News

New Zealand KFC denies customer's claims of finding maggots in chicken

March 21, 2017

A New Zealand KFC customer is trying to back off of a media swarm after she posted a photo on Facebook, showing maggots that she claimed to have found after peeling back the skin from her drumstick last Thursday in north Hamilton, according to New Zealand-based NewsHub.

The customer, identified as Cassandra Blackburn, apparently deleted the post shortly after the post was discovered by the media. When a reporter contacted Blackburn she said she took the post down because she did not want the incident to "blow up like this."

KFC parent company,  Yum Brands, has not responded to QSRWeb's request for comment, but New Zealand a KFC spokesperson identified by NewsHub as Amy McKenzie, said the alleged maggot-bearing chicken probably did not leave the KFC store with the fly eggs under the skin since McKenzie said research indicates the eggs cannot survive in any temperature warmer than 104 degrees Fahrenheit. 

Mackenzie said all KFC stores cook chicken until it's at least 140 degrees Fahrenheit. She also said a check for pests in the store involved on the morning of the sale of the alleged fly egg-infested drumstick revealed nothing askew. 

NewsHub also reported that about five years earlier another KFC outlet in Botany Downs served chicken to a customer, which later found it to be infested with maggots. In that case, the store manager said the maggots contaminated the chicken in the two hours after the family bought the chicken before they started to eat it.