MEGAN MCARDLE: The Economic History Of Stereotypes. “I mean, while I haven’t done a survey, I’m sure that most black people love fried chicken, because everyone loves fried chicken except vegetarians and women from New York who have convinced themselves that they don’t like anything with more than 15 calories. Fried chicken is sublimely delicious when done right, and even when it’s done wrong, it’s not bad. How did people get the idea that loving tender, crispy fried chicken was some strange thing that only racial minorities do? . . . Until World War II, chicken was not cheap; it was more expensive than beef. Of course, we don’t have good price data for the pre-Civil War south, but given the relative scarcity of meat in 19th century diets, I’m pretty skeptical that plantation owners were giving their slaves a lot of chicken.”