In the Summer of 1983, I photographed the exterior Fat City Bar and Grill on Pacific Highway near downtown San Diego. Originally, it had been Top’s Night Club in the 1940s. Unfortunately, I never went inside either incarnation. Last weekend, I visited the Malibu Barbie Café, located in approximately the same spot. Demolished in 2014, Fat City was cleared to make way for Hilton Homewood Suites, who made a lame attempt to capture the Streamline Moderne look of the original building in the entryway to calm down some of the outcry from local preservationists. Moral of the story: don’t wait to patronize a business that you want to stay around. Spend your money while it’s open!
The Malibu Barbie Café was one of those pop-ups that seem to be fairly popular these days. They take over a space for a limited amount of time, pre-sell tickets that include a food and merchandise credit, and allow you 90 minutes to eat your meal and take photos while the kiddies run wild like feral animals.
The theming was…nice. Cutouts, vinyl murals, and some paint dressed up the place nicely.
Pink was obviously the dominant color.
Multiple photo ops for Instagram were spread throughout the space.
Plastic life preservers; what you would expect in the Barbie world.
A historic timeline for Barbie and friends covered one wall.
I skipped the boozy beverages and went for a pink lemonade. It was carbonated. I don’t recall seeing that written anywhere, but the varying shades of pink were very difficult to discern anything on the menus we were given so who knows.
The Beach Burger came with fruit, a pickle spear, and “secret sauce.” If you don’t mind plot spoilers, I can ruin it for you right now: it’s basically a garlic aioli. How was the quality of the meal? Well…imagine you’re in college and you’ve gone to the school cafeteria for your first meal and you order a hamburger. That was about the caliber. Not awful, not great, but something to make you regret the calories.
Props to the maple bacon; it was pretty good.
From the Malibu Barbie Café website:
Our menu, curated by Chef Becky Brown (Master Chef Finalist), was created with all tastes and preferences in mind, and features a delicious array of classics with a unique Barbie-inspired twist.
A mild twist was accurate, but unique? I can’t say I was bowled over by the menu. For dessert, we chose the Cake Pops. Overall, I had the feeling that the kitchen equipment and staff were limited and that most of the menu choices reflected things that took very little prep or high skill levels.
The merch credit went down the toilet. You could buy dolls, unmemorable t-shirts, and other crap that would end up in the circular file.
As I said to my friend Marlene as we reviewed the experience, it definitely met my expectation, and that’s not necessarily a compliment. A little more vibrancy would have been welcome. Perhaps a designated “live” Malibu Barbie and Ken walking around the restaurant for greeting and photo ops. The staff was nice and attentive, but there was no attempt to train them to act like they were truly part of the Barbie world.
Exiting, I looked back at the entrance and tried to pretend that Top’s Night Club or Fat City was still here. With the glowing neon lights it almost worked. But not quite. Our waiter told us that the Golden Girls was coming to this location in November. Anyone want to join me for a slice of cheesecake?
See more San Diego, California, photos at my main website.
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