Android: styling overflow menu in action bar

I did it this way:

<style name="Theme.yourapp" parent="@style/Theme.AppCompat.Light.DarkActionBar">
  <item name="android:actionBarWidgetTheme">@style/Theme.yourapp.Widget</item>
</style>

<style name="Theme.yourapp.Widget" parent="@style/Theme.AppCompat">
  <item name="android:textColor">@android:color/black</item>
</style>

For simplicity, the android: namespace pertains to anything built into the OS while anything without android: as the namespace would pertain to your application (and the libraries you are using). Most, if not all, support libraries for the ActionBar will try to use the native ActionBar implementation and therefor use the android: namespace attributes in your styles. When the native ActionBar is not available it would use the libraries implementation and the non-android: namespaced attributes. This is why you must specify every attribute with and without the android: namespace.