Top chefs join call for gender-neutral Easy-Bake Oven

By MICHELLE R. SMITH Associated Press Published: Dec 11, 2012 at 1:47 PM PDT Last Updated: Dec 11, 2012 at 2:27 PM PDT

PROVIDENCE, R.I. (AP) - Some well-known male chefs are getting behind a New Jersey girl's call for Hasbro to make a gender-neutral Easy-Bake Oven.

Chefs including Manuel Trevino of TV's "Top Chef" and Michael Lomonaco of Porterhouse New York are featured in a YouTube video applauding McKenna Pope's online petition, which had reached about 40,000 signatures as of Tuesday on the website Change.org.

The 13-year-old 8th-grader from Garfield, N.J., started the petition when she went to buy an Easy-Bake Oven for her 4-year-old-brother, Gavyn Boscio, but discovered it comes only in purple and pink. She wants Pawtucket, R.I.-based Hasbro to feature boys on the box of the toy and to make it in gender-neutral colors.

Celebrity chef Bobby Flay said last week he agreed that Hasbro should make an oven in other colors to appeal to boys, and in the nearly 3-minute-long video posted online Tuesday by Flay's publicist, several chefs from around the country joined in on the call.

A spokesman for Hasbro did not immediately return a message seeking comment.

Lomonaco is known for his TV appearances and was executive chef at Windows on the World atop the north tower of the World Trade Center at the time of the Sept. 11 terrorist attacks. In the video, he and other chefs root for McKenna.

"We signed your petition McKenna! You get Hasbro to change that packaging! Little boys and little girls can all be chefs," he says to cheers from the rest of his kitchen.

Laurent Tourondel, who has started restaurants around the world, says cooking is for girls AND boys, while New York chef Spencer Rubin asks: "Hasbro, please make an Easy-Bake for dudes."

Joshua Whigham, of The Bazaar by Jose Andres in Los Angeles, says he supports making an Easy-Bake that's more friendly for boys.

"I can understand not wanting to cook on a pink oven," he says. "Ask Hasbro for a steel, or a black or a something really cool oven."

Brad Spence of Amis Trattoria in Philadelphia says he has young children at home.

"My son, I cook with him every Sunday, so I'd love to see something like that happen," he says.

McKenna's mother, Erica Boscio, told The Associated Press that McKenna is scheduled to meet with Hasbro on Monday.

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12 comments

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Mikey

You people are missing the whole point of this. It's not about color or packaging. It's about manipulating market forces to get what you want from a big corporation. Like the Occupy movement tried to do with the big banks, but failed because they went about it the wrong way and did nothing more than make themselves look stupid.

73challenger503

1 Like

Hasbro should make the ovens...ANY COLOR THEY WANT!!!Â A petition? Really? How entitled have we all become.Â Hasbro is a corporation, it's not the govt. We don't get a say in what they do! If they want to make big piles of steaming dog do, that's their call. If you want one other than the colors they make, send a letter to them and ask or paint it the color you want, yourself.Â And what is a manly color for an oven, anyway? I'm a guy and love the color purple.

Mikey

Â @73challenger503 Because their goal is to make money, and if the public perceives them as biased or only willing to market to a specific gender, then they will not make as much money as they would if they did cater to more demographics.

And, as a publicly-traded company, public perception of them really does affect their bottom line.

Any company that doesn't listen to its customers or potential customers will soon find itself on the auction block.

And just because YOUÂ like purple, doesn't mean others do, regardless of their gender.

pretztattoo

MyÂ four year old son received a purple oven last year for Christmas.Â Color is not important to him, only the adults worrry about such stuff.Â We allowed him to "customize" his oven where it was safe to do so.Â Now it has skull and cross bones around the base.Â He loves to spend time in the kitchen baking and cooking.Â This fall he asked to shoot a rabbit in the garden with his Red Ryder BB gun, smash it flat and thenÂ cook it in the Easy Bake.Â Instead of an Easy Bake for boys maybe an Easy Roaster, complete with BB gun and safety bladeÂ skinning knife.

kramr

2 Like

LifeÂ for McKenna must be pretty darn good if something as trivial as this is a big deal to her.

Mikey

Â @kramr Actually, this is an excellent object lesson for her...and for others as well. No matter how much you want change, you will never accomplish it unless you are willing to do something about it...be the squeaky wheel.

And it's obviously paid off, if Hasbro is meeting with her.

margay1

1 Like

...chuckle chuckle... Boy, the stuff that people find to fuss about never ceases to amaze me..! Â Â But good luck to you anyway, McKenna..! Â :-)

JTesla

2 Like

What the hell is wrong with purple? You can't get more gender-neutral than purple! It's an oven, kids that age don't care who is on the box. Heck, take him in the kitchen and use the real thing, unless you have a pink, or heaven forbid purple, oven it will all be ok.

Repoman

2 Like

Goodness folks.

If girls on the cover make this 4 year old uncomfortable, take the damned thing out of the box before you give it to him.

And purple is a color, so is pink. They aren't gender anything. If pink and purple are "girls" colors so is red. Does that make yellow and green âboysâ colors? See it sounds like we are picking teams.

Buy him the damn purple one and take it out of the box.

Or maybe donât be so sensitive and grow a pair. Because pink toy ovens donât make you âgirlyâ, not having balls enough to buy what you want because your toy oven is pink does.