sweet tapioca soup with honeydew

So this is one of those recipes I wanted to try the second I saw the picture. Cool sea-green honeydew-flavored tapioca. Sounds like a dream come true. So, I made a big ol' batch, since I just knew I would gobble it up. Basically, you make regular tapioca pudding, then add a heaping pile of pureed honeydew melon.

So when I tasted it, I was surprised to find that it had a gross bitter aftertaste. Kind of like, and I can't be sure, but it almost seems like it made the good honeydew melon taste like a pretty bad honeydew melon. Or, maybe like it tasted like honeydew rind. The melon wasn't the best, but it was certainly edible.

There is also coconut milk in the recipe-maybe it just didn't mix with the honeydew flavor. I tried the old "taste this, what is that bitter aftertaste?" move, but I couldn't seem to get my husband to try it. Dang. I want to make this work, but a different fruit is definitely in order. One that is used to being cooked. Mango-that might be the one! I'll keep you posted. This one's from the September 2009 issue.