Let me begin by saying that, even though I am a food critic that enjoys eating fine cuisine at pretentiously fancy restaurants (when I can afford it), I am also a connoisseur of fast food who will happily (and probably drunkenly) smash a Big Mac combo at 3am. Like many people in Indonesia, I am also a big fan of KFC and although I rarely eat at them these days I still have fond feelings for the colonel’s original recipe chicken.
But KFC is also known for its audacious novelty menu items, like the infamous Double Down sandwich with fried chicken instead of buns or the Chizza pizza with fried chicken instead of crust. But those are nothing compared to KFC Indonesia’s latest offering…
https://www.facebook.com/kfcindonesia/photos/a.100783435842.101066.63398470842/10154851684895843/?type=3
Yes, you are reading that correctly. Spicy chocolate chicken. The caption attached to the photo reads “Like #TheFeelingOfLove that often comes suddenly, enjoyable blends can come from unusual combinations. Let’s go to KFC to try the new menu item, CHOCHICKS! The combination of crispy chick and delicious melted chocolate melt is ready to make you fall in love. Are you ready?”
I was not ready. I thought I was, and so to fulfill my own sense of morbid curiosity (and yours, dear reader) I walked out to have lunch at my local KFC and try a piece of Chochick for myself. Just for a laugh.
But, I was not ready.
I went into it with an open mind. I really did. I told myself, chocolate and chicken might be a crazy combination but it’s not unprecedented. For example, mole is a celebrated Mexican sauce that is served with chicken and often uses chocolate as a base ingredient. Even celebrity Italian chef Mario Batali has a recipe for Chocolate Chicken with Rose Petals.
I certainly wasn’t expecting that level of sophistication. But when I ordered the Chochicks combo with fries (with such great shame that I couldn’t look my friendly server in the eyes) and saw them grab a plastic squeeze bottle of chocolate sauce that was sitting between the chicken bins and the ice cream machine, my sense-of-impending-doom meter quickly started going crazy as he delicately drizzled the sauce on just like in the advertisement.
I confirmed that the sauce was not, in fact, the same they use on their ice cream. But, to me it tasted just like their ice cream sundae chocolate sauce with a couple of packets of chili sauce mixed in.
And that is, obviously, the big problem with this. I thought that if they had made a sauce that was just a little sweet but with some real chili heat, it might be… acceptable. Instead, it had both the sickening sweetness of cheap choco-syrup combined with the sweetness of cheap fast food chili sauce made primarily from sugar and water.
The combination of that with greasy salty fried chicken skin was more than even my usually cast-iron stomach could handle. And for perhaps the first time in my life, I didn’t finish a piece of fried chicken.
The worst thing about Chochicks is that it has ruined both fried chicken and chocolate for me and I can’t see myself wanting either for quite some time. (Perhaps KFC could market it as a dieting tool?)
It’s impossible to guess what was going through the heads of KFC Indonesia’s marketing team when they greenlit this idea, but then they had previously approved an idea for an ice cream float with cheese sauce to go along with their initial Hot and Cheesy Chicken promo.
https://www.facebook.com/kfcindonesia/photos/a.100783435842.101066.63398470842/10153827288790843/?type=3
Frankly, I don’t think anybody at KFC actually thought this tasted good, but perhaps all they cared about was getting people to talk and write about it to generate buzz for the brand. Well, mission accomplished! I ate it, I wrote about it and now I’ll never look at fried chicken or chocolate the same way ever again. I hope you’re all happy.
