One singular sensation!

This past weekend I had the amazing opportunity to participate in the Pops All Star College Choir with the Pittsburgh Symphony Orchestra directed by Marvin Hamlisch. Before our Saturday night performance the stage manager came in and told us that Marvin had bought 40 boxes of girl scout cookies from her daughter and decided to share them with the choir.

After parusing the full platters, I realized how much the face of Girl Scout cookies had changed since I had been a Daisy or Brownie. Samoas are now Caramel DeLites, All Abouts are no longer in circulation and there is now a Lemonade cookie. I opted for a Lemon Chalet despite my being thirsty. Just one Lemon Chalet. The next day I found out from my fellow choir member Joyous that there had been a recall issued that same day for what else...the Lemon Chalet!

The Girl Scout cookie is an American institution that prides itself on quality, wholesomeness and good old fashioned hard work. For more than 80 years they have been the number one source of Girl Scout fundraising, causing people to stock up in February and March for the year. The earliest evidence of GS cookie sales was in 1917 with a local mindset of Girl Scouts baking and selling the cookies themselves for 25 to 35 cents per dozen. Consider an original recipe:

An Early Girl Scout Cookie® Recipe
1 cup butter
1 cup sugar plus additional amount for topping (optional)
2 eggs
2 tablespoons milk
1 teaspoon vanilla
2 cups flour
1 teaspoon salt
2 teaspoons baking powder

Cream butter and the cup of sugar; add well-beaten eggs, then milk, vanilla, flour, salt, and baking powder. Refrigerate for at least 1 hour. Roll dough, cut into trefoil shapes, and sprinkle sugar on top, if desired. Bake in a quick oven (375°) for approximately 8 to 10 minutes or until the edges begin to brown. Makes six- to seven-dozen cookies.
(http://www.girlscouts.org/program/gs_cookies/cookie_history/early_years.asp)

Today, there are 11 different varieties of cookies made in ABC Bakers in Richmond, Virginia and Little Brownie Bakers in Louisville, Kentucky. In 2007, an estimated 200 million boxes of GS cookies were sold (This statistic is from Wikipedia and although it is not an esteemed source, it was the only one available to offer the magnitude of this product). According to the Huffington Post, a foul smell and taste plagued the boxes of the Lemon Chalets due to a chemical breakdown of oils. CNN reported that approximately 636,000 boxes were affected. While this is the first major product error in Girl Scout cookies reported, the cookies still remain one American sensation. Thanks, Marvin!