Just when it seemed like the
chicken sandwich wars of summer 2019 were starting to wind down, KFC escalates the finger-lickin’ feud by deploying a new, outlandish creation in three cities across America: the Kentucky Fried Chicken & Donuts Sandwich.
As the name implies, this is a crispy chicken filet between two glazed doughnuts, priced at $5.99 (or $7.99 as a combo meal). At test locations where this dish is available, KFC is also offering a “basket meal” version, with a choice of bone-in chicken or two tenders, plus a single doughnut for $5.49 (or two doughnuts for $7.49). Participating locations are also selling individual doughnuts for one dollar apiece. These items seem much more in KFC’s junk food wheelhouse than the
non-chicken nuggets that the chain tested earlier this summer.
Though not as ubiquitous as the combo of chicken and waffles, plenty of restaurants across America pair crispy chicken with doughnuts: Michael Solomonov and Steve Cook have built a mini-empire serving theses two items in Philadelphia at their
Federal Donuts restaurants, and the Astro Doughnuts & Fried Chicken chain also sells this combo to customers in both
Washington D.C. and
Los Angeles, to name just a few purveyors.
The move of putting a fried chicken filet between two doughnuts is, however, less common in the comfort-food kingdom. If anything, the sandwich might be a riff on the “
Luther burger,” a bacon cheeseburger
rumored to be named after (and by beloved by) late soul legend Luther Vandross, where the buns are replaced by doughnuts. That dish, however, is usually made with one doughnut that’s been sliced in half and griddled before sandwiching the fillings, whereas KFC’s version is made with two whole doughnuts.
Eat KFC’s Doughnut Chicken Sandwich Before It Eats You