British chef Mike Keen paddled up the coast of Greenland eating only what local people did, and the health benefits led him to question the global food system

For a period of two months last year, a typical day for chef Mike Keen would see him skipping breakfast and lunch in favour of snacks such as dried capelin (a small bait fish), dried halibut, jerky-like dried whale and a local Greenlandic whale skin and blubber treat called mattak.

Mike Keen eats fermented seal blood in Sermilik fjord, east Greenland. Photograph: Mike Keen