Green’s Dictionary of Slang

1. (US) a brunette.

c.1888

in Stag Party 38: At an elegant tea in Washington were present Representative B., whose wife was a very pronounced brunette. The hostess, also a brunette, asked the usual question as to Mr. B.’s preference in chicken [...] ‘I prefer the dark meat always’.

2. (also dark shanks, dark-skinned meat, dark stuff) black people, esp. as sex objects.

1890		Arizona Republic (Phoenix, AZ) 7 Sept. 2/3: ‘If my chips ain’t back whar they belong I’s goin’ to kyarve some dark meat!’.
1905		Salt Lake Tribune(UT) 3 Dec. 31/3: There will be no more dark meat in the ring for there is nobody of the chocolate persuason in saght.
1922		Broadway Brevities Aug. 32: You like dark meat, don’t you. I hear that Larry Ceballos is going to marry Bee Savage, who used to be on the Roof.
1931		J.T. Farrell ‘Merry Clouters’ in Fellow Countrymen (1937) 396: Hell, didn’t you guys know that Hennessey loves dark shanks?
1932		(con. 1917–19) Dos Passos Nineteen Nineteen in USA (1966) 136: I’m not much on the dark meat.
1936		M. Levin Old Bunch (1946) 57: Maybe dark meat tonight. They were supposed to be swell.
1949		H. Miller Sexus (1969) 24: He had an extraordinary flair for dark meat.
1958		Murtagh & Harris Cast the First Stone 20: You come with me and get you some dark meat [...] You want real loving, then you got to get you some dark meat, boy.
1965		H. Rhodes Chosen Few (1966) 66: Those jodies are too close to home not to be able to run in th’ house, grab a gun, and come right back ready for open season on dark meat.
1968		L.M. Meriwether ‘A Happening in Barbados’ (in King Black Short Story Anthol. 1972) 175: They liked dark-skinned meat the best.
1975		S. Roberts ‘The Boss’ Outside Life’s Feast 74: ‘What did you say the name of that Coloured girl was?’ [...] ‘Don’t tell me you’re getting an itch for dark meat.’.
1978		L. Kramer Faggots 299: Soon there was one to Senegal for a conference on Erection Problems in the Emerging Nations, and Ike wanted to try dark meat.
1984		‘Derek Raymond’ He Died with His Eyes Open 63: I could get you a bird if dark meat don’t bother you.
1999		N. Cohn Yes We have No 34: Dark meat and ganja were merely diversions.
2001		(con. 1975–6) E. Little Steel Toes 76: Phil’s just like our pops, loves dark meat.
2005		M. Abbott Die a Little 135: [...] in a colored nightclub on central Avenue [...] Giving a dark-meat-loving matinee idol a guided tour of the city’s murkier regions.
2010		(con. 1973) C. Stella Johnny Porno 31: ‘Still go for the dark stuff?’ ‘I do indeed’.
2012		C. Stella Rough Riders 64: They a lot of white girls want the dark meat.
2012		‘Dutch’ ? (Pronounced Que) [ebook] You like the type of cracka that loves the taste of dark meat [...] when nobody’s lookin’.

3. the ‘black sheep’.

1949

R. Chandler Little Sister 14: Take a family like yours and somebody in it has to be the dark meat.

4. (US) the black penis or vagina.

1949		Monteleone Criminal Sl. (rev. edn) 65: dark meat the exposed flesh of a negress.
1966		Trimble 5000 Adult Sex Words and Phrases 59: dark meat (Vulg.) [...] 2. The Negro Vagina. 3. The Negro penis.
1972		B. Rodgers Queens’ Vernacular 49: dark meat (= a black penis).