Baltimore's best cookie
Have you tried Berger cookies? Unless you're from Maryland, probably not!
When Hurricane Irene battered the east coast in 2011, it left plenty of damage in its wake. But Baltimore was hit especially hard. As residents repaired their homes and recovered from the storm, a very specific anxiety spread throughout the city. Grocery and convenience stores might have restocked milk and bread, but in nearly 600 shops across the Baltimore area, one item was alarmingly absent.
"We've had a few pregnant women and elderly people come in three, four days in a row and say, 'Still no Bergers? Still no Bergers?'" Linda Busick told the Baltimore Sun. At the time, she worked as a clerk at Lucky's Superette Convenience Store. “I will be so happy when I see that big truck pull up to the front door. I will be ecstatic."
Bergers, for the uninitiated, refer to Bergers cookies (although you’ll probably never hear anyone pronounce the “S”). When owner Charles DeBaufre returned to work after the storm, every part of his factory was still intact. Equipment, ingredients — it all seemed to be ready for business as usual. Until he realized that the roughly 6,000 cookies his team had made before the storm were completely drenched.
Baltimore needed its Berger cookie fix.
Pictured: Berger cookies in the wild
First, what is a Berger cookie? This is the question I asked my boyfriend, whose family is from Maryland, when he brought them up sometime last year. Berger cookies have two essential components: a cakey cookie and thick, fudgey chocolate icing.
But the key to Berger cookies, the thing that’s truly difficult to replicate, is the exact proportion of each ingredient. Berger cookies aren’t just frosted cookies; they should have a messy heap of icing, so thick that you can see the imprints of individual teeth after you bite through it. Or you could do what plenty of fans do: nibble or spoon the chocolate frosting off, and toss the cookie altogether.
Most versions of the cookies’ origin story focus on the man who gave them their name: Henry Berger, a baker who opened his Baltimore shop in 1835. The business stayed in the Berger family until after World War I, when a bakery employee named George Russell purchased it. In 1969, ownership changed hands again, this time going to another bakery employee whose family took over the operation — which is how Charles DeBaufres eventually came to run the show.
DeBaufres has to walk a tightrope between growth and tradition, monitored all the while by Berger cookies’ most loyal fans. Even the haphazard application of fudge matters: the company still hand dips the cookies, dropping them into enormous metal bowls and scooping them out. In 2013, just four employees were responsible for dipping 36,000 cookies every day.
In 2015, an existential threat far greater than Hurricane Irene shook Berger cookies to their indulgent core: the trans fat ban. Horrified, DeBaufre began testing recipes that were trans fat-free.
“The cookie was so disgusting that I spit it out,” he told Atlas Obscura with characteristic bluntness. “It was like a combination of burnt hair and … ” he pauses, trying to find the exact right word. “Intestines! Yes, I remember literally thinking, ‘I am going to be out of business.’”
He quickly sunk thousands of dollars into recipe testing, a steep expense for a small business. Privately, he worried that he was staring down Berger cookies’ demise.
But Berger cookies live on, even without their delicious trans fats. Jack and I went out for barbecue a few weekends ago, and tucked among the shelves of hot sauce and baskets of corn bread, the restaurant somehow also sold boxes of Berger cookies. The day of my initiation had finally arrived!
The box is small but surprisingly heavy — easily a pound, thanks all that fudge. I had a little bite and instantly regretted it; you have to really, really love eating chocolate frosting directly out of the can to enjoy these cookies, I think. (Baltimore, please forgive me.) But for Jack and anyone else with Baltimore roots, they’re more than the sum of their parts.
Today, Berger cookies’ most important element remains their stubborn ties to Baltimore. The company still refuses to distribute beyond a tight geographic area, and the cookies made headlines when they started popping up in DC grocery stores. DeBaufre also sells online and ships cookies to fans across the country, including (notably) a Baltimore expat who’s sent Berger cookies to Steven Spielberg, among other Hollywood clients.
But if you live outside the tiny mid-Atlantic distribution zone and someone tries to sell you some Berger cookies, beware. The company sternly stands against “unauthorized retailers,” warning that the cookies might be expired or stale. If you want to enjoy Berger cookies, you have to do it their way or not at all.
Something else
There have been some very good animal tweets lately. Like this dog playing with two kittens. This yawning (yet polite) lizard. This blanket mishap. This crow that made a mistake. Or this dog with its mini me. I’ve been fried on some heavy deadlines recently and these animals really bring me joy.
One last note
Jack and I are heading to Japan tomorrow! Huge thanks to everyone who sent travel tips and suggestions a few months back. (Especially to Brady Gerber — sign up for his newsletter!) I’m taking advantage of the opportunity to unplug, so no stories for the next two weeks. I will probably (hopefully) pop into your inbox with some fun pre-scheduled link roundups. But maybe not! It depends on how far I get today.
See you on the other side!
^^ Me demolishing my last few chores and deadlines