Kentucky Fried Chicken

Yesterday's post about Dr. Pepper and the blend of 23 flavors got me thinking. The first famous consumer product with a famous set of specific ingredients that came to mind is KFC Original Recipe chicken. The Original Recipe has 11 herbs and spices. In one of the later episodes of the FOX television show Fringe one of the main characters, the crazy fringe scientist Walter makes a couple of references to KFC and the secret 11 herb/spice recipe.

During the course of my "research" for this posting, which did not include a taste test. I was intrigued that this famous American brand has three times more locations outside the US than there are in the US. About 5200 in the US and over 15000 outside the US. This is not the type of ratio that other famous brands like McDonalds (13000 US, 18000 outside) or Pizza Hut (7500 US, 5600 outside) have.

I also thought it was interesting looking through the history of KFC on their company website. The Original Recipe is 70 years old this year and another interesting (or trivial) fact is that they began selling chicken in buckets in 1957.

It was also neat to learn that the Governor of Kentucky named Colonel Sanders an honorary Kentucky Colonel for his contribution to the cuisine of the state, not for any military reason.