This is a plate of green curry chicken that I ate at a KFC in Chiang Mai. (Sorry about the shoddy phone-photos.) It cost 59 baht (about $1.90), it was delivered to my table by a waiter, and it wasn’t surprisingly good, or not bad considering, but legitimately excellent.
Think this is an unfair comparison? Even setting aside all the local adaptations, like the baby pearl eggplant (those aren’t peas), fresh chili pepper, and lashings of canonical green curry, the chicken alone was crisper and juicier than any I’ve ever had at a KFC in America. That chicken thigh was split open, dusted in whatever magical substance they use to give it that scaly crust, fried to a crackle, and sent right to my table without ever seeing a heat lamp.
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April 4, 2011 at 2:56 pm
michael webster
This is an excellent observation – there is no reason that KFC could not import their international menu, test it, and deliver.
April 5, 2011 at 7:34 am
Some Random Economist
I wonder how much of this is labor costs. The description Humes gives of how this is prepared sounds far more labor intensive than anything I’ve seen in a fast food restaurant in America.
April 5, 2011 at 9:50 pm
mike
Most people in Thailand have never been to a KFC in the US. There’s no real preconception that KFC is just fast food junk.
Rather American brands are inherently considered higher value then the local stuff. So it makes sense to leverage that and create a higher end experience.
I’m sure there are plenty of shoddy European brands that get polished up when brought to the US market, just because everybody knows Europe is so much more fancy and sophisticated compared to us!
April 5, 2011 at 10:13 pm
Ivan Karamazov
“I’m sure there are plenty of shoddy European brands that get polished up when brought to the US market, just because everybody knows Europe is so much more fancy and sophisticated compared to us!”
Mercedes-Benz – the German General Motors. Their vehicles are sold with crank windows (gasp!) in their home nation. They are driven in taxi fleets the world over.
April 5, 2011 at 10:18 pm
jeff
mike, that’s a great point