Tommy and Cherry Settle

[kgp]

Nov 12, 2022 15:43:17 GMT jwoz said:

I wanted to echo what silver said above, which kind of got glossed over.  

This article says the following:

"I was thumbing through it and in the back I found it." Cherry Settle said. "I looked, and I counted, and I thought gee, that's 11. Eleven spices, herbs and spices."


But then later, in the very same article, it says, quoting a KFC person:

"The Colonel's original recipe has 11 herbs and spices. This falls about five herbs and spices short."  (As an aside, we run into situations like this a lot in our research - which drives me a bit crazy - such as where people make two contradictory statements in the very same article and the reporter never tries to reconcile them.)

There is no real way to know what was going on here, but if we presume that Cherry Settle was indeed capable of counting to 11, then we are left with only a few possibilities.  One is that the KFC spokeswoman - Laura Melillo - was outright lying.  Another possibility is that KFC is using a method of counting that is different than we would normally expect.  Another is that the recipe did indeed contain 11 ingredients, but some additional ingredients (about 5) were not in plain text but were encoded, as some have speculated is the case with Ledington, so while Cherry Settle saw and counted 11 items, "about 5" were hidden.  There is no way to know the truth, especially since we still don't even have the Settle recipe to go by.

I didn't read it like that. I immediately understood that the KFC person was saying there are five herbs and spices (not five spices and five herbs but 5 total) short of what is in the real KFC recipe. It tells me that 6 were correct but the other 5 were incorrect. KFC will never say any recipe is 100% correct. Their entire empire would be over. I walk away then knowing 6 of them are correct. It doesn't matter because we don't have Settle's list anyhow.

[willy]

Melillo added that the contents of the handwritten note looked more like a "stuffing recipe."

This is all I could find. If you don't think KFC has long tentacles, then try to look up this story. They all basically say the same thing, without the ginger mention.

What I remember was that KFC said it was a recipe for stuffing. The Settles responded that ginger is not a stuffing ingredient, and there is a lot of ginger in the recipe.

Maybe ginger is more critical than most believe. I still remember and old timer telling how he missed the gingery goodness of the old KFC.

[cascader]

The other issue that comes up is the imprecision - CHS writes he had 9 or 10 (or perhaps 10-11) herbs and spices or seasonings? when he hit upon the last one.

Here the spokesperson states the are “about” 5 herbs and spices short.
That imprecision is telling us something about the recipe and how items are counted or grouped.

Is “pepper” one item, two items, not counted in the 11, or even more than two?

Is celery root/celery seed or fennel root/fennel seed one item or two, etc.

[jwoz]

Nov 12, 2022 21:37:57 GMT cascader said:

The other issue that comes up is the imprecision - CHS writes he had 9 or 10 (or perhaps 10-11) herbs and spices or seasonings? when he hit upon the last one.

Here the spokesperson states the are “about” 5 herbs and spices short.
That imprecision is telling us something about the recipe and how items are counted or grouped.

Is “pepper” one item, two items, not counted in the 11, or even more than two?

Is celery root/celery seed or fennel root/fennel seed one item or two, etc.

Yeah.

And the only person who could make any such statement truthfully would be a person who actually knew the OR and who was able to look at the two recipes side by side.

In light of that, I still find the statement that it "falls about five herbs and spices short" weird.  The ordinary use of the word "short" in this context is to indicate that there is not enough of something, not that things are included that shouldn't be there at all.

It's kind of like looking at an oatmeal cookie recipe that includes flour, sugar, oatmeal, baking soda, ketchup, green peas and sardines, and the only comment is that "the recipe is an ingredient or two short." 

In that case, it would be a lot easier, and a lot more correct, to simply say that the recipe is wrong, and if you were asked to explain this further you would point out both that the recipe was missing some ingredients (butter, vanilla), but that it also included ingredients that shouldn't be there at all.  

[Ken_Griffiths]

Nov 12, 2022 13:36:04 GMT kgp said:

Actually Ken that dates back to 2013 or earlier from a member of TCK. Some people actually thought it was Mark. They were selling what they said was KFC. The site was "http://www.lillybay.com.au/" it is now gone. Lumpy hated the idea of so many herbs and spices.

Yes, it was not something I ever gave much credence to either. Seemed way over the top and I suspect not viable due the cost of all those ingredients. I was always looking for less flavour, not more, anyway.

I think it might have been forgotten that a fair few franchisees chose to ‘zing’ the recipe at one stage. Anyhow I’m still happy to stick with 11 herbs and spices and a few elements like Salt, MSG etc. I personally do not require any more flavour for the way I remember the overall taste of the recipe back in my youth.

