Homemade and All-natural Thin Mint Recipe (2024)

Just discovered this site recently and have made a couple of recipes already. This recipe was fantastic. Next time I try it, I will make the chocolate thinner since I lost a few due to fragility. Since they were in the freezer, and I happened to see some vanilla ice cream in the freezer as well, I made a couple of "sample" ice cream sandwiches--highly recommended!

Laurie

LOVED this recipe - thank you so much! i particularly liked the crumb, very similar to the originals. the only problem i had was the coating melted immediately upon handling, even after freezing (though of course they are better straight from the freezer anyway....). Is there anything that can be done about that? maybe it's atypical, i dunno, i don't usually do much cookie-coating.oh, and i used MINT instead of peppermint extract, and realized it reminded me too much of my spearmint toothpaste...will adjust to use only peppermint next time. Can't wait!

flan

I also made these cookies recently and enjoyed them very much. My notes on the recipe:The dough was a bit dry, which I fixed by adding a little bit (no more than 1 tb) of vegetable oil. Goes against the healthy idea, but it was there. Chances are that it would have been fine without it in the end, though, and I'll try that next time.The quality of the chocolate for dipping is important: next time I'll spring for something better than Safeway chocolate chips! And I'll probably do a mix of semi-sweet and dark, too - currently they're a bit too sweet for me. The chocolate was also very thick for dipping, so I'll keep the whipping cream tip in mind.I also found that I added a lot more peppermint extract than was called for and I think I'll add a bit to the dough next time. Apparently I really like peppermint.Overall they were quite good and I look forward to having GS treats at any time now!

Kirstin

Finally made these. I had to wait until I had plenty of people to eat them or I would eat them all. :)I read all of the comments before I did them. Additionally, I made them with what I had on hand. Here's how it went.- Based on the input of the dough being too crumbly, I used 1 T soy flour and 1 T water as a dough conditioner. I had no trouble with the dough. In fact, I probably didn't need to put it in the freezer before I rolled it out.- For coating, I used what I had which was 12 oz Ghiradelli semi-sweet chips and a 4 oz bar of Ghiradellio 60% bittersweet and ghiradelli cocoa, too.- I didn't have any peppermint extract, so I used the Simply Organic Peppermint Flavoring I had. This is a mixture of peppermint oil and sunflower oil. I added about an eighth of a teaspoon to the dough. I probably used nearly 2 t in the coating.- I used a teaspoonful of no-trans-fat crisco in the coatingAll I can say is WOW. The cookies are delicate, tender and delicious. Much better than the real thing!Next time I may cut a bit of the cocoa. The chocolate was intense. Delicious, but the GS cookies I remember weren't so much chocolate in the cookie as in the coating.Additionally, next time I'll make a point to buy extract, just to see what difference, if any, it makes.Thank you for a SUPERB recipe!

Lynne

http://nataliedee.com/032006/disgruntled-girlscout.jpg

Wayne

Boo,If you want to make chocolate thinner, the best thing to add is heavy whipping cream. Add a little at a time till you reach desired consistancy. You may be surprised how a little will go a long way, so add a little at a time. Hope that helps.Haleh

Haleh

I made these on Friday night and took them with me when I worked at the market on Saturday. They were a huge hit with my coworkers and a few lucky market patrons. All declared them to be better than the "real" thing.Since we're fessing up, I used Trader Joe's butter and Droste Cocoa. Sharffenberger 62% for dipping. All other ingredients were as-specified.The dough wasn't dry, but it was delicate, and had to go back in the freezer a couple of times. I made the cookies on the big side--using my middle biscuit cutter, so they came out to 2+ inches in diameter. This made them a little delicate, both getting them onto the cookie sheet before baking, off the cookie sheet after baking and for dipping in the chocolate. I carefully dropped a cookie in the melted chocolate, then gently turned it over. Then I lifted it out with one fork and used a second fork to skim the extra chocolate off the top and bottom. It was fussy, delicate work and I lost a few cookies to the weight of the chocolate. But the results were worth it!And they are definitely best straight out of the freezer. ;-)

Lisa

I tried making these this weekend, and the cookies came out super cocoa flavored, to the point of being a little bitter. I used the quick and easy way to fix that (we've been dipping the finished cookies in whipped cream, ooh!) but maybe next time I'll go with a more familiar Hershey's cocoa as opposed to the fancy organic cocoa. If anyone has a thought on that, let me know.

