While in Cincinnati recently, I chanced upon the Monmouth Street outlet of KFC in Newport, Kentucky, just across the Ohio River. Given the popularity of KFC in Pakistan, where I’ve lived all my life, the opportunity to have Kentucky’s world-famous chicken in the state of its origin was hard to turn down.
As we dove into the bucket of Original Recipe chicken—which was less spicy, and less oily, than what we have in Pakistan—my Pakistani American colleague told me that many from my country make it a point to have KFC in Kentucky. The capstone experience involves Corbin, the birthplace of the franchise, even though the outlet, like most in the U.S., does not serve halal chicken. For many, it’s worth ignoring Islamic dietary restrictions in service of the pilgrimage.
