed bat (also known as the vampire bat) drink blood is because they need a huge intake of iron, so during each feed which requires them to drink almost 1 ½ times their mass in blood, when ingested, a mucous membrane prevents too much iron from getting into their bloodstreams. Blood is toxic to every mammal, but as humans, when eating meat, we get around that by draining it first then cooking it.

At the turn of World War Two, Leonarda Cianciulli, the Italian serial killer who turned her victim’s fat into soap needed a way to disguise the metallic taste of blood, caused by the hemoglobin in red blood cells. She said “I waited until it had coagulated, dried it in the oven, ground it and mixed it with flour, sugar, chocolate, milk and eggs, as well as a bit of margarine. I made lots of crunchy tea cakes and served them to the ladies who visited. Giuseppe and I also ate them. They were really sweet”.

Many cultures use animal blood in food, especially in black pudding also known as blood sausage, and with it consisting of 1 part blood to 4 parts water, given that Steve our average UK male has roughly 9 pints of blood at ½ kilo per pint, he’d make 90 kilos of black pudding, and with the quality stuff selling for £15 per 1 ¼ kilos, a cash conscious cannibal could earn themselves £1080 for a few hours work.

In truth, biology proves it’s unlikely that many serial killers who claim to have drunk blood, actually did it, or if they did, it was quite possibly a few teaspoons, but it definitely wasn’t a pint, especially as when expressed from an artery and exposed to air, blood coagulates within two to eight minutes.

It’s more likely that (being sad and damaged) either to gain a reputation, for a deluded religious belief, owing to psychosis, or simply to plead insanity in countries where the death sentence exists, that the drinking of blood is more often a ploy, but one which the press happily regurgitates to sell newspapers.

On 8th of May 1979, with his defense hinged on mental illness, Richard Chase was found guilty of six counts of first-degree murder, the jury rejected his insanity plea, and he was executed by gas chamber.

Join me tomorrow to uncover what are the best parts of a human body to eat.

Nominated BEST BRITISH TRUE-CRIME PODCAST, 4th Best True-Crime Podcast by This Week, iTunes Top 25 Podcast, Podcast Magazine's Hot 50, The Telegraph's Top 5, Crime & Investigation Channel's Top 20 True-Crime Podcasts, also seen on BBC Radio, Sky News, The Guardian and TalkRadio's Podcast of the Week.

UPLOAD EPISODE

TRANSCRIPT OF EPISODE: Cannibalism (munching) “could you eat a whole human being? (munching) With the help of a doctor, a scientist and a chef, I set out to see if it’s possible. Cannibalism: part eight – the brain”. (burp)

Brain, the favourite food of a zombie, but rarely a cannibal. But are they too afraid?

In 1978, Robert Maudsley murdered two prisoners on his wing, the second being William Roberts who he stabbed in the head with a handmade shiv, smashed his skull against a wall, and although broken, according to the pathologist’s report “the brain remained intact”. But when less-reliable tabloids got hold of the story, the knife became a spoon and Robert Maudsley was branded as “the brain eater”.

But why is this act so terrifying and morally wrong? Because, if the skin is our identity, the brain is our personality and our soul, it’s the very essence of who we are, as without it, we’re just a sack of meat.

Weighing roughly 3lbs (or 1 and a 1/3 kilos) and being the size of both fists combined, the brain is split into three parts; the hindbrain which controls the body's vital functions, the midbrain which acts as a relay for senses, movement and pain, and the forebrain interprets sensory input and decision-making.

Protected by the skull, cerebrospinal fluid, and encased in a tough outer layer called the dura mater, the brain’s 100 billion neurons pass data at speeds of 250mph, it uses 20% of our oxygen and blood, it feels no pain, and – while we’re awake – it generates enough electricity to power a small light bulb.

Every animal has a brain, with the exception of jellyfish, sea sponges, clams and most football pundits.

Symbolically, the brain plays a key role in love and war. The Fore, an indigenous tribe of Papua New Guinea are said to eat the hearts and brains of their dead to honour them, and although unproven, the dictatorial President of Equatorial Guinea is said to eat the flesh, testicles and brains of his enemy.

