Cacao crazy: the chicken eggs that taste of chocolate

Setting up camp near the scratched and feathered tree, Avril sat in wait for her first sighting of the elusive chickens. After a restless night of sleep, she awoke to the unmistakable crow of a rooster, just as the sun was rising. They had arrived. ‘I jumped up, grabbed my camera and rushed out of the tent as fast as I could. This was the moment I’d been waiting for; a chance to see something no one would ever think possible. At first I couldn’t see or hear anything – just the rush of the river in the background – but then there was another crow right above me. I looked up and there was this magnificent rooster, perched on a branch and looking directly at me.’

Several moments passed as Avril and the rooster stared at each other, seeing something completely new for the first time. Mouth agape, she slowly brought the camera up to her eye to take a photo, but as she pressed the shutter she realised something was wrong. Snapping out of her trance, Avril looked at her lens. In her excitement to get out of the tent, she had smashed it, and her hopes of bringing back evidence to her colleagues slipped away.

‘I went into full panic mode,’ she says. ‘There I was, in front of this incredible discovery, and I had no way of documenting what I had seen. All the trekking, all the physical exertion just to get here was for nothing – I didn’t have enough funding to go home and come back again, so I would have to hope my colleagues would believe me without any photographic evidence.’

Dejected but not beaten, Avril gathered herself and decided to stay a while longer to learn everything she could about these chickens. Eventually the rooster led her to a small brood of hens living right on the riverbank. Soon enough, she realised that these chickens could be categorised as a separate species altogether. Avril also discovered the source of their sustenance – these chickens were feeding on wild cacao pods which had fallen to the floor, fermented and then dried in the sun. ‘It was amazing; they seemed to really love the cacao,’ she explains. ‘The pods were picked clean and every time one fell from the tree it was as if the chickens were waiting around for them to develop in flavour.’

The chickens – which Avril named Cocos Pullum Mendacium – were certainly thriving in their habitat, and after sketching their appearance and noting down everything she could, Avril decided it was time to return home. Just as she was packing up and setting off, she realised she had misplaced her rations for the trek to the nearest town. In a state of panic, she broke the most sacred rule all ornithologists adhere to. She took a few eggs, cracked them into a pan and cooked them on her camping stove. In doing so, however, she made the discovery of a lifetime. ‘The eggs tasted like the richest, most beautiful bar of chocolate you’ve ever eaten!’ she exclaims. ‘They were incredible – they looked just like your average hen’s egg, but had a beautiful, almost fruity flavour. It was the chickens’ cacao-heavy diet that was responsible – they must have a certain way of processing it in a way that effects the flavour of their eggs.’

Giddy with excitement, Avril stashed a few more eggs in her bag to take home and set off to tell everyone she could about her discoveries. After some initial raised eyebrows, the world’s top ornithologists began to believe Avril’s incredible story, and decided to fund another expedition to gather more information.