[viper1431]

Nov 12, 2022 18:47:45 GMT kgp said:

Nov 12, 2022 15:43:17 GMT jwoz said:

I wanted to echo what silver said above, which kind of got glossed over.  

This article says the following:

"I was thumbing through it and in the back I found it." Cherry Settle said. "I looked, and I counted, and I thought gee, that's 11. Eleven spices, herbs and spices."


But then later, in the very same article, it says, quoting a KFC person:

"The Colonel's original recipe has 11 herbs and spices. This falls about five herbs and spices short."  (As an aside, we run into situations like this a lot in our research - which drives me a bit crazy - such as where people make two contradictory statements in the very same article and the reporter never tries to reconcile them.)

There is no real way to know what was going on here, but if we presume that Cherry Settle was indeed capable of counting to 11, then we are left with only a few possibilities.  One is that the KFC spokeswoman - Laura Melillo - was outright lying.  Another possibility is that KFC is using a method of counting that is different than we would normally expect.  Another is that the recipe did indeed contain 11 ingredients, but some additional ingredients (about 5) were not in plain text but were encoded, as some have speculated is the case with Ledington, so while Cherry Settle saw and counted 11 items, "about 5" were hidden.  There is no way to know the truth, especially since we still don't even have the Settle recipe to go by.

I didn't read it like that. I immediately understood that the KFC person was saying there are five herbs and spices (not five spices and five herbs but 5 total) short of what is in the real KFC recipe. It tells me that 6 were correct but the other 5 were incorrect. KFC will never say any recipe is 100% correct. Their entire empire would be over. I walk away then knowing 6 of them are correct. It doesn't matter because we don't have Settle's list anyhow.

This is exactly what i was going to say.    I read it that the KFC rep meant 6 were right but 5 were wrong, hence it falling short by 5 herbs and spices.

[cascader]

Another interpretation is that what the Settles found was a CHS written recipe for <something> that coincidentally listed (but was originally unnumbered) some typical CHS ingredients for example (without quantities) such as:

Settles Recipe in CHS handwriting (originally unnumbered)
1) “Black Pepper”
2) “White Pepper”
3) “Ginger”
4) “Sage”
5) “Paprika” (blend as desired for heat) 
6) “Celery”
7) “Garlic” Salt (or equivalent powder) 
8) “Thyme”
9) “Basil leaf”
10) “Cinnamon”
11) “Fennel”

Now suppose the actual CHS OR recipe in KFC possession also uses essentially those same ingredients, and disregarding for now whether to count the peppers and seasoned salts etc., among the 11, assume it actually looks roughly like:

Secret OR recipe:

11 secret herbs and spices:
1) Peppers, Black and White, and others, optionally as enhanced from Stange Corp.   
2) Ginger, Jamaican  
3) Sage 
4) Celeriac root, stalk,  and celery seed
5) Thyme 
6) Basil, sweet
7) Cinnamon stick & leaf and cassia bud
8) Fennel root and fennel seed
9) secret item 8
10) secret item 9
11) secret item 10

Elements:
Salt, MSG, corn starch, baking soda, etc.
Milk and egg dip, cream of tarter, etc.

So how many herbs and spices are they short? For sure 3, but About 5 and maybe even more on a technicality, as celery seed is usually from a different species than the root etc. :

1) Cinnamon leaf,
2) Cassia bud,
3) secret items 8,
4) secret item 9,
5) secret item 10

There would be no incentive for KFC to provide anyone any insight into the exact difference.  

If there are “multiples” in the recipe, which could mean many things, but blends of similar or related items is one, it might make counting challenging, which it appears to be. 

Some multiples examples in this vein that are realistic:
pepper: black, white, and others including paprika(s), Szechuan, bell, long, cubeb, etc.
cinnamon: stick, leaf and bud
parsley: leaf and root
cilantro leaves and coriander seed
celeriac root, stalk and seed 
fennel: root and seed 
caraway: root and seed 
mustard: green and seed 
nutmeg: mace and ground nutmeg
oregano: Greek and Mexican 
sage: culinary and garden, berggarten etc 
thyme: lemon and traditional 
savory: winter and summer 
mint: spearmint, peppermint etc.

[Helen]

The inside story.

[silver]

Nov 16, 2022 15:29:37 GMT Helen said:

The inside story.

I think you would need to interview the Settle's whereby to get the inside story.