In this week's photo, we have GSEM's Healthy Builders, a Jr. FIRST LEGO League team from our council! This team not only participated in the National FIRST LEGO competition here in St. Louis on Friday, April 29, but also got to attend a pizza party after the competition and meet teams from other councils in New Jersey, Wyoming, Texas, Iowa and New York! We'll have the full story of last week - a big week for Girl Scouts and STEM - here on the blog soon!

This week's photo comes from our Girl Scout Shop, where we're all decked out and ready for April Showers!

"Personal care items are not a luxury, they are a necessity," says Donna K. Martin, CEO of Girl Scouts of Eastern Missouri. "Having good hygiene and maintaining good health are important for a positive self-image and sense of well-being. Through this exceptional community service project, Girl Scouts and our generous community members help supply essential items for local families in need."

The Girl Scouts' April Showers program provides 99% of all personal care items distributed in our region, according to Operation Food Search. GSEM is also trying to set a Guinness World Record by collecting 1.2 million personal care items this year!

Jennifer Lindley Francis shared this recipe on our Facebook wall yesterday, and we thought it was too good not to share with everyone. Without further ado, here is a recipe for Thin Mint pancakes!

Thin Mint Pancakes

Whisk together in a large bowl:
1 cup flour
1/2 cup sugar
1/3 cup sifted sweetened cocoa
2 teaspoons baking powder
1/4 teaspoon salt
Whisk together in a separate bowl:
1 1/4 cup milk 1/2 stick of butter, softened 2 large egg yolks
2 tsp vanilla
Pour wet ingredients in with dry ingredients and whisk together until combined Crush up 4 thin mints and add to batter. Take 2 large egg whites and whip together to form stiff peaks. Gently fold that into the batter. Cook as normal.

Delicious! Let us know if you try this recipe!

Girl Scouts of Eastern Missouri staff members visited the Capitol in Jefferson City on Tuesday to "scout for Girl Scouts," give cookies to our representatives, and meet with some of our representatives about Girl Scout issues like transportation. It was a great learning experience!

If you live in St. Louis, you're probably familiar with the pizza place Pi, known for their delicious deep-dish delicacies. But what you might not know is that they have a food truck - pictured here - and that they're a friend to Girl Scouts!

Yesterday, @pistl tweeted: "Tomorrow, the @PiTruckSTL will visit Millipore at 11am with 50% of sales to benefit Girl Scouts (100th Anniversary), @GirlScoutsEM." True to form, they tweeted us the above photo from 15 Research Drive in St. Charles, with the tweet:

"The @PiTruckSTL has arrived and is ready for a great lunch with our friends at Millipore. Grab a fresh deep dish & support @GirlScoutsEM."

Thanks for your support and for your continued delicious pizza, Pi!

 

    

This week's photos of the week were sent in by Jean Viazanko-Laws, in honor of the Girl Scouts' 100th Birthday!

From Jean:
 "I have two photos to share with you. The first is a black-and-white photo of my Mom (Patricia Bourque Viazanko) and her twin sister (Pamela Bourque Meyer) in their GS Uniforms, the date on the photo is July 5th, 1945. The second is a "color" photo of my Aunt Mary Lou Bourque and her photo is dated June 7th, 1953."

Do you have any vintage Girl Scout photos to share? Send them to us at sconnors@girlscoutsem.org!

 

Girl Scouts went to KTVI's studio on Monday, February 27 to take part in an across-the-decades fashion show. Can you name which decade each of these uniforms is from?

Check out the footage shown on KTVI here!

A cheesecake created by Cardwells featured Caramel deLites as the crust.

Last Thursday night, the Girl Scouts of Eastern Missouri hosted a great event at the Ritz Carlton in Clayton, Missouri. Known as Dessert First, the event challenged local chefs to create culinary delights from Girl Scout Cookies. With a lot of media attention leading up to the event, we here at the council spent the few days before getting more and more excited. This was a first-of-its-kind event here in Eastern Missouri; though other councils have had similar competitions to create desserts out of Girl Scout cookies, none have been combined with an elegant dinner and awards ceremony.

Although our Communications Department had met with a few of the chefs beforehand to take photos and even sample a dessert or two on the air, all the chefs were very secretive about their recipes until just before the event. The result was absolutely delicious. From the Ritz-Carlton's winning strawberry-lemon ice box cake, a fluffy, light dessert made from lemonade cookies and topped with a sugary-sweet slice of lemon peel, to the mint-chocolate torte from Edgewild and the Caramel deLite cheesecake from Cardwell's on the Plaza, all the desserts competed wonderfully, though the Four Seasons and Ritz-Carlton took home the night's awards. 

All the desserts are create-able in any home kitchen, and a few are even no-bake, including the Four Seasons' cheesecake on a stick. It's easy to recreate using just a microwave. All recipes will be available on our website soon. The only caveat - make sure you've purchased Girl Scout Cookies to use in your recipes, as they won't taste the same without them!