OXO, Cuisinart, and Julia Child: The Secret (Accessible) History Behind Your Kitchen

For many people with disabilities, the kitchen can seem a deeply unfriendly place. From counters that require users to stand and cabinets that are often out of reach, to ovens that can’t be opened in mobility chairs and tools that are hard to grip or difficult to read—cooking can seem like an impossible challenge. But it doesn’t have to be this way. In fact, since the mid-1900s, researchers, designers, and people with disabilities have worked together to reimagine the kitchen in ways that have made it better for all of us. Listen in for this hidden history behind many of your favorite cooking tools, from OXO Good Grips to the Cuisinart food processor, as well as the inspiring stories of how today's blind and disabled cooks have hacked their kitchens to achieve both dinner deliciousness and culinary glory. All that, plus cameos from the household names who turn out to be accessibility legends: Betty Crocker and Julia Child! Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

You can listen to OXO, Cuisinart, and Julia Child: The Secret (Accessible) History Behind Your Kitchen online on Radio and Podcast. Open the player on this page to stream the available audio.

OXO, Cuisinart, and Julia Child: The Secret (Accessible) History Behind Your Kitchen is an episode from Gastropod by Cynthia Graber and Nicola Twilley.

This episode is 51:12 long.

This episode was published on Feb 10, 2026.

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