The Girl Scouts Are Pissing Me Off

Warning! Somewhat heated rant about Girl Scout Cookies below.

I was reminded this week that Girl Scout cookie season is upon us, and I took a moment to reminisce back to the days when REAL Girl Scouts trudged through the Oakland Hills with dozens of boxes of cookies, knocking on strangers doors in the hopes of winning the special prizes and getting the fancy patch for my sash, uphill both ways in the snow, yada yada yada.

These days, Girl Scouts are soft, using mom and dad and their office connections to sell cookies, using order forms and preordering by email (!). Why in my day...grumble, grumble, grumble, but I digress. I decided to take a look at the Girl Scout’s website and see what else has changed in the 10 (oh fine, 20) years since I was a Scout.

The Girl Scouts apparently use two different cookie manufacturers, ABC/Interbake Foods and Little Brownie Bakers, which make many of the same cookies, just under different names. Three types of cookies are mandatory: Thin Mints, Peanut Butter Sandwich/Do-si-dos and Shortbread/Trefoils, the other five cookies are up to the manufacture to decide. Among the many things that these manufacturers have in common is the evil use of the toxtacular substance lovingly labeled vegetable shortening (contains one or more of the following partially hydrogenated oils: palm kernel, soybean, palm). That’s right food lovers, TRANS FATS IN EVERY BITE! Yum.

Let’s put this down to food pet peeve and general angry irritation #1. The use of this cheap and plentiful ingredient has taken over the snacking world. I’m a crazy, annoying label reader, I read the label of every item of food that has one, I seek out foods without this poison, and I can tell you that they are ever decreasing. Every single cookie sold by the Girl Scouts contains trans fats. Every single one. The worst offenders? Trefoils, Do-Si-Dos and Animal Treasures (yea! for the children!) with 2g of trans fat per 2-3 cookie serving. The less worst offenders? Samoas (aka Caramel DeLites), Tagalongs and Peanut Butter Patties (listed as having 0g trans fat yet partially hydrogenated oil is still listed as an ingredient because if a product has less than .5 grams of trans fats it does not need to be listed as having ANY trans fats EVEN THOUGH the Recommended Daily Allowance of trans fats is, like, ZERO due to it being, well, toxic poison and NO amount of toxic poison is really good for you at all, now is it?)

Bitter? Angry? Me? No. Not at all. Based on the Girl Scout Purpose statement, ("The Purpose of Girl Scouting is to inspire girls with the highest ideals of character, conduct, patriotism, and service that they may become happy and resourceful citizens" - watch Starship Troopers much? [shudder]), one might believe that the health and well being of these and other happy citizens is first and foremost. Apparently, not. Don’t get me wrong, I am not anti-Girl Scout, I am just anti poisoning the citizens of this great nation. This year, I’m going to have to just say NO to the little Scouts and their delicious cookies full of evil.

Comments

[Sam]

thank you for the info about the evil in the GSCs, molly
NO samoas for me this year, obviously!
(when I was in the girl guides - we used to bake our own cookies to sell. call me old-fashioned...!):(or just call me old)

[Fatemeh]

Ummm... OK, while I agree with you 100% and all... and while I think that you and Sam are both troopers (and wise) for abstaining...

...I'm happy to eat BOTH of your shares of Samoas.

I figure I poison myself with other stuff regularly, so a once-a-year fix of artery-clogging cookies won't kill me... well, not tomorrow, anyway.

[Nic]

Mmm...samoas... I have to say that the Trefoils are my favorite, though.
For a trans-fat free girl scout cookie, you could try this recipe for the Original Girl Scout Cookie, posted on AllRecipes by the Girl Scouts of America: http://cookie.allrecipes.com/az/ThriginlHmBkdGirlSctCki.asp
I'm planning on trying them out soon, not to protest the trans fats, but just to protect my wallet from the ever inflating price of a box of cookies. Anyone know where I can get a trefoil cookie cutter? =)

[Molly]

damn...they made you bake your own cookies? Now I feel like such a slacker!

I agree that GSCs are delicious, but now that I know what's in them, I will just enjoy them less if I eat them. I'll eat my Coffee Haagen Dazs instead.

Maybe I'll even bake my own cookies...

[Pim]

Can you please, please bake some Samoas and share some with me?

I've rid the evil partially hydrogenated oil and High Fructose Corn Syrup completely from my diet, so no girl scout cookies for me either. :-(

[Barbara]

Samoas--make a shortbread base, toast some coconut and mix it with freshly made caramel, pour that over the shortbread, let it set, then melt some dark chocolate and drizzle over it.

I must think on this. How to shape them?

I will think on it.

[ally]

what's up with the samoas now? first of all, they're now calling them caramel deLites, even though there's nothing 'lite' about them. they changed the recipe to include less partially hydrogenated oils to please 'label readers' who probably should be snacking on carrots and celery instead of cookies in the first place. now it makes the caramel melt during shipping so i have to lick the bottom of the plastic tray! there's a reason cookies are snacks and not main courses! they're bad for you! they make your teeth rot, they can give you diabetes, and they're good and we'll still eat 'em.

plus, now there isn't even any chocolate in them (unless you think less than 2% alkalized cocoa counts)!

so great, thanks a lot for ruining yet another product. just munch on your veggies if you think it's bad, but leave a good thing alone! now they taste like crappy plastic. you just have to change things so you can degrade at the slowest rate possible 'til you're 120, living off our crappy social security system. just live life for the sake of living already.

[Kevin]

EXACT-A-MUNDO!

It's nice to know it's not just me appalled by GS cookies.

[Diana Jeffery]

You are so funny!!! Thanks for making my evening. I am a Girl Scout Leader. This is my first year and i am sorry to say i was never a Girl Scout. ( Mom didn't like the council that we moved to) Anyway, we can't do White sugar in our house at all. we are allergic to both cane and beet sugars (read white)and I too avoid hydrogented oils, cotton seed oils (those make men's sperm run in circles for all you ladies wishing to get pregnant)So, I feel for you. But, I do so miss eating Thin mints and Samoas, um.

However, I found your site while looking on the internet for a Trefoil cutter for my darling Juniors and have found both the Traditinal GSUSA Trefiol shape (my preference) as well as the new Contemporary Trefoil shape.

So, those of you who have to work extra hard to satisfy your sweet tooth in a more heathier style, you can also do it in Girl Scout Style!

[Virginia]

Girl Scouts hasn't done much of a benefit for me. The goals are set too high. I don't sell enough cookies. I'm starting to go anti.