The Avocado Toast Must Go!

The other day I felt like going to the cinema to escape a rainy afternoon. I had one of those cravings: buy a bucket of popcorn, secretly smuggle in my bottle of Valentina hot sauce, grab a Coke, and settle in for a film. To my surprise, the only real options at the cinema near my house were Toy Story 5—weren’t the toys supposed to have died in the third film?—Supergirl—another superhero movie?—or Scary Movie. For God’s sake, is it really no longer possible to watch something different?

Someone might argue, “Well, you have the Irish Film Institute or the Lighthouse Cinema.” Fair enough—those were the alternatives. But after checking their schedules, the only screenings available were Backrooms and Obsession, both of which I had already seen. What a disappointment. Why does it feel so difficult to find a different kind of cinema? Why is the overwhelming majority of what we can watch still dominated by the American film industry, whose stories and narratives we consume so relentlessly that we end up metabolising them almost unconsciously? Paradoxically, it hardly matters which film we choose: they’re often the same stories with different characters—sequels, prequels, spin-offs, films turned into television series, and television series turned back into films.

Images endlessly reproduced until their meaning dissolves.

Back in 1944, our friends Theodor Adorno and Max Horkheimer argued in Dialectic of Enlightenment that culture had ceased to function as a space for experimentation, reflection and autonomous artistic creation. Instead, it had become an efficient, profitable and standardised cultural industry. While they acknowledged that the production of cultural goods had increased dramatically, they also insisted that greater output did not necessarily translate into higher quality or into works capable of provoking genuine critical or introspective reflection in the viewer.

Dialectic of Enlightenment by Theodor Adorno and Max Horkheimer

Films increasingly rely on pre-established formulas—the famous “hero’s journey,” for instance, developed by Joseph Campbell—with just enough variation to allow audiences to identify with the characters and empathise with their emotional journeys. As Oscar Wilde once wrote, it is much easier to sympathise with feeling than with thought. Thinking requires effort.

Nowhere is this more evident than on streaming platforms. We are given what appears to be an endless catalogue of choices, spending hours scrolling through films and television series that endlessly fold into one another, only to end up watching the latest “must-see” recommendation from a TikTok creator. These productions demand very little cognitive effort. Their greatest surprises amount to one or two carefully engineered plot twists, just enough to keep viewers comfortably waiting for the next season or the next superhero instalment.

Contrary to what we often assume, our freedom to choose is remarkably limited. We are given the impression that each product is unique, distinguished by visual aesthetics, minor narrative details or different characters. Yet beneath those superficial differences lie stories designed to be easily consumed, quickly forgotten and effortlessly replaced by the next title in an ever-growing catalogue.

A few days ago, I was listening to a podcast featuring food critic Katy McGuinness. At one point she described what she called a certain sameness in restaurants: repetitive places with interchangeable menus, predictable flavours, and dishes whose outcome diners already know before they’ve even placed their order.

It struck me that menus, too, have a tendency to become homogenised. Certain dishes gradually become “universal” or—if you’ll allow me the expression—Eurocentrised, reshaped to suit a palate that is easy to satisfy. This isn’t only about flavour; it is also about the construction of dining experiences that no longer surprise, challenge, or leave any lasting aesthetic impression on those who consume them.

Nowhere is this trend more evident than at breakfast and brunch. Walk into almost any café or restaurant in Dublin and, without even opening the menu, you can already predict what will be on offer: Eggs Benedict, shakshuka, scrambled eggs, pancakes or avocado toast. Some places have even begun introducing what they call a “Mexican breakfast,” which more often than not amounts to scrambled eggs with guacamole and a thoroughly domesticated hot sauce.

These are dishes that once embodied very specific cultural identities, rooted in particular territories, histories and traditions, yet they have gradually been transformed into seemingly universal options. It wouldn’t surprise me if, five years from now, chilaquiles become a staple of Dublin’s brunch scene, replacing whichever dish has fallen out of fashion by then—adapted, of course, to a palate that barely tolerates spice, or perhaps none at all.

A small suggestion for brunch restaurants: please, it’s time to let go of the avocado toast.

