Hong Kong fast food part 2: KFC is an abomination

Apologies for the delay between posts.  This is partly attributable to my going on holidays over Easter, and partly attributable to the psychological burden I naively placed myself under last time by promising that I would write about a particular subject.  Previously I have been at liberty to write about whatever takes my fancy from from week to week.  This week, however, I have been labouring in vain to capture in mere words the sheer disappointment of my visit to KFC Hong Kong.

Last week I noted that McDonalds is pretty much the same in Australia and Hong Kong, apart from a few localised menu items and the inexplicable ability to have your freaking wedding there.  One presumes that there is someone at McDonalds HQ whose job it is to ensure a degree of uniformity across McDonalds' international operations, so as not to disorient Americans who somehow find themselves travelling overseas.  I can only hope there is no such person at KFC, because if there is, then that person is massively incompetent.

Now I am not exactly a regular at KFC in Australia.  The whole idea of KFC seems to be taking chicken, which is a pretty healthy food when roasted or braised, and seeing how deadly they can make it by coating it in batter and deep frying it. While hamburgers are pretty unhealthy too, beef is basically full of fat to begin with; at least they're not covering it in chocolate or something to make it even worse for you.

I don't really go for the idea of eating deep-fried chicken pieces, mainly because they leave a greasy residue on your fingers afterwards which reminds you of what you've done.  I prefer their burgers, which by keeping your fingers clean allow you to mentally disavow ever having eaten fast food and move on.  Everybody knows, however, that KFC Australia's main redeeming feature is the chips.  Proper chips, of decent thickness, loaded with chicken flavoured salt, in a little red box.  Sure, they're not as good as the ones at the fish and chip shop, but you can get them at the drive-through, which is another factor which facilitates disavowal.

So imagine my surprise when I discovered that KFC Hong Kong does not sell chips.  No french fries either.  Why?  Why would that be the item you exclude from your localised menu?  Have sliced deep fried potatoes not yet proved that they are more than a passing Western fad in Hong Kong, like ugg boots or cognac?

What KFC instead serves up in Hong Kong is a series of side order-based insults to someone who was expecting chips.  There is rice with sauteed mushrooms or a sort of chicken casserole on top. These are not salty or deep fried and are therefore scarcely an alternative.  There is corn on the cob, which okay, goes with fried chicken but in addition to chips, not instead of.  There is KFC's venerable reconstituted potato and gravy. Right, so you imported *that* idea across borders but not chips?  That just makes things worse.

What KFC offers in lieu of chips is a bizarre waffle-shaped abomination it laughably calls the "crisscut fry".  I have so many problems with this.  Firstly, "crisscut" is not a word.  Secondly, calling it a "fry" conjures up images of the fries other fast food places serve, which are thin and long and moreish.  The KFC crisscut fry is a fat slab of latticed potato which takes several mouthfuls to eat.  Because it is so big, you only get about four to a medium serve, so the act of stealing a chip from your dining partner ceases to be a laughing matter.  Thirdly, at least when I visited, the crisscut fries were so thoroughly deep-fried that I am taking it on trust that they were once potato.

There is of course a range of other oddities, although everything else seems trifling next to the absence of chips. There are only two burgers on the menu, one of which features thousand island dressing - Hongkongers love thousand island dressing on pizza too, incidentally - and the other "savoury cheese sauce".  The adjective "savoury" implies something is added to the cheese but wisely gives no clues.

So there you have it.  Cultural relativism is all very well, but I have learnt is that it isn't much help when you just want a caramel sundae and some proper chips.  All I can hope is that somewhere in Australia there's a Hongkonger on holiday staring up at a fast-food restaurant menu and wondering where the hell he is going to get a prawn burger, a medium mushroom rice, a taro shake and a wedding for under $500.

Hong Kong fast food: part 1

Hong Kong is a foodie's paradise.  Your dining choices in Hong Kong run the gamut from curried fish balls on a stick in the street to 9-course degustation menus on the 110th floor.  But at some point, we all gravitate back to the ubiquitous fast food chains for something familar, cheap and deep-fried. Allow me if you will to do a little review of some of Hong Kong's most popular Western fast food chains.

First stop, Maccas.  What strikes me most about McDonalds is how standard it is across borders.  Most of the differences you find at Hong Kong McDonalds are minor, Vincent Vega style examples.  They have a prawn burger.  They offer taro pie and taro shakes.  And there is no caramel sundae.  I know this because I tried to order one and it was as though I had ordered a walrus in suitcase sauce.  There was nothing but confusion all around.

The only Hong Kong McDonalds item I would miss in Australia is the "GCB".  Presumably this stands for grilled chicken burger, because that is what it is.  But you cannot ask for a "grilled chicken burger", otherwise confusion reigns.

This is a problem for me because I have a policy when ordering in fast food places that I refuse to say the name of an item if I think it is stupid. There is a gourmet burger place here called "Shake 'Em Buns" whose nomenclature tomfoolery is particularly egregious. They call their basic hamburger the "Missionary" and their cheeseburger the "Cushin for the Pushin'".  I will not order those burgers by name under any circumstances. I would rather go hungry. I will ask for a cheeseburger. You know what I mean, dammit.

Where was I?  Oh yes, the GCB.  When you finally get one, the GCB is actually pretty good - the chicken has an amazing soy and chilli marinade which is frankly wasting its talents working for McDonalds.

Hong Kong McDonalds is also unconscionably cheap. I cannot be expected not to eat fast food when a regular Big Mac meal costs A$2.50. The lack of caramel on my sundae is assauged by its price of A$0.75.  A McChicken burger costs A$1. From this, we can conclude that Australians are getting majorly ripped off.

But by far the most notable thing about Hong Kong McDonalds is the McDonalds Wedding Party, the wedding for people who are still mad that their parents wouldn't take them to McDonalds for their sixth birthday.

You get a McDonalds restaurant for two hours, decorations, an MC, burgers and fries for all the guests, McDonaldland character bonbonerie and a pair of McDonalds-themed wedding rings. You can even get a cake made out of hot apple pies! Packages start at A$500 for 20 guests.

Now, ladies I know you are probably thinking "that's not for me". But you haven't heard the best bit yet.  They can also do your dress! Why spend thousands of dollars on some lame Mariana Hardwick creation when you can get a dress made out of balloons for less than A$200?

As far as I know, Hong Kong is the only place in the world McDonalds offers weddings. I am not quite sure what this says about Hongkongers. Maybe they are cheap. Maybe they just really like hamburgers. All I can say for certain is this: it is a real thing that actually exists.  I think that is all I can tell you.

Now I was going to review KFC next, but the whole wedding thing sort of took the wind out of my sails for now.  So I will be back next time with a look at Hong Kong KFC. A minor bit of foreshadowing: it is neither finger-licking nor good.