Never having shot one, but eating plenty of it, not the store bought but wild, free roaming, bison rates right up there towards the top, IMO. Shot an old musk ox bull on Nunivak Island years ago, that was very flavorful. However, I threw some backstrap I'd cut into steaks on the BBQ and when I went to stick a fork in it to turn over, the fork darn near bounced off the steak! Very good flavor but it was about the toughest meat I've ever eaten! Ended up turning most of that into various types of sausage. Did have some cow musk ox meat that was an entirely different story than the bull.....tender and very flavorful!
A personal funny story about the musk ox. I'd sent a wetlock box of some silver salmon to my folks in Idaho, in 1989, along with 10 lbs or so of the musk ox meat. Later on. They told me they'd made some mince meat from the musk ox, again in 1989, which was probably good since it was so tough. I moved back to ID in 1997 and didn't give the musk ox mince meat a second thought. Around 2006, my mom was telling me that they had a church pie social and had made a pie from the canned mince meat....around 17 years after they had made it. I kind of chuckled and asked how the folks liked it! She said that it was the hit of the church social, with my dad chiming in, that he had mentioned they were probably the only ones in the USA eating musk ox mince meat pie. Didn't sound like they had too much concern or thought about it being around 17 years old!
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