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Comment by cromka | Hacker News Reader

I remember coming to the US for the first time in 2014 as a tourist and went to KFC, assuming it would be the ultimate version of what we, the Poles, had known and liked since the 90s. There were two surprises:

1) it tasted way, WAY worse than Polish version, we couldn't even finish it. When I asked for the spicy ones while ordering, I was given a weird look and told in response that they had 'hot sauces available if I wanted it hot'. Later, after moving to the US, I found Popeye's more akin to the taste from the homeland,

2) the US chicken tenders were the size of EU chicken breast. Now this Twitter thread stresses the breed, but that breed could be also grown in EU, so I wonder what's the actual explanation for the difference?

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I'm no expert, but my assumption for both is more liberal antibiotic use and the quality of the feedstock. Free ranging chickens (in my experience) taste better than battery-farmed ones. I don't think the chicken KFC buys is free-ranging. As for your second point, antibiotics are often used to get chickens fatter than they can get naturally within a very short timeframe. This publication[1] (from 2018) goes into some detail about the entire practice.

[1] https://pubmed.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/29537307/

assuming it would be the ultimate version of what we, the Poles, had known and liked since the 90s

That's generally not how fast food chains work. When expanding to a new country they don't just sell the same recipe they use at home. They do market testing and tailor the recipe for maximum appeal to local tastes. For most people fast food is always going to taste best at home.

> That's generally not how fast food chains work

Well, the KFC brand is a franchise in this part of the world, so they probably had even more freedom in their recipe. But it's not just "taste best at home" thing, the difference in quality is staggering. As I said, Popeye's tastes way better than US KFC, and it's rather a common opinion in the US.

Chicken tenders don't have anything to do with the size of the chicken - they're basically chicken nuggets which are made from... "pink slime" is the the term I've heard used but that's clearly pejorative though probably descriptively accurate. Anyhow it's liquified chicken poured into a mold, take of that what you will.

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