KFC Coleslaw

Kentucky Fried Chicken, or KFC, has changed over the years, in many ways, not for the good.  They got bought by Yum Brands. the same group that owns Taco Bell and Pizza Hut and, in many areas, several of these franchises are located in the same physical store.  Yup, the same crew who is mangling your taco is also responsible for the KFC line.  Yum Brands used to own Long John Silvers and A&W as well, if those are any indicator of the company’s commitment to decent food.

In many ways, the KFC menu is not what it used to be.  The mashed potatoes and gravy, which were awesome until Colonel Harland Sanders sold the chain, are now pretty much packaged staples that every bad diner in America uses.  The original gravy was deemed to be too difficult so the new owners changed to a version even Colonel Sanders hated.  Most recently potato wedges, a popular side for decades, were dropped in 2020 in favor of Secret Recipe Fries, seasoned with the secret 11 herbs and spices that the chicken has, but that doesn’t work well on potatoes.  And the franchises local to HalfCracker Ranch  dropped the corn cobs and baked beans!

One thing that still delights most diners though is the coleslaw.  It’s a little sweet, slightly vinegary and has a decent mix of cabbage chopped into small bits that aren’t hard to chew.  And, with a little fussing, it can be made at home. With some adjusting of the recipe to your specific tastes, it can be even better.  And, since coleslaw as a single side at KFC is $2.49 at the local, to HalfCracker Ranch, KFC location, it’s a lot cheaper to make at home.

Colonel Harland Sanders, being your basic Southern Boy, likely developed a coleslaw recipe typical of Southern coleslaw.  Which doesn’t narrow it down much, since every Southern Momma made coleslaw slightly different from every other Momma, and often never the same way twice.  This is a recipe that nobody bothered to write down, it was too easy to just make it up as you went.  The basic ingredients were the cabbage mix, usually cabbage, carrot and some onion, but which might including everything from peppers to pineapple depending on what was handy, along with a creamy, sweet and tangy dressing,  Lets take a look at what’s visibly in KFC’s coleslaw.

First, there’s cabbage.  Plain old green cabbage.  Although the KFC version always looks pretty white, except for a few green flecks.  And there’s carrot.  You can see the bits of orange in there as well.  But that’s really all we see.  You can taste onion for sure, but you really can’t see it in the mix.  It could be onion powder, but any good Southerner would have just used onions, maybe yellow or Vidalias from Georgia,  We’re calling this at just cabbage, carrot and a bit of onion for flavor.  Pretty simple ingredient mix to find, but buy the components at your local farm stand for the best flavor.

Those bag mixes at the supermarket?  Yeah, you can use them but they are the wrong mix.  Usually these mixes will have red and green cabbage,  sometimes additional vegetables are in there as well.  They won’t be the right combination, but they will work.  Sort of.  They’re just the wrong size.  The bagged mix has a larger shred to it, not the best option to duplicate the KFC mix.

Besides the fact that the shredded cabbage can have rather large pieces, none of the pieces are the same uniform size of those in KFC’s mix.  They will likely taste fine, but they aren’t an authentic version.  You can, if you’re so inclined, get them to the right size and texture, just take them for a ride in your blender.  Yep, toss the bag in the blender, add a cup or two of water, and pulse them until the mix is the same uniform, micro-shred of the KFC mix.  You likely will need to scrape the blender down a few times and, of course, you’ll need to drain the water off, but you’ll end up with an approximation of the right mix.  Except not quite right.

So chop them up yourself.  Grab a head of cabbage and a carrot and toss them in a food processor.  Pulse until they are the right size and you’re pretty much ready.  You can do them together, but it’s often easier to do the cabbage, dump it in a large bowl, chop the carrot into one inch pieces and then pulse the carrot separately.  You’ll get a more uniform look.  Dump the carrot into the same bowl and you’re ready for the onion.