Glorgana

I've added shortening to chocolate to make it a bit thinner when melting. A non-hydrogenated oil that's solid at room temperature, such as palm or coconut oil, might do the trick.

purple_kangaroo

I tried these last week!Verdict: Delicious - but I had a few problems.1. Crumbly dough - thanks for the egg idea, that might work, provided it doesn't change the taste.2. Chocolate was smooth but too thick. It took me 15 minutes to successfully coat 3 cookies (which were gobbled up as soon as they were cold). Then I did something silly: added boiling water. Of course my chocolate siezed up! I'll try again with a different brand of chocolate. Is there anything I can add to make it runny? Oil? Butter?

Boo

how about using peppermint oil instead of extract for that extra-cool thin mint flavor?I wish I knew the conversion rate, oil is bound to be much stronger.thanks a million for working out this recipe!

brownie

your delightful concoction sounds utterly sinfulmy next compatriot should be these heavenly-looking baked dessertplease forgive mei am only 9

Hi

Do you need to temper the chocolate to get it to set up properly without freezing? I'm hoping to make these and send to my girlfriend (and her fellow soldiers) in Afghanistan. She says it will be like money in the bank to have these to hand out...

Pie Queen

For those of you having trouble with lumpy and thick chocolate...it may be your chocolate chips. I used Guittard semi-sweet chocolate chips (a belgian brand), and then when I ran out I used Nestle. The Guittard choc was my favorite of the two, it was much more smooth and better flavor. It did a more even coating also.The trick to melting chocolate is to do it slowly. I used a double boiler and put a small amount of water in the bottom pan on low heat just to create sme warm steam. The chocolate melted rather quickly and did not scald even after working on dipping cookies for 1/2 hour.

Heather

My daughters are bugging me to try this-- I suppose it'll be our friday project. Hopefully I'll have a bit more self control than I did as a 3rd grader-- I ordered a box from my friend & ate the whole thing. At school. In one day.

Aloe

I'm assuming you used natural cocoa, not dutched? These do look fabulous - my husband is drooling.

Sarah D.

I saw a the blog as a referrer on my sitemeter, couldn't see the link though.Nice blog though. Been here often...

Tony of the bachelor cooking

I had a tough time making these for some reason. When I put my dough in for 20 minutes, it became frozen solid. When I was able to roll it out the cookies went in for the proper time and bubbled and started spreading--then burned. Not sure what I did wrong. The chocolate coating was very thick and didn't make for easy dipping. Couldn't quite get the balance between burnt cookies and very chewy cookies. Perhaps it just warrants some practice. Thanks for the chance to experiment.

annie

Wow! Those look absolutely delicious! I just got some Thin Mints from a co-worker, but your homemade cookies look even better.And I'd love to see the Samoa recipe, too. Those are my all-time favorites (even more than Thin Mints!)

driver8

The dough for mine was quite crumbly as well, so caused quite a bit of frustration on my part. :( I'm not very used to using melted chocolate either, and mine seemed really quick, and hard to get a really thin, "melty" coat on the cookies. This made for comments from my husband such as "not a good chocolate to cookie ratio" (being too much chocolate) Any tips for next time? They were good enough in our house to warrant another try. ;)

Heidi

Thanks for a great looking recipe! I can't wait to try it.On another note I'm so tired of seeing the Girl Scouts on EVERY street corner around here. I think it's awful! I was a GS when I was a girl and we went to a few houses, family & friends and that was it. Now you can't walk out of the grocery store without being accousted by Girl Scout MOMS - often without their girls.Too bad - another nice tradition bites the dust.

Diane

I made these today. Did not find the dough too dry. I had to freeze the rolled out dough after cutting the shapes to get the cookies on the parchment paper. It's pretty warm here today in Texas, so very warm in my kitchen and the dough was too soft after rolling it out. The taste was ok. It's not going to put the Girl Scouts out of business. I used melted chocolate chips because it was my first time making this & I didn't want to shell out for expensive chocolate if it didn't work. That said, the melted chips were a little thick. I would have preferrred to use a better quality chocolate, but I would have to temper it first (for snap, shine & strength!!) and so it wouldn't melt between my fingers. All that said, thanks for posting the recipe.

Elaine

wow. when i tasted these cookies out of the oven....i mean org*smic. seriously. guys, bake some for your ladies and she will treat you like you just bought her a mercedes-benz. the girlscout cookies are ....well o.k. But these cookies will make you cream.....that butter up and bake another batch. hell yeah.

rodge

You are brilliant. I am telling you, I just got my box of GS ThinMints this week and they are sitting in my freezer taunting me. I love the taste, but all those trans-fats are a giant turn-off. I am pissed that the Girl Scouts see fit to sell something bad for people! Anyway, thank you so much for this post.

