What a badly edited article. Practically every paragraph is duplicated, and there is no clear logical development. Furthermore, on such an essentially subjective matter, whose was the idea of getting a herbivore (all right, a vegetarian omnivore) to judge flavours of food (vegetables are what food eats).
And some of the essential 'facts' are wrong, or at least very questionable. The evolutionary base of flavour is unproven; the assertion that certain flightless birds have been evolving away from an avian 'base stock' longer than other birds is not easily supported given physiological modifications of the other species. But horse doesn't taste the same as donkey (I haven't tried zebra), goat as mutton, despite being very recent splits. I have never eaten any of the great apes, but those who have tried bushmeat say they don't taste anything like pork (I don't know anyone, have never even read the accounts of anyone who's tried long pig to do the comparison).
And rabbit doesn't taste anything like chicken; but that might be due to the fact I've eaten rabbit since weaning, so the cuts of rabbit in my freezer invoke a pleasant nostalgia; I may well buy another. Guinea pig tastes a bit like rabbit, too, and I wouldn't be surprised to find this true of many rodents, though I wouldn't risk the Mouse's ire by checking Rats, or several other members' on squirrel or beaver. While I agree that snake and alligator do show some slight similarity (not in texture, though), as do guinea fowl, but even pheasant, closely related in evolutionary terms, is so separate nobody could confuse the two. Pigeon, too; there may well be other things that taste like it, but none big enough to be worth cooking. Duck (just had some), goose? Specific, recognisable flavours.
Some of it is the environment and diet - enough fish meal in the trough and chicken can approach albatross (what flavour is it? Seabird, innit?), and the all acorn Spanish dark-fleshed pork is wildly different from other pigs. Some of it is a substance specific to the species; the formic acid in chocolate-coated ants is immediately recognisable. While shrimps, prawns, crawfish, lobsters, écrivisses, scampi and even crabs (the major marine arthropoda) share a certain common characteristic this does not carry across to their close relative the scorpion (though if ever I find a scorpion with claws big enough to crack I think I'm changing planet).
Frogs' legs, like escargots, taste of what you cook them in; I suspect that's why they get classed with chicken, as chicken in a strong garlic, herb and butter sauce tastes very herby, garlicky and a bit buttery
. Wichetty grubs, as arthropodic stock, have no reason to taste like chicken, and apparently don't; they taste like scrambled egg (again I apologise for not being able to give a personal opinion) or almonds(?) when raw.
So I'm not going to give any great hopes for Kentucky fried iguana, or hadrosaur.
