It tastes like chicken, in ways that crocodile and rattlesnakes do not, and has, well, honey in it. That’s it…that’s all I can describe on the taste front. We became instantly addicted to it the moment we first tasted it twelve years ago when we were on our honeymoon. It was then that my wife decided to find the recipe and create her own Honeystung Chicken. Despite the various recipes found on the internet and tales from old men who live in caves spouting gibberish about “honey-infused fertilized eggs,” no match for the taste has yet been found.
Still, the effort has, until now, been for naught. Her concoctions, by no means inedible or distasteful, just doesn’t match the culinary cacophony of craving-inducing creativity of the Honeystung Chicken we experienced in the Caribbean. I recall the first few times we attempted to find the “homemade version” of the dish and the subsequent hospital visits which enabled me to become acquainted with the hospital version of a grilled cheese sandwich (which contains a piece of cheese colored cardboard put in between two pieces of hard tack and ignited by a blowtorch). I also remember the calls from the ASPCA who suspected we were feeding our dog and cat some of the less-than-successful attempts at capturing that sweet golden goodness (we had not, by the way…their increased girth was a direct result of my misinterpretation of my wife’s instructions on how much food I was to feed them while they were away on holiday).
The point is, despite the attempts by my wife, who is a darn good cook, something magical has been left out of all the recipes for this addictive, fantastic dish. Its supposed origin (Royal Caribbean Cruise Line) is mum on the subject, but I know they are harboring some alien discovery that makes it taste so good.