Spicy chicken fries are coming out this week, and it may have something to do with a misconstrued tweet sent by Liam Payne, band member of One Direction and every 13-year-old girl’s dream man.
Original chicken fries were sold between 2005 and 2012, but they gained some attention on social media when BuzzFeed published a listicle entitled “35 Foods From Your Childhood That Are Extinct Now,” which included chicken fries, the Associated Press reports.
Even more enthusiasm about the extinct menu item from the fast food giant Burger King was generated when Payne tweeted the following:
I'm so fulllllll!!! Think I just ate my body weight in chicken fries and sides owwwwww
— Liam (@LiamPayne) May 31, 2014
A previous tweet referring to “the kernel” (more commonly known as “The Colonel”) suggests that he was actually eating at KFC. He likely omitted the necessary commas which would have made it clear that he was eating “chicken, fries, and sides,” and not “chicken fries,” especially since Burger King had yet to resurrect them.
AP was not able to get a comment from Payne for clarification, but a representative from Burger King said, “Whatever he meant, it certainly helped catapult ‘Chicken Fries’ into pop culture consciousness as a follow up to the Buzzfeed story.”