# I have discovered the secret recipe for KFC fried chicken **URL:** \ **Category:** Cafe Society\ **Created:** [August 26, 2016, 9:14am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/i-have-discovered-the-secret-recipe-for-kfc-fried-chicken/764002 "2016-08-26T09:14:57Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 20\ **Page:** 1
**Author:** ![steatopygia](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/steatopygia/32/3132_2.png) [@steatopygia](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/steatopygia)\ **Post date:** [August 26, 2016, 9:14am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/i-have-discovered-the-secret-recipe-for-kfc-fried-chicken/764002/1 "2016-08-26T09:14:57Z")
I discovered it in the Chicago Tribune. [Story](http://www.chicagotribune.com/lifestyles/travel/ct-kfc-recipe-revealed-20160818-story.html) ---
**Author:** ![GuanoLad](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/guanolad/32/42_2.png) [@GuanoLad](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/GuanoLad)\ **Post date:** [August 26, 2016, 9:56am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/i-have-discovered-the-secret-recipe-for-kfc-fried-chicken/764002/2 "2016-08-26T09:56:17Z")
The trick to KFC has always been the cooking method, rather than the recipe, which has been known, or been easily worked out, for ages. ---
**Author:** ![bobot](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/bobot/32/21622_2.png) [@bobot](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/bobot)\ **Post date:** [August 26, 2016, 10:15am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/i-have-discovered-the-secret-recipe-for-kfc-fried-chicken/764002/3 "2016-08-26T10:15:35Z")
I saw that in the Trib last weekend, and thought: Did they just print the Secret 11 herbs and spices? (I clipped and saved it.) The story was followed with another story about the test kitchen trial, and the verdict was that with the addition of post-cooking MSG, it was a dead ringer. ---
**Author:** ![Amateur\_Barbarian](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/a/59ef9b/32.png) [@Amateur\_Barbarian](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Amateur_Barbarian)\ **Post date:** [August 26, 2016, 12:39pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/i-have-discovered-the-secret-recipe-for-kfc-fried-chicken/764002/4 "2016-08-26T12:39:33Z")
The secret herbs and spices are salt, pepper and MSG. Known for decades. ---
**Author:** ![CalMeacham](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/calmeacham/32/35_2.png) [@CalMeacham](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/CalMeacham)\ **Post date:** [August 26, 2016, 12:49pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/i-have-discovered-the-secret-recipe-for-kfc-fried-chicken/764002/5 "2016-08-26T12:49:42Z")
> [@Amateur\_Barbarian](#): > > The secret herbs and spices are salt, pepper and MSG. Known for decades. This is the recipe as given in William POundston’e book **Big Secrets**. Poundstone obtained a package of the spices as used in the stores and had it analyzed by a food laboratory, giving the results cited above. There was, he said, nothing else in there – the lab would’ve caught it. So what of the “eleven herbs and spices?” Poundstone suggests that THe Colonel did use and sold such a recipe, but that subsequent owners of the franchise, after it left his hands, stripped it down considerably. They certainly did this with his chicken gravy recipe – he sternly criticized what Heublein substituted for his original recipe (“so good you can throw away the chicken and eat the gravy,” he said). ---
**Author:** ![Amateur\_Barbarian](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/a/59ef9b/32.png) [@Amateur\_Barbarian](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Amateur_Barbarian)\ **Post date:** [August 26, 2016, 1:07pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/i-have-discovered-the-secret-recipe-for-kfc-fried-chicken/764002/6 "2016-08-26T13:07:27Z")
Thanks for filling in the short form. I was on my phone and don’t have the millennial patience for writing hundreds of words with my fingertip. 🙂 But yes, that’s it exactly and Big Secrets was published in 1983. Which, like most facts, never seems to reach those who spend days or weeks “recreating” a wrong answer. Again. 🙂 ---
**Author:** ![furryman](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/furryman/32/99_2.png) [@furryman](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/furryman)\ **Post date:** [August 26, 2016, 4:59pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/i-have-discovered-the-secret-recipe-for-kfc-fried-chicken/764002/7 "2016-08-26T16:59:42Z")
Meh. I think KFC chicken is too salty. ---
