Even the highest-paid executives at KFC must do their time in the kitchen.
Even the highest-paid executives at KFC must do their time in the kitchen.
NIKKI Lawson wants you to forget what you think you know about fast food.
KFC's new managing director for the South Pacific region says the category has been "misunderstood" and unfairly maligned as a scapegoat for society's ills.
The chain is one of several fast food brands targeted this week by a Cancer Council campaign to force them to apply health star ratings to their menus, but Ms Lawson argues that KFC is designed to be a tasty "treat"- and people don't appreciate what goes into its production.
"There's a perception that, because it's fast food, it's going to arrive pre-cooked and then it gets thrown in a fryer and then served up," Ms Lawson told news.com.au.
"The art of cooking that goes on is something that gets misunderstood."
Art of cooking - really? That's a big statement coming from one of the world's biggest multinational fast food giants.
We're talking about the brand that switched its moniker from Kentucky Fried Chicken to its abbreviated nickname in 1991 to avoid being associated with the negative connotations of the word "fried".
Since then, consumer tastes have veered even more dramatically towards the health-conscious, while interest in home cooking has reached almost religious levels of devotion, thanks to the popularity of television shows like MasterChef and My Kitchen Rules.
Perhaps that's why Ms Lawson insists that I meet her at an actual KFC store for our interview, where she proceeds to demonstrate how its chicken is prepared from scratch.
"We dip it in there because it just helps the flour adhere to the chicken," she says before dunking the fillets, fresh from the fridge, into a bucket of cold water before methodically coating it in breading mix. "The secret is the spice mix - our own people don't know the recipe."
KFC boss Nikki Lawson gets her hands dirty in the kitchen.
Ms Lawson wants to dispel the misconception that KFC, like some other fast food brands, consists of pre-prepared, frozen products.
One, two, three, four, five, six, she counts as she flips the chicken fillets in the breadcrumbs, before loading them onto a tray to descend into a high-pressured vat of hot oil.
Fresh chicken fillets are breaded by hand before going into a high-pressure fryer.
This method not only speeds up the cooking process, but gives KFC chicken its distinctive flavour and crunchiness.
"It's the volatiles in the herbs that get contained," she enthuses. "You can cook exactly the same chicken in an open fryer and it will have a different taste."
Ms Lawson took the helm at KFC South Pacific nine months ago after serving as chief marketing officer for the previous six years, after transferring to Sydney from her native South Africa.
When they're making fried chicken on MasterChef, KFC doesn't seem quite as guilt-inducing.
Like everyone who joins the company, owned by global giant Yum! Brands, she learned how to prepare KFC chicken in a compulsory in-store induction, a process that can take as long as six weeks.
It's how KFC ensures its marketing and product development teams have their fingers on the pulse, and understand the logistics of how its 640 Australian stores operate - enabling them to work out what promotions or new menu items will be viable.
"Sometimes the best-laid strategies, if you can't bring them to life through your restaurants, are going to be useless," she said. "It's about execution."
Paradoxically, fried chicken is both the antithesis of quinoa-salad-loving health consciousness, and a legitimate hipster dining option - albeit at the types of high-end establishments that charge $24 for a single plate of the finger-licking fare.
KFC lists its kilojoule content on the menu so that customers can make 'an informed decision'.
For KFC, which dominates the chicken segment of Australia's $19.3 billion fast food industry, but considers fellow giants like McDonald's and Domino's its biggest competition, the Southern food trend came as a boon.
"I think it's fabulous, it's been good for us actually," Ms Lawson said.
If those inner-city latte sippers are eating fried chicken, it must be OK for us to pop into KFC for a serving of Wicked Wings, the thinking seems to be.
But the health impact of eating fatty, high-kilojoule fast food continues to be controversial, with a study backed by the Cancer Council this week blasting Australia's best known chains for selling energy-dense food and drinks, contributing to the obesity crisis.
Researchers subjected 13 fast food brands to a health star rating analysis, ranking KFC as the sixth worst performer with an average of 2.5 stars across its products.
Ms Lawson said the chain's products were designed to be enjoyed as "a delicious treat" and that KFC gave consumers the power of choice by including nutritional information on its menus - adding that people were "often pleasantly surprised" by the kilojoule count of a KFC burger combo.
"I think the perception's been built up that they're a lot worse than the reality of what they are," she said.
"It's good for consumers to become more educated and purchase with open eyes."
A Zinger burger combo has 2697kj, while a three-piece box has 4413kj. A Zinger burger has 18.4g of fat, while there is 13.1g of fat in one piece of original recipe chicken. The average daily energy intake for an Australian adult is 8700kj.
For those who partake of the high-kilojoule fare, KFC's constantly evolving menu is a source of fascination and, sometimes, frustration.
The chain releases a new product every four weeks, with those that perform well added to the menu permanently - like boneless chicken tenders, sweet potato mash, frozen Pepsi and the "Go Cup", a mini bucket designed to fit in a car's cup holder.
The most recent addition, a spicy fried chicken skewer called the "hot rod", was so popular that there was concern about running out of the special, splinter-free beechwood sticks used to make them.
But it's impossible to keep everyone happy, and the KFC Australia Facebook page is littered with pleas to bring back various innovations, from the popcorn chicken nachos to the barbecue bacon roller and Zinger Pie.
One disgruntled customer wrote that his weekly cheat meal "used to be KFC" but, after tasting the limited edition Tabasco chicken, was unable to "get back into" original recipe fare - and had resorted to eating Hungry Jacks.
KFC's social media team responded diplomatically to each of the fervent requests, promising to pass them on to the company's product development team.
Requests for the pizza-chicken hybrid known as "chizza" to appear on local menus fell on deaf ears earlier this year.
Meanwhile, the company this week announced plans to send a Zinger into the stratosphere on a weather balloon in a space-age publicity stunt.
It is testing a breakfast menu in selected stores - including a chicken, bacon and egg twister - and, in line with Yum! Brands' global push to embrace the digital, KFC is about to trial home delivery in Australia.
Currently, it is possible to order on the KFC app and skip the queue at any counter or drive-through.
Testing will begin in the next few weeks of a home delivery service in partnership with Foodora, to be rolled out initially across 10 stores.
