Barbie Bake Shop and Cafe 1998 and Sweet Treats Barbie 1998

 I’m a coffeeholic and that’s a fact. So while I was waiting for the new Barbie Coffee Shop 2020 to appear in my country, I decided to track down a particular playset that I had had in mind for quite some time – Barbie Bake Shop and Café 1998. It so happens, this playset is rather hard to come by. I’ve seen it on eBay but it was usually missing most of its accessories. But then I found it and I got it through my local shopping portal. The transaction turned out to be a bit disappointing though.

Barbie Bake Shop and Café was produced at the time when the Superstar era was almost at an end. Changes seemed inevitable. A lovely Superstar face smiles at you from the box photos, that’s true, but she’s got the Shani body sculpt and her facepaint seems a little too detailed. I’ve found out there were two different boxes for the same playset and these were dated 1989, 1999 or 2000. The sets were almost identical save for the colors of some of the accessories. Mine seems to be the earliest one.

                               the source: https://www.amazon.com/Barbie-Bake-Shop-Playset-Pieces/dp/B002UP780S

the source: https://barbados.desertcart.com/products/6833461-barbie-bake-shop-cafe-playset-more-than-75-play-pieces-1998-arcotoys-mattel

Barbie Bake Shop and Cafe has some features characteristic for both the Superstar and the Generation Girl eras. You can see the appliances look very realistic and so do some of the utensils, though soft pastels still dominate providing a very pleasant frame. The table is molded to resemble real wood, but the color is too yellow. However, the evidence that the Superstar standards were still there is visible in the number of accessories. Apparently, there were people at Mattel who thought you really need a lot of stuff in the kitchen and supplied it accordingly.

I really like when a playset that is supposed to pretend to be a building really looks like one. That is to say, it has a roof and a floor, throw a couple windows and a door in and I’m satisfied. They give you a sense of dimensions and space. Now, Barbie Bake Shop and Café does have many of these elements and it folds up saving you limited display space. I really hate it when Mattel releases, say a supermarket and it consists of one shelf and a cash register with a conveyor belt. That’s not a shop, not to my mind. That’s exactly what it is – a shelf and a cash register with a conveyor belt. That’s one of the reasons why the Bake Shop and Café appealed to me.  

The building itself is fairly simple in its architecture and it consists of two major sections – the café and the kitchen “in the back”. So I imagine Barbie has to get up at 4 AM to bake these goods and serve them later with the best coffee on Earth. The kitchen should satisfy the most immediate needs of a baker – there’s an oven that opens up and some additional work space that you can hide if need be. There are shelves and hooks to put all the utensils. The Café portion is furnished with a very elegant looking counter to display the baked goods. There’s a revolving platter and a “working” cash register. Outside there’s a sign presenting some of the cakes and there’s a real chalk board too. A flower basket attached to the outer wall should be there as well, but it’s missing, along with some other accessories.

So back to my playset – it’s not new which is fine, but it was described as complete. There was only one photograph to present it and you couldn’t see all the accessories in it. I found it hard to believe that all the tiny accessories were still there after all those years so I asked the seller if the set was really, really complete. The lady was adamant it was. It wasn’t. It was missing a few things, some of them I was really looking forward to including in my collection.

I contacted the seller and I sent several emails that were probably more polite than they should. In return I received … silence. And it was self-explanatory. Pity, I planned to purchase a few more things from the lady like a lovely Potty Training Kelly for my daughter. Of course I won’t do that. I really don’t understand such people, it doesn’t pay to cheat clients. I’m inclined to believe the lady didn’t check the contents thoroughly and she didn’t know what exactly the set should include, but of all people she could sell it to, it had to be a collector who knew that very well.  Now the thing is, I really didn’t expect the set to be complete, but it would have been nice to know what it was missing.

Complete or not, I still like the set a lot and I have to admit it’s been the best offer so far so I should be glad I got it. Barbie’s kitchen is really well supplied. There’s almost everything you may possibly need to bake delicious cakes. There’s a baking tray and cupcakes that fit it. You can actually remove them from the form! There’s still a bigger form with a cake cut into six pieces. There’s a set of cookie cutters and the cookies really fit in them so you can pretend you’re actually making them. There’s spatulas, bowls and spoons galore and even a very realistic looking knife!

When you bake a cake, you’re going to need something to serve it on and Mattel had thought of that. The plates and cups are made of nice, clear plastic that unfortunately scratches easily, but that’s fine. The set is rather old, isn’t it. The best part of the entire set, at least to my mind, is the coffee maker, an old-fashioned, traditional one that comes with a jug. I imagine waitresses of an old diner carrying them asking clients if they need a fill-up. That’s the picture I had in my mind for the Barbie that’s presenting the set today. Sadly, the jug is missing and it may sound really silly, but it’s not the same without it and the lack of this single item makes the entire playset much less attractive to me. At least the cash register is still there and it still works – I mean, it opens. Inside there is some paper money. The cash register should open up with a credit card, but that piece also happens to be missing, so you need to use … the knife!

Overall, as far as the playset goes, it’s a great piece to have in your collection. Even without a few pieces, it makes a great mini diorama for your dolls. You can hardly expect that quality and that many accessories in the package from today’s Mattel. This happens to be the very first playset in my collection and it certainly won’t be the last, because I enjoy collecting playsets almost as much as the dolls themselves! And speaking of dolls, there’s one Barbie that fits the scene better than any other. Let me introduce her to you – Sweet Treats Barbie 1998.

I love this doll and I’d been meaning to buy her for quite some time. I actually don’t know why I like her so much. She’s not the typical doll I would collect. She’s from 1998 which happens to be the end of the superstar era, her body sculpt and face paint are the best evidenace of that, yet there’s something about her that reminds me of the good old Mattel of the 80s and that’s the fact that she comes in two variations – high and low color and the dolls’ bangs differ as well. Mine is a high-color doll with straight bangs, but you can also come by a doll with curled fringe. That’s what I like and it used to be pretty common in the 80s.

What I also appreciate about this doll is the simplicity about her. Her hair is pretty short, for the standards of that time period, but it’s made of the most marvelous, silky, golden saran. The outfit is pretty basic but it’s a three-piece. It’s not a dress that pretends to be a top, a skirt and an apron, you actually get three separate pieces that you can mix and match with other clothes! The denim skirt is incredibly versatile too. The shoes are the basic, white tennis shoes that look great with many casual outfits.

Sweet Treats may look simple and basic, but she came well accessorized, at least if you manage to get her still boxed. There was a nice looking furniture piece to prepare baked goods on, there was a mixer that really worked, a bowl, a spoon, a spatula, a measuring cup, a sprinkler and two cookie cutters. There were also some edibles, but these would’ve been long expired, that is to say if I actually got them. Unfortunately, all those lovely things are long gone, I got only the doll, but I’m pretty satisfied by the fact that she still kept her stock outfit and her shoes. I remembered my little girl got a nice little accessory pack a few years back and I took it out to show you. It comes with a mixer, a cupcake, some measuring tools, a bowl and a muffin form.

Doesn’t Sweet Treats Barbie look perfect in the Bake Shop and Café? They were even manufactured in the same year! Now my dolls have a nice place to go and have some coffee and a lovely Barbie to serve it.