A Most Curious Affair: On Chicken Wings and the Paradoxes of Flavour

By V. L. K. Djokoto

One cannot help but observe, with a certain amused bemusement, that the universe delights in throwing together the most unlikely bedfellows and demanding we find them harmonious. Such is the case with this peculiar creation—the sweet-salty fish-sauce-glazed chicken wings that have emerged from the Bangkok establishment known as Smoking Goat, a dish so deliberately contradictory that it might have been devised by a philosopher rather than a chef.

Consider, if you will, the delightful absurdity of the thing: we Ghanaians, who have spent centuries perfecting the art of the marinade—our light soup swimming in profound depths, our pepper base a symphony of singular purpose—are now being asked to embrace a condiment whose very name suggests something best left unexamined. Fish sauce! The very words provoke in the uninitiated a facial expression not unlike that of someone who has just swallowed a particularly bitter truth about themselves.

Yet therein lies the exquisite joke. For what is life, if not the willingness to be surprised? We are a people who understood long ago that the most sophisticated of palates are those which understand contradiction. Our own grilled tilapia teaches us this lesson: the char of the flame married to the sweetness of the fish, the salt of the sea mingling with the heat of our peppers. We know that opposing forces, when properly introduced, do not annihilate each other—they waltz.

And so it is with these improbable wings.

The Smoking Goat has committed a minor act of genius, though one must maintain a proper decorum in one's admiration. The sweetness—undoubtedly derived from some combination of caramel or perhaps brown sugar, that democratic ingredient beloved alike in Bangkok and Accra—provides a base note of seduction. Upon this foundation, the fish sauce, that maligned and misunderstood emissary from the sea, deposits its umami wisdom. "Here," it seems to whisper, "is the very essence of savouriness itself. Accept me, and I shall elevate you beyond the pedestrian."

One cannot help but imagine how such a dish might be received in various quarters of Accra. At the Nkrumahist philosopher's table, it would surely provoke a debate about the nature of authenticity—can we embrace the innovations of distant lands without surrendering our own culinary identity? The answer, I should think, is obvious: a culture confident in itself fears no foreign influence, just as a secure man may admire the wit of his rivals without diminishing his own.

The genius of this dish lies precisely in its refusal to choose sides. It does not apologise for being sweet, nor does it flinch from its savoury declaration. One might compare it to a person of genuine distinction—someone utterly uninterested in being universally liked, content instead to fascinate and occasionally perplex. Such characters are rare. Such dishes are rarer still.

The practical question—how does one prepare such a marvel?—is less important than understanding why one should. The chicken wings themselves are merely vehicles, as all vehicles are, for the ideas one wishes to transport. What matters is the glaze: a careful balance that borders on the absurd, that hovers in the space between cultures and continents, asking nothing but to be tasted with an open mind and a courageous spirit.

Here in Ghana, where we have watched the world converge upon our shores and our tables, where our street food vendors now compete with cosmopolitan kitchens, where a young person might enjoy waakye at dawn and pad thai at dusk without experiencing the slightest cognitive dissonance—here, surely, such a dish finds its natural home.

The Smoking Goat has given us wings, one might say. Not the literal wings of poultry, though those are certainly included, but rather the wings of possibility—the understanding that flavour, like life itself, need not be monolithic to be meaningful.

To embrace these wings is to embrace a simple truth: that the best parties are often the ones where the most unlikely guests find themselves seated next to each other, and that when the wine is good, when the company is attentive, when the food speaks truth to palate—why, then everything becomes not merely possible, but inevitable.

And that, as the Ghanaian saying goes, is no small thing.