Yes, I know – I don’t write newsletters very often. But I’m trying to get more comfortable with the idea that not everything I write has to be a well-researched 4,000-word thinkpiece about The State of the Union, and that sometimes I can write about frivolous topics.
And so I present to you, my ranking of Girl Scout Cookies, from worst to best.
8. Shortbreads
Shortbreads are a joyless cookie popular with people who were alive to see The Great Depression. It’s easy to have your taste buds tickled by these bland cookies whose trace amounts of sugar remind you of a time when sugar was rationed by the War Department, and so you’re grateful for whatever you’re given. With a flavor profile only slightly more adventurous than a communion wafer, Shortbreads are for people who believe cookies that have more than one ingredient are a sin. Shortbread cookie lovers voted for Donald Trump in the 2020 election.
7. Thin Mints
Thin Mints are as overrated as a food item could possibly be. Chocolate and mint? Groundbreaking. Olive Garden will throw better-tasting chocolate mints at you at the end of your meal.
The idea of Thin Mints is great, sure. But wouldn’t it be nice if there were anything texturally interesting going on with the cookie itself? It’s just a plain, dry chocolate disk coated with a woefully inadequate layer of mint-flavored chocolate. To combine the mint WITH the chocolate is to mute the flavors of both. I propose the following change to the fundamental infrastructure of the cookie: Make it more like an Oreo, with the mint creme as its own discrete filling (separated from the chocolate), surrounded by chocolate cookies and then DIPPED in a mint-flavored chocolate.
As Thin Mints currently stand, I get more of a mint flavoring from my toothpaste. Thin Mints are best when they’re blended into other desserts, like Dairy Queen Blizzards or milkshakes. And why is that? Because Thin Mints aren’t strong enough to hold their own as a cookie. Until they can fix their form-factor issues, they should be relegated to only serving as accoutrement for better desserts.
6. S’mores
I had no idea how complicated the S’mores cookies are. Apparently, the Girl Scouts introduced two versions of a S’mores cookie in recent years.
I’ve only had one version – the one with the graham cracker center, coated with a thin layer of marshmallow, and then a layer of chocolate on top of that. The one I haven’t tried is the sandwich cookie version, but it certainly looks like it would be good (maybe even better??). That said, I’m not sure what the official rationale is for the two versions, but it does lead me to believe that they haven’t worked out all the kinks yet with this one.
I can’t in good conscience recommend the sandwich cookie version of the S’mores yet, but I’m optimistic because I did enjoy the flavor of the other S’mores cookie. It’s a newer cookie, so it’s a little bolder. Could it stand to be even S’mores-ier? Yes, it could. But so could everything.
Despite its complicated status as a cookie, the S’mores deserves a spot on the list above both Shortbreads and Thin Mints, the perennial losers.
5. Caramel Chocolate Chip
These are fine for what they are. They’re not reinventing the wheel. You buy these if you don’t want to be adventurous. Maybe your favorite food is chicken tenders. You’ll be fine with these.
4. Do-si-dos
Now we get to the REAL cookies. The icons. The legends. It begins with the Do-si-dos. Peanut butter on peanut butter with peanut butter mixed in. Dry as the fucking Sahara, but that’s an easy transgression to forgive because no other cookie in the game is brave enough to shove this much peanut butter down your gullet.
You need to have a tall boy of milk to accompany these cookies. Only a masochist would eat these dry. But the winning combo of Do-si-dos and several gallons of milk is an absolutely exquisite dessert, nay, meal.
3. Lemonades
I never think I’m in the mood for lemon cookies and then BAM the Lemonades exceed my expectations every time. Lemon has more dimension as a standalone flavor than just about anything. I’ve never regretted buying a box of these.
Lemonades are simple, elegant, and unassuming – but absolutely packed with flavor. They’re everything Thin Mints want to be. My only note is that “Lemonade” is an awful name for the cookie. It makes me think of… well, lemonade. Which is not a drink that pairs well with cookies. My suggestion: Rename them Lemon Fuck-Me-Ups.
2. Tagalongs
These are the Reese’s peanut butter cups of cookies. In a makeover show, Shortbreads would be the “Before” photo and Tagalongs would be the “After” photo. An unbelievable glow-up.
In a brilliant feat of structural engineering, here the Girl Scouts have relegated the interior cookie to a strictly load-bearing role, one that would merely serve as support for the REAL ingredients in the Tagalong. The cookie contains a natural crater to hold the generous pool of peanut butter in place, and is finished off with a coating of milk chocolate so ample, it would make the Thin Mints absolutely quake with rage and envy. I am a simp for the Tagalongs.
1. Samoas
Here’s how good the Samoas are: I fucking hate coconut and I still acknowledge that these are the greatest Girl Scout cookies of all time.
Ask anyone who knows me: There is only one food I won’t eat – one food in the entire pantheon of foods I’ve encountered where I must draw a hard line in the sand. Coconut. Fuck coconut. Shredded-paper-ass-texture-having, sunscreen-ass-tasting, dessert-ruining coconut.
But the team of scientists they commissioned at Girl Scout Laboratories have done the impossible – they made coconut taste GOOD.
I can’t even begin to understand what’s going on in the Samoa cookie. I assume it’s none of my business. But every year, I think to myself, “There’s no way these can be as good as I remember,” and then I take a bite and YES THEY ARE AS GOOD AS I REMEMBER AND EVEN BETTER.
The caramel, the chocolate, the coconut (even typing that feels blasphemous) all create an actual symphony of flavor. The ratios are perfectly calibrated, the texture yields the ideal mouth-feel, and it ends with a smooth, buttery finish that leaves me wanting to rob a cargo ship full of these cookies.
If you don’t like Samoas, please have your serotonin levels checked.
Ok... so, there is a NEW cookie this year, called Adventurefuls. Horrible name...but, it's a brownie cookie with a pool of salted caramel in the center. I have not yet had the pleasure of trying them, but I ordered a box from one of my students this week & will be sure to report back to you.
as a former girl scout, aka the leading SME, i feel it is my duty to weigh in here.
thin mints reign supreme, followed by peanut butter patties, then peanut butter sandwiches, then caramel delights, then shortbread. all others are irrelevant.
good day.