We all know that we can't really do the things we see done on TV or in the movies. All the good stuff is stunts or special effects or fake. But sometimes we see something in a movie that we can do in real life. That's how the quest for KooKooRoo® Chicken got started.
Background: In the movie, La Cucaracha, our main character, Walter, eats several meals. Another character, Louis, buys him a meal in a dark Mexican pub early in the film. That pub grub looks like chicken, black beans and squash. Late in the movie Walter eats a nice meal in an elegant country home. At that meal there is a bottle of wine, a plate full of chicken and another big pile of butternut squash. (If you're watching closely, you may get the impression that butternut squash is the official food of Mexico.)
The pervasive presence of chicken and squash is explained on the DVD version of La Cucaracha in the director's commentary. The director, Jack Perez, and Eric Roberts discuss all the details of making the movie, including the food:
Jack: There's your butternut squash.
Eric: Butternut squash and KooKooRoo® chicken. 'Cause I had to eat tons of it, remember?
Jack: Yeah.
Eric: I ate all morning that day.
So, I thought, wouldn't it be fun to eat the same kind of chicken that Eric ate in the movie? (You notice that I didn't say, wouldn't it be fun to eat the same kind of cockroach Eric ate in the movie?) I thought I would just look up the recipe for cucuru in The Joy of Cooking and then go to the grocery store and buy chicken and whatever other ingrediants I needed to make cucuru. How hard could it be?
At this point all you people who live in California are thinking I'm pretty stupid, right?
There was no recipe for cucuru chicken in The Joy of Cooking. I couldn't find a recipe for cucuru anywhere! But I was absolutely determined not to give up until I had found a recipe for cucuru.
After reading all the cookbooks I could find and failing to find cucuru, I went to the library where I used to work and asked Kappa, the reference librarian, to help me find a recipe for cucuru chicken. You should always ask a reference librarian when you need information.
Kappa told me that it's not cucuru chicken, it's KooKooRoo® chicken and it is not found in cookbooks, it is found in KooKooRoo® restaurants. The ingredients needed to make genuine KooKooRoo® basting sauce are a company secret so you can't make it at home. You can only buy it at a KooKooRoo® restaurant.
So I figured that all I had to do was locate a KooKooRoo® restaurant and order some chicken and a side of butternut squash. I looked in the yellow pages and didn't find any KooKooRoo® restaurants. I soon found out that KooKooRoo® restaurants are located only on the west coast. So it was time to give up. There would be no KooKooRoo® chicken for me. How could something so easy turn out to be so difficult?
I sank into deepest despair.
Then I had a thought. Maybe it wasn't really KooKooRoo® chicken in the movie. Maybe they just used any old chicken from a catering truck and called it KooKooRoo® chicken. You know how people say Kleenex® even when it's just store brand facial tissue? So I sent an email to Jack Perez, the director of La Cucaracha to ask if it was really KooKooRoo® chicken that Eric was eating in the movie. Jack replied:
In answer to your Koo-keroo querie (did I spell koo-keroo right?), (No, Jack, you didn't.) YES, it was in fact Koo-keroo. Eric loves the stuff. I don't believe it was any one particular koo-keroo because we shot at different locations around L.A., but I do know we would send a runner out to get it whenever we were shooting any "Walter eating" scenes. He never seemed to tire of it, even after multiple takes.
So it was definately KooKooRoo® chicken in the movie and I had to have some! So I called the airport and for just a little over $200 I could get a round trip ticket to the nearest KooKooRoo® chicken restaurant and back over the weekend. I was just starting to consider this possibility when I got a lucky break.
Someone (let's just call him Ken Koochick because I'm pretty sure he doesn't want to have his name on the web) said that he would get some KooKooRoo® chicken and mail it to me on ice. As it turned out, this was easier said than done, as Ken was soon to find out.
Apparently, if you have the kind of business set up that ships food every day, then you also have a ready supply of dry ice, styrofoam packing cases, and a shipper ready to pick up your boxes, fling them on a jet and wing them across the country. When you are shipping one little box of chicken just this one time, things are harder.
People also tried to talk us out of it. They said things like, "Why do you want to do this? Chicken will spoil in the mail. There is chicken in New York. Eat some New York chicken!" All I can say to them is that this wasn't just about eating chicken anymore. It had turned into a QUEST FOR KOOKOOROO® CHICKEN!
If you have your heart set on KooKooRoo®, Boston Market® just won't do.
On Thursday, Ken Koochick emailed me the good news. He had figured out which shipper would ship the chicken and how to pack it. He would get the KooKooRoo® chicken on Thursday, pack it in ice, ship it and it would arrive at my house on Friday at noon.
On Friday, Airborne Express® delivery man pulled up in front of our house bearing our order of KooKooRoo® chicken. With mounting anticipation we opened the white styrofoam box. Inside the box we found tons of food: two whole KooKooRoo® chickens (original skinless flame-broiled), two side orders of butternut squash and two side orders of cream spinach. We didn't order the creamed spinach because it wasn't in the movie but they included it because two sides come with each order of chicken. We could have asked for black beans but we didn't because shipping black beans to us all the way from California would have been stupid!
Here's my review: I was a little surprised to find that the chicken was a lot spicier than the roast chicken you can buy here. The basting sauce was red but watery, not goopy like BBQ sauce. They take the skin off so the chicken isn't greasy but the basting sauce must have sealed in the juice because everything was nice and moist inside even after reheating it.
I was impressed with the butternut squash, too, and I know my butternut squash. I've grown my own and I've had squash in restaurants and the most common problems in restaurants are too watery or made from squash that wasn't totally ripe. KooKooRoo® butternut squash was thick and orange and tasted every bit as good as homemade. I wasn't sure we should eat the creamed spinach because it wasn't in the movie, La Cucaracha, but it smelled good so we ate it anyway.
Was it worth it? Yes. It was the most fun I've ever had with a chicken! If you are ever in California you should find a KooKooRoo® chicken restaurant and eat there. It's cheap, it's delicious and it's much better for you than a greasy cheese burger and fries. What's not to like?
I would like to send a special THANKS to "Ken Koochick" for being crazy enough to get involved with THE QUEST and mail a box of KooKooRoo® chicken coast to coast.
So here, finally, is a photo of genuine KooKooRoo® chicken being eaten for the VERY FIRST TIME EVER (as far as we know) in New York State.
FYI, I've heard that cockroaches taste like cashews....
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