KFC becomes the first quick service restaurant to bring on-trend street food to the high street, as it adds to its traditional fried chicken menu with the introduction of a range of slow cooked pulled chicken products for its customers.
Arriving ahead of KFC’s 50‐year anniversary, the slow cooked Pulled Chicken range ‐ which includes the Ultimate Burger, Chicken Twister Wrap and lower calorie Lil’ Wrap ‐ has been launched to provide customers with a greater choice across the KFC menu.
Given the size of KFC’s customer base, H&C News looks forward to rapid feedback on this major menu innovation, and anticipates that customers will be quick to share their views.
2015: the year of Pulled Chicken
KFC Innovation Manager, Louise Direito said: “If Pulled Pork was the dish of 2014, then 2015 will become the year of Pulled Chicken. Influenced heavily by both our Kentucky heritage as well as the UK street food scene, the new range is a labour of love for us. We have been working tirelessly for the past 18 months to improve the variety of our menu and are delighted that we can now provide our customers with something completely unique to KFC.”
Britain’s growing love affair with ‘Americana’
The innovative move reflects Britain’s growing love affair with ‘Americana’, which has driven a 35% increase in the number of American and BBQ style dishes served in UK restaurants since 2010 and a boom in the number of new smokehouses, burger bars, diners and rib shacks that have popped up throughout the country. London alone has seen a 40% increase in American themed eateries opening on its streets since 2012. The booming trend has also influenced the grocery industry with pulled meats beginning to appear on supermarket shelves, contributing to a £10m sales growth in Pulled Pork alone. It is now estimated that the Southern American BBQ style food market is worth over £68m in the UK.
Consumers on the hunt for new dishes
Trendologist Charles Banks, founder of thefoodpeople said: “The popularity of American- inspired cuisine, BBQ and pulled meats comes from the contemporary BBQ craze that has swept the US and now the UK, evolving from a food trend into a food genre.
“Pulled meats and BBQ fit perfectly with where the UK food scene is right now ‐ it’s about comfort, simplicity, low and slow cooking, the use of cheaper cuts of meat, social and convivial food and huge flavour delivery.
“We have worked with KFC to take inspiration from this genre and make it work for chicken, rather than pork and other meats more traditionally used in this style of cooking, to create a menu which caters for the growing number of consumers who are on the hunt for new dishes and culinary experiences.”
Balance of tenderness and flavour
The new Pulled Chicken is made from a blend of (60%) white breast and (40%) dark meat to give a balance of tenderness and flavour, and cooked in a sauce inspired by an authentic Kentucky recipe. The meat is first tumbled in a dry spice rub which includes smoked paprika, clove and chilli before being marinated in a molasses-based sauce and slow cooked for almost two hours.
The new Pulled Chicken range is available in KFC restaurants from 1st September, across the UK and Ireland.
About KFC
KFC, the world’s largest chain of chicken‐based quick service restaurants, grew from the chicken business set up by Colonel Harland D Sanders in the 1950s. The Colonel had found a way to combine 11 herbs and spices with flour to create a unique taste, and to this day the secret recipe is only known to a handful of people. It is locked away in a vault in Louisville, Kentucky.
KFC came to Britain in 1965, with the first store opening in Preston, Lancashire, and there are now 865 stores across the UK, with over 24,000 employees.
KFC has made considerable nutritional improvements in the last few years, cutting salt by as much as 50% and switching cooking oils to cut saturated fat levels in Original Recipe Chicken by up to 25%.
KFC was voted Britain’s Top Employer in 2012, 2013 and 2014, becoming the first company to win the award for three consecutive years, and the company has been named as a Great Place to Work for the last four years. The company places a big importance on developing people, and became the first restaurant company in the UK to launch an honours degree – a BA (Hons) Business Management course in conjunction with De Montfort University, Leicester. KFC also works with City & Guilds to provide Level 2 and Level 3 Apprenticeships to team members and team leaders.
KFC is also committed to benefiting the community, and uses its expertise at developing young people to work with some of the most disadvantaged young adults in the UK through a work experience partnership with Barnardo’s. The company also works to help the global community, and has raised over £4m for the United Nations World Food Programme in the last six years.
KFC UK, Inc is a subsidiary of Yum! Brands, Inc., which also owns the Pizza Hut and Taco Bell restaurants.
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