As a millennial born in the late 1980s, I’ve watched Barbie go through many life cycles: she’s had over 200 career paths, raised her various siblings, and built an incredible community in her fictional, plastic version of Malibu. In this time, there have been brief forays into cooking, mainly in her iterations as Pasta Barbie, Baking Chef Barbie, and Ice Cream Shop Barbie.
As we usher Barbie into her new, flat-footed era of self-discovery, I’ve been thinking a lot about how and what Barbie would eat during this chapter of her life. As a fellow home-owning, city-dwelling millennial woman (I haven’t figured out how to float through my home yet, but I’m working on it), the possibility of having unfettered access to a dream kitchen feels daunting—but thrilling. I do recognize that none of these interpretations are serious or absolute. Think of them as simple daydreams and musings of pink house grandeur.