Conch is the firm, sweet, briny white meat of a large marine sea snail, drawn from the broad pink-lipped spiral shell that is one of the most recognisable objects in the tropics. The prized eating species is the queen conch (Lobatus gigas) of the Caribbean and the warm western Atlantic — a grazing gastropod whose single muscular foot yields a dense, ivory-coloured cut that is intensely chewy and mild, somewhere between clam and abalone. Pronounced konk, it is a defining flavour of the Bahamas, the Florida Keys and the wider Caribbean, where it is pounded tender, tossed raw with citrus and chilli as ceviche, dropped into fritters, simmered into a long, peppery chowder, or cracked from its shell at the roadside and eaten on the spot.