Millie Bobby Brown Struggled Through Eleven's Waffle Eating On The Set Of Stranger Things

It's difficult to fully encapsulate how strong the influence of "Stranger Things" has been on pop culture. Last season's inclusion of Kate Bush's "Running Up That Hill" skyrocketed the nearly 40-year-old song to the top 10 on the Billboard charts, and in-universe pop culture references are often given a new lease on life after appearing on the popular show. The show has made reference to "Dungeons & Dragons" since the very beginning, but search results for the tabletop roleplaying game increased by 600% after the introduction of The Hellfire Club in season 4.

One of the earliest pop culture popularity bursts occurred during the show's first season when Kellogg's Eggo Waffles became the unofficial snack of "Stranger Things." When Millie Bobby Brown's character Eleven finally escapes Hawkins Laboratory, she is given an Eggo waffle for breakfast by Mike Wheeler (Finn Wolfhard). The Eggo is her first taste of the sweet, processed goodness of American-made snacks and sparks an addiction to the toaster treats. She stole boxes of Eggos from Bradley's Big Buy, Hopper leaves them out in the woods to lure her back home, and in season 2, Eleven used her powers to telepathically find Dustin while sitting in front of an open freezer of Eggos.

Eggo waffles and Eleven go together like spaghetti and meatballs, but in a cruel twist of irony, Millie Bobby Brown doesn't particularly like the frozen waffles. 

During a video segment with WIRED where the actor answered some of the most Googled questions about her, she admitted that waffles aren't her favorite. "No, I don't [like waffles] and people think I do," she said. "But actually, in 'Stranger Things,' I had a little spit bucket next to me and I'd spit into it because I couldn't swallow the waffles because I'd gag." This isn't the first time Millie Bobby Brown has expressed her personal distaste of Eggo waffles, but it's certainly the first time she's felt confident enough to be brutally honest about it. Shortly after the first season of "Stranger Things" debuted, an at-the-time 13-year-old Brown told The Wrap, "No, I like them, they're cool. They're OK I guess." She clarified by saying, "I'm not a breakfast person." Her answer is very middle-of-the-road but definitely sounds like a response from a budding actor trying not to come off as negative, especially toward an extremely popular product featured on her show.

It makes sense though, because as a kid who grew up in England, Brown wouldn't have developed a palate for America's pervasively sweet foods. As far as what Brown actually enjoys, she gave an extremely Gen-Z answer by praising avocado toast. "That's my victory breakfast!" she exclaimed. "I ate it before the MTV Awards, I ate avocado toast before the SAG awards [but] I didn't eat avocado toast before the Golden Globes." Now that she's an 18-year-old, Brown clearly appears to have found the strength to make her true opinions known, even if it shatters the illusion of her character. It's called acting, people!