“A quirky tradition in Japan sees people tucking into a KFC bargain bucket on Christmas day, instead of a home cooked dinner, with orders booked weeks in advance.

Stores get a holiday-themed makeover in the run up to Christmas, decked out in red and green.

The 'Kentucky for Christmas' slogan was part of a marketing campaign in 1974 for the chicken franchise, and now every year around 3.6 million Japanese people sit down to eat KFC fried chicken for Christmas.

Even KFC's mascot, Colonel Sanders, gets dressed up, with life-size models seen around Japanese cities, dressed as Santa Claus.

The campaign started in the 70s to tempt tourists and expats with chicken on Christmas Day when they couldn't find turkey to eat, and was the the brainchild of Takeshi Okawara, the manager of the first KFC in the country, according to the BBC. …”

DailyMail article:
https://mol.im/a/11537059

I hope the food is better there. If I eat anything from KFC, it takes less than 15 minutes before I’m in the bathroom suffering a blowout.

Because they are Japanese. Why do they like Elvis and American cars so much? Who knows? Why do we watch Godzilla moves? I guess it is a novelty like eating Tim Horton donuts in the Deep South.

Christmas in Japan is closer to Valentine's Day or the other commercial holidays where you don't get a day off work unless they fall on a weekend. There's a very small percentage of Christians there. Christmas Eve is considered a romantic holiday for many. Christmas Day is often a party day with friends or coworkers, not so much a family day for younger people. New Year's Eve/Day is when you spend time with family. KFC did some excellent advertising back in the 1970s and tied chicken to Christmas. Nowadays, it's not just KFC benefitting from the sales but other places that sell fried, roasted, or rotisserie chicken. In my experience, the KFC thing isn't as big of a deal as it's made out to be in the press. It's a big deal for KFC since it's like 10 percent of their annual sales, but it's not like everybody is eating KFC for dinner. Last year, I read in the Japan Times that 3.6 million families bought KFC for dinner during Christmas. That's a pretty small percentage of the population. I didn't know anyone who ate KFC for Christmas dinner. KFC food quality is a whole lot better in Japan than it is in the USA though.

I spent a couple of months in Tokyo and the surrounding area years ago.

I was working in a Japanese laser company and the company provided a free lunch for everybody, including me.

After I'd been there about a month I was pretty sick of fish and rice and the word filtered up to the Owner/President of the company.

The next day at lunch, we got KFC and Coke...and I hate Coke but the KFC was very welcome for me. The Japanese workers there were slamming the KFC down like they hadn't eaten in a week.

And no, I didn't get stomach problems from it at all.

KFC in Tokyo near the Hotel New Otani is like freshly prepared Chick-fil-a by Gordon Ramsey. It is familiar, yet fabulous. Tempting yet traditional. Affordable and accommodating. I so appreciated the Japanese culture of excellence there and McD and Krispy Kreme.

The New Otani is where I stayed. Nice place. They had a western style breakfast buffet every morning.

Taste...it's fried chicken. They may also see Christmas as an American holiday and figure American food would pair well.

I tried fast food chains all over the world in my youth, sometimes out of desperation, and japanese fast food was by far not only decent but actually surprisingly tasty ranging from very good to excellent.

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Yep, Okawara was caught off-guard in a radio interview. The interviewer asked him if eating fried chicken on Christmas was a common western tradition. He replied, "Uh, yes, it is a big tradition in the US." Of course there's not a shred of truth in that, but somehow the idea went viral. Corporate got wind of it and created an actual marketing campaign based on the notion. Most Japanese don't seem to know how it all started, and probably don't even care.

Since then he's expressed remorse for his lie, even though it's largely responsible for KFC's success in the country and his own career rise in the company (he eventually became CEO of KFC Japan).

And yes, it does taste different there.

quote:

Originally posted by Leemur:
I hope the food is better there. If I eat anything from KFC, it takes less than 15 minutes before I’m in the bathroom suffering a blowout.

Exactly. Just as effective as Taco Bell. Around here, the stores are co-located. Coincidence?

Have you guys had Japanese fried pork steaks? Very common and pretty good. If they apply the same process to Chicken it would be very good as well.

I will say that KFC in China is weird and not very much like KFC in the US.

But hey, Chinese food on Christmas is a tradition in the US caused by "A Christmas Story", and because the are open. Fine with me.

quote:

Originally posted by PHPaul:
Exactly. Just as effective as Taco Bell. Around here, the stores are co-located. Coincidence?

They're operated by the same corporation, along with Pizza Hut. All are sub-brands of the Yum! fast food corporation.

A&W and Long John Silver's used to be part of Yum too, before those were sold off several years ago.

quote:

Originally posted by Lefty Sig:
Have you guys had Japanese fried pork steaks? Very common and pretty good. If they apply the same process to Chicken it would be very good as well.

You're referring to Tonkatsu (aka Pork Katsu), so what you're looking for is Chicken Katsu, which is Japanese-style friend chicken cutlets with the same style of panko breading. It's also commonly available.

But KFC in Japan serves American-style fried chicken. It's just higher quality because the Japanese strive for excellence in everything.

This guy! It was this guy that started it all...

Because fa ra ra ra raaaaa ra ra ra ra.

quote:

Originally posted by Lefty Sig:
Have you guys had Japanese fried pork steaks? Very common and pretty good. If they apply the same process to Chicken it would be very good as well.

And Pork Tonkatsu as well. Chicken would be good that way also.

quote:

Originally posted by Lefty Sig:
Have you guys had Japanese fried pork steaks? Very common and pretty good. If they apply the same process to Chicken it would be very good as well.

They do, and it is. Fried port cutlets = donkatsu, fried chicken cutlets = kushikatsu.

It kept me alive when visiting Japan on extended business trips. The hosts wanted to eat fish 24x7 (which I despise) and the pork and chicken cutlets I could find at the train stations and bento boxes were excellent, if somewhat déclassé to the locals.

Decades ago a friend of mine was in Japan on business. After returning, he told me that for the first two days he tried to find good food.

After that he just tried to find food that didn’t have eyeballs or suckers.

quote:

Fried port cutlets = donkatsu

Technically, "donkatsu" is the Korean version of Japanese "tonkatsu". But it's all delish.