It’s Girl Scout cookie time and most of us have a favorite box, but the version you’re used to might be different in a different city. The Girl Scouts of America actually use two different bakers - ABC Bakers and Little Brownie Bakers - to create the 200-million-plus boxes of cookies we eat in the U.S. each year. And those bakeries don’t make the cookies exactly the same way. Here are some of the different versions:
- S’mores: In Orlando, these cookies are made by ABC Bakers, coated in chocolate with a thin layer of vanilla/marshmallow on a big graham cracker. But in West Palm Beach, Miami, and the rest of the state of Florida, the cookie with the same name, but made by Little Brownie Bakers, is made sandwich-style, with fudge and a hint of maple flavor. I ate mine so fast, I'm not sure which bakery mine in Port St. Lucie came from. Hahaha!!
- Thin Mints: Fans in Southern New Mexico are used to crunchier, mintier Thin Mints, made by ABC Bakers, but their friends in the northern part of the state know the richer, smoother cookie with a chocolate coating from Little Brownie Bakers.
- Samoas: In Dallas, this cookie with a heavy caramel layer, toasted coconut and dark chocolate goes by this name, but over in Fort Worth, Texas, they know this as the Caramel deLite. And that version from ABC Bakers is more cookie than caramel.
There are also Tagalongs, which are called Peanut Butter Patties in some places and have a lighter peanut butter layer, not to be confused with the Peanut Butter Sandwich cookies that are called Do-si-dos in some places. Other cookies with noticeable differences: Shortbread/Trefoils and Lemonades/Savannah Smiles.
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