When it comes to the flavor of raw animal testicles, Pauly Long really can’t put words to it. To him, the “Testicle King” of TikTok, raw animal testicles just taste like, well, testicles.

“They have a gamey and earthy flavor? I have no idea how to describe it,” he tells me. “But in terms of the texture, it’s kind of like a scallop.”

It doesn’t matter if they’re bull, goat or lamb cojones, Long can’t say he enjoys the taste. But when the testicles are really fresh, he does like slicing them open at the top and squishing the ballsack-of-the-day’s contents straight into his mouth.

@paulylong Replying to @Diamond stepper IT’S TEST️CLE TIME! #bulltesticles #rawmeat #raworgans #foodchallenge #eatingchallenge #eatingasmr #foodasmr #asmrfood #asmreating #eatingshow #eatingsounds #eatingshowasmr #mukbang #mukbangeatingshow #indonesia #bali #foodie #fyp #viralvideos ♬ Chopin Nocturne No. 2 Piano Mono - moshimo sound design

Long, who lives in Bali, has built his whole social media presence around videos of himself consuming large quantities of exotic and mostly raw foods. He introduced raw animal testicles into his diet in April 2022, and the excitement online was immediate. His first testicle-eating video hit 60,000 views overnight and climbed into the millions shortly thereafter.

But what started as an engagement stunt ended up being what Long saw as an investment in his health. “Back in 2021, I was trying to do YouTube, and I was trying out some different Indonesian foods with the hopes of going viral,” he explains. “So as soon as the testicles video went viral, I just went all in on the raw meat and organs diet, and it actually ended up working out really well. I loved it, and I felt great while I was doing it — as long as the organs were fresh and sourced properly.”

On average, Long started clearing three to four raw animal testicles a week. He’d either pair them with cheese (“Moldy cheese nuts!”), or slurp them down au naturale.

In recent years, TikTok has been flooded with aspiring gains-oriented “alpha” men who promote all sorts of primal diets in the name of masculinity, from diets of only raw meats and organs to ones focused on raw eggs. A common talking point among them is that a leaner, more muscly build — achieved via high protein consumption and intense lifting sessions — brings you up higher on the virility ladder. And so, fitness social media influencers like Brian Johnson, aka Liver King, have grown sizable audiences by both proselytizing raw meat and organ diets and assailing our “masculinity crisis.”

@paulylong MOLDY CHEESE NUTS #bulltesticles #eatingchallenge #moldycheese #rawmeat #eatingshow #eatingasmr #eatingsounds #eatingfood #foodie #foodchallenge #foodasmr #fyp #foryou #viralvideos ♬ original sound - Pauly Long

But while consuming raw meat can be good for your health if done safely, abusing a raw — or even cooked — organ or meat-only diet can pose threats to your health, according to fitness journalist and published nutrition expert Anthony Roberts. Multiple studies suggest that organ meat consumption is linked to a rise in uric acid, which can result in non-alcoholic fatty liver disease, kidney stones and gout. Also, consuming other organs — including cow brain, which Long has tried — can transmit animal-to-human infections, including Creutzfeldt-Jakob disease, the human version of mad cow disease.

As for chomping down on raw testicles? “Too much of a good thing isn’t going to be a good thing,” Roberts says. “Unsurprisingly, there isn’t a lot of data on people who eat testicles four times a week. My gut instinct tells me that it’s not a great protocol, but at the same time, there isn’t much research.”

Testicles do provide important macronutrients, like protein, but Roberts says they’re not going to be more beneficial than, say, a regular piece of meat. In terms of Long’s videos, Roberts says they don’t have much to do with fitness or nutrition, but instead just look like “testicle mukbang.”

@paulylong

♬ original sound - Pauly Long

Long swears he felt especially great when he was eating four raw balls a week; his GI issues magically resolved, and he attributed his health benefits to the testicles’ nutrients and “active enzymes.” However, animal testicles don’t contain any elixir-type of nutrient capable of fixing GI issues, nor do they help the human body with “active enzymes.” Much like their flavor, they’re just balls.

So why did Long feel so much better after eating a gazillion gonads? “Whatever he was doing previously might’ve been a problem,” Roberts theorizes. “Let’s just say he had a histamine intolerance, or a food allergy or any one of a million things that wouldn’t be triggered by raw organ meat. Now he feels great eating raw organs, which isn’t surprising. He could have switched to one of a hundred diets, and they would all have made him feel this way.” (Long says that in the past, he did abuse alcohol and binge eat junk food, which he suspects was the leading cause of his former GI issues.)

Lately, though, Long has pivoted to other raw meats. Together with “Testi King,” his TikTok bio now reads “Sushi Guy” and “Raw Salmon Dude.” The pivot, however, wasn’t a personal choice. “All three of my distributors stopped getting testicles, and I can no longer find them,” he says. “So I haven’t had them in several months.”

Maybe that’s for the best? Again, moderation is important, and there isn’t any evidence to point to that shows slurping balls is good for your health. “I’ll tell you what, though,” Roberts says. “They’re good for your social media account.”

Which, at the end of the day, is why Long balled out in the first place.