Yes, that's a definate option, but recursive solutions are often the most elegant to write.
btw, I recently found a neat way around Perl's stack depth limits, it goes something like this:

@_ = ($self->{rest});
goto &{ $self->can('value') };
[download]

:-)
update:
sorry, that should have read

goto &{ $_[0]->can('value') };
[download]