**Author:** ![Amateur\_Barbarian](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/a/59ef9b/32.png) [@Amateur\_Barbarian](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Amateur_Barbarian)\ **Post date:** [August 26, 2016, 6:21pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/i-have-discovered-the-secret-recipe-for-kfc-fried-chicken/764002/8 "2016-08-26T18:21:51Z")
> [@furryman](#): > > Meh. I think KFC chicken is too salty. It’s also insanely expensive and - the main problem for me with even occasionally indulging - the quality varies greatly, from soggy and slightly undercooked-seeming, to crisped out, to just plain oily. I only got a batch that was as good as I thought it’d be about one time in four, and that seemed to be a decline from the previous decade of enjoyment. So I get mah frahd at the grocery store, where it’s occasionally a disappointment, but also only about $8 for a full set of parts. ---
**Author:** ![Sunny\_Daze](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/sunny_daze/32/438_2.png) [@Sunny\_Daze](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Sunny_Daze)\ **Post date:** [August 26, 2016, 6:50pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/i-have-discovered-the-secret-recipe-for-kfc-fried-chicken/764002/9 "2016-08-26T18:50:39Z")
Well, I’m willing to try and recreate the “original” as shown in the article. I agree that what KFC sells now is ridiculously expensive for what you get. ---
**Author:** ![Turek](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/turek/32/18782_2.png) [@Turek](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Turek)\ **Post date:** [August 26, 2016, 7:01pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/i-have-discovered-the-secret-recipe-for-kfc-fried-chicken/764002/10 "2016-08-26T19:01:18Z")
> [@Sunny\_Daze](#): > > Well, I’m willing to try and recreate the “original” as shown in the article. > > I agree that what KFC sells now is ridiculously expensive for what you get. Keep in mind KFC Original Recipe is cooked in a pressure fryer. ---
**Author:** ![Amateur\_Barbarian](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/a/59ef9b/32.png) [@Amateur\_Barbarian](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Amateur_Barbarian)\ **Post date:** [August 26, 2016, 7:02pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/i-have-discovered-the-secret-recipe-for-kfc-fried-chicken/764002/11 "2016-08-26T19:02:49Z")
> [@Sunny\_Daze](#): > > Well, I’m willing to try and recreate the “original” as shown in the article. The problem is that we have no idea what the original was, other than vague statements by Sanders. So any suitably complex recipe with lots of odd ingredients is going to be able to claim it’s the ‘secret formula’ - by which they mean the current one, since they’re still going by KFC’s well-honed marketing claims and not the reality of the actual product. So it’s just a really complicated fried chicken recipe. Bon appetit. 🙂 ---
**Author:** ![jz78817](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/jz78817/32/1028_2.png) [@jz78817](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/jz78817)\ **Post date:** [August 26, 2016, 7:03pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/i-have-discovered-the-secret-recipe-for-kfc-fried-chicken/764002/12 "2016-08-26T19:03:56Z")
> [@Turek](#): > > Keep in mind KFC Original Recipe is cooked in a pressure fryer. that just makes it cook more quickly, no? ---
**Author:** ![Amateur\_Barbarian](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/a/59ef9b/32.png) [@Amateur\_Barbarian](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Amateur_Barbarian)\ **Post date:** [August 26, 2016, 7:10pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/i-have-discovered-the-secret-recipe-for-kfc-fried-chicken/764002/13 "2016-08-26T19:10:32Z")
> [@jz78817](#): > > that just makes it cook more quickly, no? Yes and no. Again going by Poundstone’s detailed description, the pressure cookers are heated much higher than normal temperatures (450F?) before a precisely-sized batch of coated chicken is dropped in and the lid sealed. What happens is the outside of the chicken crisps very quickly, but then the cold mass of the meat pulls the temperature down to a more normal level (350F?) where that plus a few pounds of pressure from the steam make it cook very quickly, something like 12 minutes a batch. It’s all those components - fairly ordinary coating (milk, flour, salt, pepper, MSG), precise size of batch, starting temp, cooking temp+pressure, time - all of that is KFC’s “secret recipe.” Most home kitchens can’t even approximate the temp/pressure part of it very well. ---