Likewise, with many serial killers, brain eating is symbolic of unrequited love, control and domination. In 1989, Daniel Rakowitz murdered his roommate Monika Beerle claiming he loved her. Dismembering her in a bath, he boiled her remains, and having liquified her brain into a creamy soup, he said “I tasted it, and I liked it”, only to – supposedly – feed it to the homeless in New York’s Tompkins Square Park.

So, is the brain a suitable meal for any cannibal? Yes, of course.

Even Palaeolithic cannibals knew the value of a human brain, as comprising of 10% membrane, 30% water and proteins, but 60% fat, and although the fattest part of the human body, Dr Jim Stoppani, a Yale certified nutritionist said “the brain would provide slow-burning energy as it's high in fat and glucose”.

Comprising of roughly 2700 calories, enough to keep a cannibal alive for a day, with it weighing 1300 grams and being more than the recommended daily intake of 100 grams of cholesterol, a cannibal could safely eat a brain over 13 days, but – as a one-off meal – it wouldn’t be problem if they wolfed it down.

Journalist Carl Hoffman who witnessed The Asmat tribe of New Guinea said “they shook the brains out onto the leaf of a palm, scraped inside the skull with a knife to get every last bite, then mixed the mass with sago, wrapped the leaf up, and roasted it on the fire”. Although when TV host Reza Aslan ate brain with The Aghori tribe, he said “the brains tasted of charcoal… as they were burnt to a crisp”.

Which is a shame as being described as “soft, fatty and a bit waxy” with a texture like “a rich scrambled egg cooked in lamb’s fat”, composed mostly of fatty tissue, “it has a very mild, almost sweet flavor and a soft texture akin to heavily whipped cream” and it’s rich in vitamin B12 and omega-3 fatty acids.

Like sheep brains, human brain tissue is pale yellow, it has a slightly spongy feel but being “neither rubbery nor tough” it can be easily cut with a knife. In Slovakia, pig’s brains are mixed with ground meat, eggs and pickles. In Asia, lamb brain is pan-fried with salt and ginger. In the Middle East, it’s soaked in milk. Or, as Peter Bryan said having fried it, “I ate his brain with butter. It was nice”.

And although full of calories and nutrients as the survivors of the Andes plane crash can testify, brain tissue can be deadly. From 1957 to 1960, 1000 members of the 20,000 strong Fore tribe of New Guinea died of Kuru, a rare and incurable disorder caused by eating infected human brain tissue, resulting in tremors, slurred speech, memory loss (not unlike mad cow disease and dementia) and finally death.

Brain eating seems acceptable if it’s committed by indigenous tribes with long-held beliefs, but in the West, it’s still seen as shocking, and for good reason. In 2009, Otty Sanchez of Texas, who had a history of mental illness was hearing voices following the birth of her son. Triggering a postpartum psychosis, she murdered her three-week old son at “the devil’s orders”, eating parts of his brain, nose and toes.

Like many of these ancient tribes, it was said, by eating his brain, she wanted him to live-on inside her.

Join me tomorrow for possibly the least palatable part of a human body – the hair.

Nominated BEST BRITISH TRUE-CRIME PODCAST, 4th Best True-Crime Podcast by This Week, iTunes Top 25 Podcast, Podcast Magazine's Hot 50, The Telegraph's Top 5, Crime & Investigation Channel's Top 20 True-Crime Podcasts, also seen on BBC Radio, Sky News, The Guardian and TalkRadio's Podcast of the Week.

TRANSCRIPT OF EPISODE: Cannibalism (munching) “could you eat a whole human being? (more munching) With the help of a doctor, a scientist and a chef, I set out to see if it’s possible. Cannibalism: part seven – skin”. (burp)

The only thing that serial killers and cannibals think that human skin good for is making a suit.

Infamously, Ed Gein sewed a suit made of women’s skin, including leggings made of leg flesh, a corset with breasts, a belt made of nipples and masks flayed from female faces, so he could literally "become his mother and crawl into her skin"; as well as lamp shades, a bongo, bowls made of skulls, nine vulvae in a shoe box, lips as a window shade drawstring and a female nipple doorbell, to name but a few.

