Avocado Toast

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Part of a series on Millennials. [View Related Entries]

About

Avocado Toast is a food featuring avocado fruit spread over bread. The term became a popular reference and in-joke for millennials after an article about millionaire Tim Gurner featured a quote from him saying he got rich by saving and not spending money on frivolous things such as avocado toast. Since the article, millennials joke about their poverty by referencing all the avocado toast they have supposedly purchased.

Origin

On May 15th, 2017, Australian website 9news^[1] ran an article recapping a 60 Minutes episode in which millionaire property mogul Tim Gurner said “When I was trying to buy my first home, I wasn't buying smashed avocado for $19 and four coffees at $4 each.” Gurner was attempting to make the point that millennials spend too lavishly to afford a home, while older generations saved money in order to invest in a home. However, the quote about avocado became a subject of derision as it became the focus of dialogue around Gurner's comments. TIME^[2] tweeted an article that claimed Gurner stated "Stop buying avocado toast if you want to buy a home."

Spread

This understanding of Gurner's comments led to jokes on Twitter painting the idea as massively out-of-touch with the economy (examples shown below). The jokes were covered by several news outlets, including Mediaite^[3] and Time.^[4]

In the months following the article, "Avocado Toast" has become an inside joke among millennials satirizing boomer-generation critics who don't understand the economic hardships of their generation. For example, on July 21st, 2017, Instagram user badtastebb^[6] posted an image of a person covered in avocado and toast and made to look like Shrek as a sarcastic reaction image to boomers who ask if millennials would rather have avocado toast or a house (shown below, left). On July 22nd, CAFE^[5] tweeted an image by @drewtoothpaste (artist of Toothpase for Dinner) satirizing the idea in a tweet that gained over 360 retweets (shown below, right).

Hold My Avocado

On August 8th, 2017, shortly after President Donald Trump frightened Americans by promising "fire and fury" at North Korea if they continued to threaten America with its nuclear program,^[8] Twitter user @kennethn^[7] tweeted a scenario which featured the phrase "Hold my avocado," a play on Hold My Beer. The tweet went viral, gaining over 72,000 retweets and 203,000 likes.

Time^[9] covered the tweet and people enjoying the joke. However, TIME's article was harshly mocked on Twitter for being further out-of-touch with millennials. The harsh backlash led to a Twitter Moment.^[10]