You know what the best food in the world is? It’s a free sample of chicken in some kind of sweet sauce, served on a toothpick, found in a food court. Iris and I were at Uwajimaya today, and she asked for a sample of orange chicken at the Thai counter, and she reported that it was awesome. But you know what I’m talking about: bourbon chicken from the cajun place, orange peel chicken from the Chinese place, doesn’t matter.
Corollary: If you order and pay for a whole serving of the chicken, it’s not very good.
I would argue that it is actually the serving of food on a stick that improves the taste, and not the free-ness.
The fact that you only get one is an important factor, I think.
There’s a night market in Beijing (and probably similar ones all over China/HK/Taiwan/etc) that serves almost exactly that (except for the free part). Dozens of stands with meat on a stick, small portions for about $.50 – $2. Most of it is lamb, but they have other mammals, insects, fish, birds. There are a few other things on a stick like candied haw and spicy noodles (not on a stick).
I was going to ask what “haw” is, but I looked it up on Wikipedia. Hopefully you are talking about “Chinese sweets made from the fruit of the Chinese hawthorn” and not “Haw, the nictitating membrane on the eyes of some animals.”