Fifteen cookies were pitted against each other in order to find the best for Lafayette College students. (Graphic by Elisabeth Seidel ’26 for The Lafayette)

The chocolate chip cookie: the gold standard of classic American desserts.

A universally, objectively good foodstuff, the consumption of the average chocolate chip cookie is an above-average experience. At its worst, a chocolate chip cookie is disappointing. So, as we set off on our quest to find the best chocolate chip cookie in all of Easton, it was understood that the likelihood of us encountering a cookie that was so bad as to induce disgust, fear or anger was quite low. Our scale has been adjusted accordingly.

As many external variables have been accounted for as possible. All cookies were measured with a standard metal yardstick and consumed with Good & Gather Original Almond Milk. Like good scientists, we made a spreadsheet.

Let us begin.

Lower Farinon/Gilbert’s

Distance from newsroom: several feet

Price: $2.50 or one meal swipe

Synopsis: Graham crackers were inspired by the ideas of Sylvester Graham, who believed that one should minimize all sources of pleasure, especially through diet.

Not only does the giant Bon Appétit cookie taste like a graham cracker, but it also fits the cracker namesake’s vision: no pleasure.

At first glance, this cookie looks soft and inviting, but take one bite and you will find that this corporate creation explodes into dust. If Amazon were to develop a cookie to give its workers in lieu of a birthday bonus, it would be this. At least they used dark chocolate chips.

Rating: 🥛/5

ThreeBirds Coffee House

Distance from newsroom: 0.6 miles

Price: $3.50

Synopsis: Two words: granola bar. 

Granola bar in appearance, granola bar in feel, granola bar in taste. Even the chocolate chips reminded us of those from a Nature Valley product. 

Both gluten-free and vegan, this oatmeal cookie would, unfortunately, be the perfect subject for a Fox News hit piece on “woke,” plant-based foods. Flat and nearly five inches wide, neither of us could muster the strength to finish this round flapjack.

We sympathize with the celiac community.

Rating: 🥛/5

Duchess Cookies

Distance from newsroom: 0.6 miles

Price: $4.19 with student discount ($4.50 without)

Synopsis: We’re not mad, we’re just disappointed.

The Duchess chocolate chip cookie has an incredibly mild taste, with overarching notes of flour. It’s also THICK, likely lending to the middle of the cookie’s gloopiness and our suspicions of having consumed an undercooked product. From bag to mouth to digestive tract, we imagine that the physical condition of this cookie changed very little.

If ever you’ve had the urge to eat window caulk for dessert, this is your cookie.

Rating: 🥛🥛/5

Upper Farinon/Marquis

Distance from newsroom: several feet

Price: your meal plan

Synopsis: If you were to describe a chocolate chip cookie to an alien with no taste buds, and then ask it to bake you a batch, it would report back with something akin to the standard Upper Farinon and Marquis chocolate chip cookie.

If you swat away the fruit flies buzzing around them, we promise these cookies are just fine. The edge is a tad too crunchy for comfort, but the middle will satisfy you if you aren’t looking for anything special. We’d also appreciate more chocolate chips.

Cut away the edge and eat only the center if you live on the dangerous side.

Rating: 🥛🥛/5

Virella’s Sweets & Treats

Distance from newsroom: 0.9 miles

Price: $1.25

Synopsis: The Virella’s chocolate chip cookie is one of the smaller ones we tried. It’s fluffy and soft, lacking the slight crust that many associate with chocolate chip cookies. 

The taste might split opinions – it is sweeeeeet, with a slightly artificial, Pepperidge Farm tang. It is, fundamentally, a decently enjoyable cookie, but fundamentally, it is also a boring cookie.

Honestly, just try it for yourself. The vibes of Virella’s are immaculate and we can’t wait to go back for the food.

Rating: 🥛🥛🥛/5

Sweet Girlz Bakery

Distance from newsroom: 0.6 miles

Price: $50 for four dozen

Synopsis: Sweet Girlz is known for cupcakes. Let’s keep it that way.

The cookie is … fine. It’s small and the chips appear to have been individually placed on top, seemingly an afterthought. While some may find this slightly disconcerting, fellow Type-A Virgo moons might have fun playing a little game called “Get One Chip in Each Bite!”

Additionally, the way this cookie is compacted between the teeth may elicit the strange sensation of the eating experience having become an Oddly Satisfying Hydraulic Press compilation. That might sound fun to you, but remember you’ll be stuck squishing 48 of the damn things.

Rating: 🥛🥛🥛/5

Wawa (pre-packaged)

Distance from newsroom: 0.2 miles

Price: $1.99

Synopsis: This cookie tastes weird, almost as if it has too many preservatives. Interesting since the wrapper claims that Wawa bakes its cookies fresh daily … legally circumspect wording if you ask us.

The cookie is doughy but gritty; large, unincorporated grains of sugar are plainly visible. But Wawa uses bittersweet chocolate chunks as opposed to chocolate chips, a decision worthy of praise. 

We would buy this cookie again, but walking into Wawa and ordering it would bring us no pleasure.

