Happy birthday, Girl Scouts of America!

And in their honor, here is an excerpt from their web page about the famous cookies with a recipe you can try at home.

Girl Scout Cookies had their earliest beginnings in the kitchens and ovens of our girl members, with moms volunteering as technical advisers. The sale of cookies as a way to finance troop activities began as early as 1917, five years after Juliette Gordon Low started Girl Scouting in the United States, when the Mistletoe Troop in Muskogee, Oklahoma, baked cookies and sold them in its high school cafeteria as a service project.

In July 1922, The American Girl magazine, published by Girl Scout national headquarters, featured an article by Florence E. Neil, a local director in Chicago, Illinois. Miss Neil provided a cookie recipe that had been given to the council's 2,000 Girl Scouts. She estimated the approximate cost of ingredients for six- to seven-dozen cookies to be 26 to 36 cents. The cookies, she suggested, could be sold by troops for 25 or 30 cents per dozen.

In the 1920s and 1930s, Girl Scouts in different parts of the country continued to bake their own simple sugar cookies with their mothers. These cookies were packaged in wax paper bags, sealed with a sticker, and sold door to door for 25 to 35 cents per dozen.

Girl Scout Cookie, circa 1922

• 1 cup butter
• 1 cup sugar
• additional sugar 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.

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Damien's note: A year or so back, a young Girl Scout and her mother who were trying to sell cookies in Houston were verbally attacked by a Christian woman who claimed they were supporting lesbianism and abortion. Her vicious attack made the news and many people increased their cookie purchases as a result of her abusive behavior. Go, Thin Mints!