Food & Drink
The (half-baked) demise of Berger Cookies freaks out metropolitan area
This is not the way the cookie is supposed to crumble.
This is not the way the cookie is supposed to crumble. Early in the
year, Baltimore awoke to find out that its iconic, beloved Berger
Cookies were becoming scarce to non-existent.
The city Health Department had shut down the Cherry Hill plant, where
the well-known treats are made, on Jan. 31 because it lacked a
food-service license. It wasn’t a food issue. It was a paperwork
problem. Soon, stores were running out.
One industrious hoarder took to eBay, offering a box of Berger
Cookies for $25 with a note: “Left over from our Super Bowl party.”Other
snackers took to Twitter and Facebook bemoaning the loss of the
fudge-topped shortbread sweets. Also complicating cookie-gate, the
bakery’s owner, Charles DeBaufre Jr., was in the hospital, unable to
sign needed documents to continue the business.
After being produced since the 1800s, was this the end of the
intoxicating sugar-and-chocolate rush experienced by generations of
Baltimoreans? For more than a month, citizens waited for the crumbs to
settle. Finally, the company was able to work out its difficulties and
crank up the ovens. By March, delivery trucks were on the road again,
stocking shelves. Life was sweet again in Charm City.