Depending on your taste, about half a small onion will be the right amount for a head of cabbage.  Mr. Cracker runs the onion in the food processor until it’s well minced, (well, most often he uses a cheap chopper that’s basically a mini food processor).  A finer onion blends easier and doesn’t leave a dramatic onion bite if the mix settles a little.  If you’re using a Vidalia (Or Texas Sweet, Florida Sweet or other brand name of the same general sweet onion variety) you’ll likely need more like a quarter of an onion.  Toss the mix in a bowl and let it sit while you put together a dressing.

I say “a dressing” rather than “the dressing” because you’ll never exactly match the original KFC recipe.  Nobody knows what it is.  If you get a recipe from an “employee” of KFC from the last few decades, they’re lying to you.  Because, while the coleslaw is supposedly made in the store, it’s really just assembled in the store.  Dump a bag of the cabbage mix and a bag of the dressing into a bowl, mix it up and put in the refrigerator.  Welcome to modern food service.  I did have an employee from the mid 1970’s tell me the dressing was just Miracle Whip™, tarragon vinegar and celery seed, but this was more likely his mom’s recipe than KFC’s.  At least it’s not the current KFC recipe.

Most of the copycat KFC coleslaw recipes are a mix of mayonnaise or Miracle Whip™ dressing, milk and/or buttermilk, vinegar, (usually apple cider but sometimes just white vinegar) sugar, lemon juice and some spices.  Those may be decent dressings, but they are not the KFC recipe.  How can you tell?  The KFC allergy lists shows their coleslaw is available to those with milk allergies.  Meaning no milk or buttermilk.  Some of the recipes use Miracle Whip™ which is also wrong.  The ingredients for Miracle Whip™ include high fructose corn syrup while the KFC ingredient list shows just sugar.  The US Government makes them specify the high fructose corn syrup, so, it’s not in there.

What’s left?  The KFC ingredient list matches mayonnaise, apple cider vinegar, and sugar, but also has Xanthan gum and paprika, ingredients also required to be listed by the Feds.  So, in addition to the cabbage mix from above, we need to include those.  Sort of.  A few copycat recipes also include canola oil.  That’s another ingredient KFC does not list.  They list soybean oil but, since that’s in the mayonnaise, it’s already in the mix.  Of course, they also list “natural flavor” which is a catch-all for about 346 billion possible things a company can put in food without having to be specific.  And one of those is crucial to the right flavor, even if KFC doesn’t use it.

But the real question is the Xanthan gum. Xanthan gum is a vegetable-based food additive derived from simple sugars and used as a thickener or stabilizer for sauces and gravies.  KFC lists it, so it’s in there.  But you don’t need to use it.  Especially since it costs a fortune to buy for the home cook, about $15 for eight ounces!  It has a lot of uses if you’re going gluten free, but otherwise, don’t bother buying it just for coleslaw.  There are other ways to make the dressing the right consistency anyway, they just aren’t as easy in large commercial productions.

So, our recipe will be mayonnaise, sugar, apple cider vinegar, paprika and our own secret ingredient which would be in every Southern coleslaw dressing – celery seed.  You can use celery salt, which is likely in KFC’s version, but celery seed is a more traditional ingredient to a Southern coleslaw dressing.  Although having the cabbage blend and the dressing isn’t the entire story.  Every Southern cook knows that coleslaw needs time to meld the flavors.  Like overnight.  It’s always much better the next day.

Disclaimer

As always, here at Half Cracker Ranch we take care to not poison our friends.  But, if you have allergies to any of the ingredients, especially the eggs in the mayonnaise, do not make this recipe.  Or at least use the various substitutes available.  Vegan mayonnaise is wrong on many levels, but some people may not tolerate the eggs and must use it.

Extra Notes

While this is just an approximation of the KFC recipe, it really does taste very similar to the expensive, at about three times the price, side dish from the popular chicken chain.  And better, it’s a really decent Southern recipe for coleslaw.  For what it’s worth, a half cup of Miracle Whip™, a quarter cup of tarragon vinegar and a half teaspoon of celery seed, as Mr. Cracker’s friend’s recipe stated, makes a darned good dressing for a bag of the shredded coleslaw mix from the store.