Americana: Girl Scout Cookies
Photo courtesy of Flickr, posted by CurtisLeeJones
They’re inescapable. Your niece sells them. They’re outside the local Kroger. Your coworker is selling them for her kid. So you buy a box.
From everyone. And before you know it, you have a caloriepalooza in your pantry. But, oh, are they good.
Local girl scout groups started baking them at home as a fundraiser as early as 1917. They were sold for all of $.30 a dozen. It wasn’t until 1936 that the national Girl Scouts organization licensed cookies for production by a commercial baker. I remember going on a field trip to Richmond in elementary school to the FFV bakery, where Girl Scout cookies were produced. I thought they were all made there, but I learned later (okay, today) that they were actually prepared by 14 bakeries way back then.
Now there are two authorized bakeries, and up to eight varieties of cookies. But let’s face it, there’s really one one. Thin Mints.
‘Scuse me, I’m going to go see if we have any in the pantry. Or even better, in the freezer.