On today's episode of the 700 Club, not-dead televangelist Pat Robertson was intrigued by a snippet from his co-host Kristi Watts' interview with Condoleezza Rice. Rice said her favorite Thanksgiving food is mac 'n' cheese, a sentiment that Watts seconded. So Pat Robertson hears this, notes that the two ladies' skins have similarly high melanin levels, and asks, "What is this mac 'n' cheese? Is that a black thing?" It is! It grows on trees, in Africa.

Some are interpreting this as though Pat Robertson has never heard of mac 'n' cheese at all. That's possible, but it seemed to us more like he'd never heard of it as a Thanksgiving or Christmas dinner staple. And neither had I, your white writer, known that this was a thing until a few years ago. So while we're posting this because it's fundamentally comical to hear Pat Robertson say the words "Is that a black thing?", the question stands: Is that a black thing, or just a Southern thing? It's definitely a Southern thing — ha ha, I am learning this by looking at a New York Times survey map, like an asshole — but do similar proportions of black and white Southern people eat this on Thanksgiving?

What else do Southern people do, in general? Maybe I'll search the New York Times archives for some articles about it.