Easily Pleased

Looks great, but there's a typo in the recipe. It should be "wafers," not "Wafters."

Anonymous

Ok I said I would make the cookies and post....They are truly delicious!I had to veer from the recipe a bit for dietary reasons. I used 1 cup of Splenda brand sweetener, insetad of 1 cup powdered sugar. I also used low saturated fat margerine instead of butter.When I mixed the ingredients as instructed, the batter was way too crumbly and dry, I couldn't get it to form into a ball let alone stay glued together. So I added 1 egg, and a tad bit of canola oil to make it more wet so it would stick together. This did the trick!Immediately after mixing and adding these ingredients, I flattened the dough. I didn't need to put in the fridge/freezer, I just rolled out onto a pie sheet. I used a shot glass as my cookie cutter...worked perfectly!Bakes for 12 minutes to make them crunchier, took off pan and put on cooling racks. Once they were cool I melted the chocolate and peppermint extract and dipped the cookies in chocolate. I put them into the freezer on a cookie sheet to set which literally took 2-3 minutes and they were solid hard. My husband and I enjoyed quite a few of them last night, they turned out delicious!Defintely the best right out of the freezer......and a great healthy alternative from the real thing. My batch of cookies made way more than what the recipe says. I made them very small and thin like the real thin mints are, so I got about 60 cookies out of the batch.Even with alterations to the recipe these are fabulous, enjoy!

Heather

Shauna, thank you sooo much!When I try it I'll comment on how it went.

Annabelle

Seeing as how everyone loves the delicious Samoa cookies (ahh, caramel! *meltymelt*), I'm not going to say how much I want a recipe for some, and how much I am grateful that my minty-chocophile trans-fat Girl Scout cookie days can end (in dry-heaving violent death throes).But I'm thinking it. Really hard.Also, does anybody have a vegan recipe for alternative Tagalong/Peanut Butter Patties (not the sandwiches)? I'm surprised these weren't already asked about, honestly.

Genevieve

Definitely this sounds fabulous! My co-workers brought in boxes of the thin mints which I couldn't leave alone a few weeks ago......and every cookie I ate I felt guilty that they were not a healthy option. :o) (Since I normally eat very healthy except when it comes to GS cookies!) I've been switching to organic and natural foods as much as possible lately, so a natural thin mint cookie is a wonderful alternative. My husband should be happy about this too! Thanks for the recipe I will try it tonight and repost tomorrow with how it turned out.

Heather

Uh I love the idea of making store-bought foods as homemade ... but does anyone else think its kinda cheap to get all that girl-guide-cookie-goodness without any dough going to those girls for all their hard work and ongoing contribution to the community?Why not make a donation-in-kind of what you WOULD have spent. And that way none of the cash goes to Mr. Christie either.

Katrina Broughton

::drool::I always shell out enough for 6-10 boxes a year..... you just made my hero list. *__*

Mel

I thought in the name of food blogs, i would post this web-address for homemade samoa goodness. I haven't tried the recipe, so don't hold me accountable!http://wordstoeatby.blogspot.com/2005/03/sugar-high-friday-i-want-some-moas.html

CulinaryKate

I tried this last night.. but I didn't go organic. I used regular 'everything'.. margarine, powdered sugar, hershey's baking cocoa, etc etc.. So, any mishaps certainly can't (and shouldn't) be automatically blamed on the recipe. I'm more than happy to take the blame.I made a 3/4 batch, so that i could use a 12oz bag of chocolate chips for melting.The results: The cookie dough was way too dry. way too dry. it was relatively floury in texture. I added a little butter to it to help some, but I didn't add enough, I guess. The cookies cooked up ok, for the ones that actually formed good circles.As far as taste goes, there was a definite cocoa aftertaste. But, after chilling them, the taste is pretty good, and I can definitely get that 'thin mint' taste. Thanks for the recipe!

Kirby

Jazzalto - I was wondering the exact same thing when I read the recipe! I hate rolling dough, so I historically didn't make any cookie that requires it, recently I started attempting the freeze it first and cut slices from the log. So far I've been successful.

Sandy

Might this recipe be easier to chill in a log and to slice them thinly when they are finished? It wouldn't have the pretty edges, but it might be quicker and ensure that they are thinner cookies.

Jazzalto