And although suspected of being a cannibal, as he had gutted a body like a deer and a heart was said to have been “found in a pan on the stove”; he only confessed to grave-robbing, no tooth marks were found on any bones or flesh, and the heart was actually in a plastic bag, by the pot, and not in the pot.

Problem is that by itself when the fat and meat is stripped away, skin is not great as a treat to eat.
Covering 2 to 3 square meters and weighing between 3 ½ and 10 kilos, skin is the largest organ in the human body. Comprising of the epidermis, dermis and hypodermis, a square inch is made up of 19 million skin cells and contains 300 sweat glands, 20 blood vessels and 1000 nerve endings. Although just 2mm at its thickest and as thin as 0.07mm, skin produces melanin, brings oxygen and nutrients to your cells, removes waste, regulates your heat, and protects you against UV light and pollution.

It renews itself every 28 days – which makes a very fresh part of the body shedding 30,000 skin cells a minute – but the outer layer is made up of between 10 to 30 thin layers of dead skin cells. Delicious.

So, if Steve were to have his skin flayed off – but no fat, because our cannibal is dieting – those 7 kilos (or 15 ½ lbs) of skin could provide roughly 13,000 calories, enough for about 5 days, being full of carbs, proteins, fats and vitamin c.  But as cannibals in the palaeolithic era discovered, “skin was a last resort”, especially human, as without the meat and the fat, skin is merely an effective seal for preserving it.

That said, with 167,000 people dying each day, if we put our morals aside, with an average of 22 square feet of skin each, our daily death toll could provide 3.65 million square feet of skin a day, and needing 45 square feet to make a leather jacket, daily we could clothe the world in 81,600 Fonzy-style jackets.

But would that ever happen? No.

Visually, skin is the most personal part of a human body, it makes us unique without needing to move or make a sound. It is significant in many religions (as with the symbolic eating of the body of Christ), the flaying of skin is used as war trophies (like in 1571, when Marcantonio Bragadin, General of the Venetian resistance was flayed, his skin stuffed with straw and paraded along the streets riding an ox), and even for proven cannibals – like the Korowai of Indonesia’s Papua – although no longer practiced, they still encourage tales of flaying and the eating of human flesh to keep any Westerners away.

As for serial killers, the heart and the brain is a symbolic meal, but the skin is more of a souvenir.
Armin Miewes said he was motived to become a cannibal as he always wanted a brother and this way "someone could be part of me", although it’s uncertain if that was true. And in 2000, having stabbed her boyfriend 37 times, Katherine Knight flayed his skin, hung it on a meat hook, and as his decapitated head cooked in a pot, she laid table settings for his kids, with plates of his flesh served with vegetables and gravy. As a victim of a violent and abusive relationship, if that’s not purely symbolic, what is?

Without the fat and meat, skin isn’t a meal, but a protective layer, a symbolic gesture, or a souvenir.

So, maybe in this case, cannibals have got it right?

Karl Denke, the Cannibal of Münsterberg, who supposedly sold human flesh at the market, not only had jars of flesh curing in salt, two tubs of meat pickling in brine, skinned bones and pots of bubbling fat for eating and selling, but he also sewed himself some gentleman’s apparel; with shoelaces wound from skin and hair, and belts flayed from the chest (avoiding the nipples) and occasionally the pubis.

And maybe that’s why, when we eat animals, we choose not to anthropomorphise them. A cannibal wants to see another human as a meal not a best mate, as (like us chomping on a piggy) we don’t want to be reminded of who or what they were, as a bacon sandwich is yummy, but not if it’s smiled at you.

Imagine tucking into Steve’s lightly tanned flesh, and you’re reminded of his last holiday in the Algarve, his appendix scar, a tattoo of his kid’s names, the cigarette stain on his lips, and his battle with eczema. Even if you’re starving to death, would you still be hungry enough to eat his scabs? I thought not.

Join me tomorrow to examine a zombie’s favourite part of the human body – the brain.