The problem, in my humble opinion, also lies in the growing concentration of those producing these menus. Chefs and restaurateurs who successfully establish one brand often go on to open a second or third venue under a different name. At first glance, the specialised food press and social media construct the image of a gastronomically diverse city, one where exciting new concepts are constantly emerging. Yet the real issue is not so much which dishes circulate, but rather who possesses the economic resources and cultural capital to bring them into circulation.

Those who achieve commercial success gain greater access to investment, strengthen relationships with suppliers, enjoy increased media exposure, and accumulate the recognition that enables them to continue expanding. There is nothing inherently wrong with this—provided that independent projects are afforded the same opportunity to enter the market. But opening a food business is already difficult enough. Beyond the obvious financial constraints, entrepreneurs must also navigate a maze of permits, licences and administrative hurdles, even if their ambition is simply to launch a small food stall or neighbourhood café.

Against this backdrop, it is hardly surprising that many restaurateurs choose to serve what has already proven successful. The decision to include Eggs Benedict, avocado toast or pancakes on a menu does not necessarily reflect a lack of culinary imagination. More often than not, it is a strategy for economic survival. When profit margins are tight and failure could mean closing the business for good, innovation ceases to look like an opportunity and instead becomes a risk few can afford to take.

It is here that Adorno’s notion of the culture industry reappears, this time in the culinary landscape of my beloved Dublin. Repetition does not emerge because no one has new ideas, but because the system rewards whatever minimises uncertainty. Gastronomy begins to operate according to the same logic as any other cultural industry: reproducing successful formats rather than exploring unfamiliar possibilities. Creativity is reduced to superficial modifications—a seasonal ingredient, a new fermentation technique, a different presentation—while the underlying structure of the menu remains virtually unchanged.

Never before has there been such a wide array of cafés and restaurants, yet rarely has this abundance translated into a genuine expansion of our gastronomic horizons. The city seems to multiply its options while quietly reducing our ability to imagine different ways of eating. Competition is no longer about proposing new culinary grammars, but about executing an already accepted grammar more efficiently than everyone else.

Perhaps, then, the more important question is not why so many restaurants serve the same brunch, but what economic, cultural and symbolic conditions make it increasingly difficult to serve something different. What chef would invest their life savings in a menu built around nixtamal—or forgotten Irish ingredients—knowing they would first have to educate diners from the ground up? What investor would finance a project whose greatest virtue lies in challenging customers’ expectations when far more predictable and profitable business models already exist? Innovation takes time to be understood; the market demands immediate results.

The standardisation of taste, then, is not simply a consequence of consumer preferences. It is the product of an economic ecosystem that rewards repetition while penalising risk. Little by little, the city begins to resemble a catalogue of variations on the same menu. Generic cities. Soulless cities. Cities designed for tourism. Restaurants change their names, their ceramics, their interior design, the typography on their menus, or the origin of their specialty coffee, yet the dining experience remains remarkably similar to the café just around the corner.

What has become truly scarce is not another excellent brunch, but a meal capable of prompting diners to ask where what they have just eaten comes from, what ingredients compose it, how it was prepared, and what cultural history lies behind the dish.

All it takes is a walk down the same street to find a second or third venue built upon a concept that has already proven commercially successful. It resembles the logic of a television spin-off: the antagonist redeems themselves, the studio recognises the popularity of a supporting character, and a new series is commissioned to continue exploiting a formula that has already demonstrated its profitability.

Another element deserves attention: food criticism itself. Increasingly, journalists, media outlets and food influencers operate within ecosystems shaped by sponsors and commercial partnerships—brands that are often suppliers or business partners of the very restaurants they review. This is not to suggest that every positive review lacks integrity. Rather, it invites us to ask how independent criticism can truly be when companies such as Birra Moretti or Just Eat sponsor the opening of the city’s newest “must-visit” restaurant. How can genuinely independent criticism flourish when the very mechanisms that grant visibility to a restaurant are themselves, at least in part, sustained by the commercial interests that underpin the gastronomic ecosystem?

Anyway, all this irrelevant philosophical has made me hungry. Let’s just go for brunch tomorrow.

Who knows...

Maybe, just maybe, we’ll be surprised.