**Author:** ![Leo\_Krupe](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/l/ebca7d/32.png) [@Leo\_Krupe](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Leo_Krupe)\ **Post date:** [August 26, 2016, 7:31pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/i-have-discovered-the-secret-recipe-for-kfc-fried-chicken/764002/14 "2016-08-26T19:31:37Z")
> [@CalMeacham](#): > > This is the recipe as given in William POundston’e book **Big Secrets**. > > Poundstone obtained a package of the spices as used in the stores and had it analyzed by a food laboratory, giving the results cited above. There was, he said, nothing else in there – the lab would’ve caught it. > > So what of the “eleven herbs and spices?” Poundstone suggests that THe Colonel did use and sold such a recipe, but that subsequent owners of the franchise, after it left his hands, stripped it down considerably. They certainly did this with his chicken gravy recipe – he sternly criticized what Heublein substituted for his original recipe (“so good you can throw away the chicken and eat the gravy,” he said). _Big Secrets_ is such a fantastic (if a bit dated) book. I’ve got the two sequels, _Bigger Secrets_ and _Biggest Secrets_, although the second wasn’t published by the same company as the other two, and it reads differently, as though Poundstone didn’t write it, although his name’s on it. No matter. As I recall, the Col said the “new” gravy mix tasted like wallpaper paste. (As an aside, Poundstone also wrote a biography on Carl Sagan. I’m not a Poundstone shill, I just like sharing things that others might find interesting/useful.) ---
**Author:** ![Sunny\_Daze](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/sunny_daze/32/438_2.png) [@Sunny\_Daze](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Sunny_Daze)\ **Post date:** [August 26, 2016, 8:02pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/i-have-discovered-the-secret-recipe-for-kfc-fried-chicken/764002/15 "2016-08-26T20:02:08Z")
I thought that just the “Extra Crispy” was cooked in the pressure cooker. (Yes, I realize it’s all a crapshoot anyway.) ---
**Author:** ![Turek](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/turek/32/18782_2.png) [@Turek](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Turek)\ **Post date:** [August 26, 2016, 8:21pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/i-have-discovered-the-secret-recipe-for-kfc-fried-chicken/764002/16 "2016-08-26T20:21:02Z")
> [@Sunny\_Daze](#): > > I thought that just the “Extra Crispy” was cooked in the pressure cooker. > > (Yes, I realize it’s all a crapshoot anyway.) Nope, EC is cooked in an open fryer. EC is also marinated; OR isn’t. EC is breaded with unseasoned flour. (At least, all these things were true 25 years ago, when I was a wee KFC cook). ---
**Author:** ![ivylass](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/i/9de053/32.png) [@ivylass](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/ivylass)\ **Post date:** [August 26, 2016, 8:32pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/i-have-discovered-the-secret-recipe-for-kfc-fried-chicken/764002/17 "2016-08-26T20:32:13Z")
Publix fried chicken. That is all. ---
**Author:** ![Ambivalid](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/a/a5b964/32.png) [@Ambivalid](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Ambivalid)\ **Post date:** [August 26, 2016, 8:34pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/i-have-discovered-the-secret-recipe-for-kfc-fried-chicken/764002/18 "2016-08-26T20:34:45Z")
> [@Amateur\_Barbarian](#): > > It’s also insanely expensive and - the main problem for me with even occasionally indulging - the quality varies greatly, from soggy and slightly undercooked-seeming, to crisped out, to just plain oily. I only got a batch that was as good as I thought it’d be about one time in four, and that seemed to be a decline from the previous decade of enjoyment. > > So I get mah frahd at the grocery store, where it’s occasionally a disappointment, but also only about $8 for a full set of parts. ‘Big Poultry’ run amok, eh? ---
**Author:** ![Amateur\_Barbarian](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/a/59ef9b/32.png) [@Amateur\_Barbarian](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Amateur_Barbarian)\ **Post date:** [August 26, 2016, 8:46pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/i-have-discovered-the-secret-recipe-for-kfc-fried-chicken/764002/19 "2016-08-26T20:46:32Z")
> [@Ambivalid](#): > > ‘Big Poultry’ run amok, eh? Big Poultry, if you insist, is probably Tyson. KFC was reasonably priced for a long time. I don’t remember when it was that I was shocked that a “twenty dollar” meal for the family broke two $20s. It was quite sudden. ---
**Author:** ![thelurkinghorror](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/t/7c8e57/32.png) [@thelurkinghorror](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/thelurkinghorror)\ **Post date:** [August 26, 2016, 10:41pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/i-have-discovered-the-secret-recipe-for-kfc-fried-chicken/764002/20 "2016-08-26T22:41:43Z")
Awesome OP post/username correspondence! “I have discovered the secret recipe for KFC fried chicken… and I only had to eat 247 buckets!” [Next page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/i-have-discovered-the-secret-recipe-for-kfc-fried-chicken/764002.md?page=2)