Rating: 🥛🥛🥛/5

Mojo 516 Cafe

Distance from newsroom: 0.1 miles

Price: $2.33

Synopsis: The Mojo triple chocolate chip cookie has variety. Eating it is like biting through the layers of the Earth. It tastes a little bit like banana bread, and like any good banana bread, it has ridiculously large chocolate chips, a welcome surprise.

This cookie would be four milks out of five if not for the crunchy edges robbing our mouths of all moisture.

Rating: 🥛🥛🥛/5

Miss Jackson’s Kitchen

Distance from newsroom: 0.1 miles

Price: $1.59

Synopsis: With crisp macadamia nuts and flakey kosher salt, this cookie ought to be fancy.

Wrapped in appealingly modern, logo-stamped wax paper and then placed in a homely brown paper bag, this cookie is the perfect example of Miss Jackson’s strange tendency to toe the line between cozy and corporate; it’s the textbook definition of the Miss Jackson’s experience. It even tastes like breakfast.

The oddly bumpy texture of the cookie’s exterior is reminiscent of a bacteria colony growing on a Petri dish, but if you can get past the visual of chowing down on someone’s abandoned lab experiment, this cookie is a decent consolation prize for what might have been an otherwise unremarkable meal.

Rating: 🥛🥛🥛🥛/5

The Modern Crumb Bakeshop

Distance from newsroom: 0.8 miles

Price: $2.75

Synopsis: This cookie is unremarkable – and that isn’t necessarily a bad thing.

Both chewy on the inside and a bit crunchy on the outside, this is the texture we were looking for. But there were perhaps too many chocolate chips, causing the cookie to become overwhelmingly sweet and leaving us with a mass of chocolate that cannibalized the incredibly tasty body of the cookie.

Overall, this was a classic cookie experience, just not the most memorable one.

Rating: 🥛🥛🥛🥛/5

Wawa (warmed)

Distance from newsroom: 0.2 miles

Price: $2.50

Synopsis: Tucked away in the dusty digital corners of the Wawa breakfast screen lies a cookie that absolutely rules.

If you can figure out how to get it in your cart, you’ll find yourself with a freshly warmed and delightfully supple cookie, packed with gooey chocolate chips and seared with what seems to be the grill lines of a panini press.

The chips are velvety smooth and contribute to a flavor reminiscent of a rich chocolate ice cream.

This is a huge step up from Wawa’s other offering.

Rating: 🥛🥛🥛🥛/5

McDonald’s

Distance from newsroom: 1 mile

Price: $1.06 for three

Synopsis: The Golden Arches serve enough people in a day to populate the country of Thailand, so its chocolate chip cookie had no excuse to disappoint – and it didn’t. 

When we pulled into the drive-thru and asked for one single chocolate chip cookie, the attendant informed us that the cookies only came in threes. And at just a dollar plus sales tax for the total package, this cookie is the best value. Period.

Upon first glance, your expectations might be low – the edges are a little too dark and there appears to be a dearth of chocolate chips, but just one bite will instead reveal a treat lush with chocolate and packed with a crunch that melts away into the rest of the cookie.

While we wish the chocolate was darker, the overall flavor of the cookie is deep and almost caramelized. One could easily be convinced that these cookies were homemade and not those of the largest fast-food chain on the planet.

Rating: 🥛🥛🥛🥛/5

Easton Baking Company

Distance from newsroom: 1 mile

Price: $1.50

Synopsis: This cookie is a journey. The owner of the bakery selects the cookie from a glass cookie jar and hands it to you. You banter, you pay and you leave. This is the quintessential bakery experience.

The cookie itself is crispy yet chewy. It’s a little bit sticky with a syrupy scent. The chips are fairly small, their delicate nature enabling them to rapidly melt in your mouth and quickly synthesize with the batter, and the resulting interplay between sweet and salty gives this cookie an umami-like flavor.

How much of this positive review was due to the cookie’s storage in that oh-so-charming glass jar? We’re not sure.

Rating: 🥛🥛🥛🥛/5

Mia & Maddie’s Bakery

Distance from newsroom: 0.8 miles (storefront opens in April)

Price: $36 for one dozen

Synopsis: This is it. The peak. The apex. THIS is the best chocolate chip cookie in all of Easton.

Don’t be fooled: this cookie is not for novices. Your grandmother would not bake this for you – it has been painstakingly crafted. You do not choose to eat this cookie on a whim – you must dedicate yourself to it.

But what this cookie lacks in comfort, it makes up for in perfection. A bite through the gentle crispness of the shell reveals a gloriously rich inner cookie.

It is gigantic. It is creamy. It is layered. The chocolate chips are somehow milkier than milk chocolate.

Simply put, Mia & Maddie’s Bakery checks all of the boxes. Keep an eye out for a Small Business Spotlight.

Rating: 🥛🥛🥛🥛🥛/5

Allie’s Specialties (Terra Cafe)

Distance from newsroom: 0.8 miles

Price: $4.51

Synopsis: This is the most expensive coo-

No. We will not be calling this product a “cookie.” It is bread. It looks and tastes like bread. Chocolate chip bread. Something akin to a sweetened KFC biscuit.

The experience of eating Allie’s bread was uncanny and bizarre. Nothing in the ingredients list suggests this product isn’t a cookie. We wish we didn’t like it.

Rating: DISQUALIFIED (🍞/5)