Ingredient Wed Sep 16 2009

No Love for S'mores! Kitchen Sink Wins at Carol's Cookies Flavor Contest

As you may know, I love cookies--specifically, Highland Park-based Carol's Cookies, which was one of my first posts when I joined the Gapers Block staff two years ago. Since then, I could have sent several children to college on what I've spent on these cookies. Worth it.

To celebrate thirty years in business, Carol's announced a Flavor Contest earlier this summer to give customers and fans an opportunity to create a new cookie to be added to the family. The winner would get a fantastic prize: a trip to Carol's bakery for a two-day baking bender and a year's subscription to her Cookie of the Month club (yowsa!). I jumped at the chance and submitted my own idea of what I thought was missing from Carol's offerings: a S'mores Brownie cookie.

I called the very gracious Carol Goldman herself last week to talk about the competition and geek out over her cookies. The competition, which had over 400 entries, was narrowed to eight finalists that were judged yesterday at a private meeting of several culinary luminaries at Carol's headquarters. Alpana Singh (of "Check, Please!" fame), Katrina Markoff of Vosges Chocolate, and Marc Schulman of Eli's Cheesecake were among the judges.

A few hours after talking to Carol, I received an email from her son Jeff congratulating me: I was a finalist. What? What? WHAT? Could this all be mine? What were the odds that my suggestion was picked? Did I care? I was elated and shocked by the coincidence (really).

While it was an honor to be selected, it was painful when I got the news this morning in another fateful email from Jeff Goldman: Jennifer Wisniewski from Milwaukee won the grand prize with her Kitchen Sink suggestion (Oats, Coconut, Milk Chocolate and Semi-Sweet Chips, Almond Slivers and Pecans). Second went to a Pumpkin Chip number, Third to a Turtle Fudge, and...my little old S'mores cookie came in fourth. I'm bummed that I couldn't name drop my cookie largesse ("You know that S'mores cookie? Yeah, that was me."). I resolve to love the Kitchen Sink cookie (coming soon!) as my own suggestion.

— Robyn Nisi / Comments (1)