​The French are known for making love, not war, but their other specialty is making pastries. From buttery croissants to crusty baguettes to sweet treats of all sizes, shapes and flavors, French bakers are le chat's meow.

Though the U.S. has little hope at besting the French at their own game, that hasn't stopped stateside bakers from trying. One common example: the pain au chocolat, a croissant whose flaky, buttery layers give way to a center of melted chocolate.

In the spirit of liberté, égalité, fraternité (and gluttony), Gut Check decided to pit the two most prodigious local purveyors of pain au chocolat against one another to see who does it better: La Bonne Bouchée (12344 Olive Boulevard, Creve Coeur; 314-576-6606) and Saint Louis Bread Co.

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Robin Wheeler

​Gooey butter cake no longer belongs solely to St. Louis. We can blame Paula Deen for that. (Just because it has the word "butter" in its name does not mean it belongs to you, Paula.)

In Memphis this week, Gut Check learned just how far beyond St. Louis gooey butter cake has traveled. While waiting in the check-out line at a Midtown Memphis Walgreens, we spotted this display:

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Nabisco

Triple Double Oreos hit the shelves this summer.

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Oh my God! Oreo's introducing a giant, double-decker cookie that sort of looks like a chocolate Big Mac!

News that Nabisco's introducing the Triple Double Oreo leaked last week. ABC calls it outrageous; Nabisco had the audacity to take a normal Oreo and top it with chocolate creme and another Oreo cookie wafer!

We're all going to die of the fat. The Consumerist likens the cookie to KFC's Double Down and Denny's Baconalia.

To which we say, simmer down! It's just a damn cookie.

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Katie Moulton

Lies! Buyouts! Blackmail! Jelly beans!

​In 1976 lifelong candy enthusiast David Klein had an idea: to take the lowly jelly bean, that reject runt of the Easter basket, and turn it into gold. Jelly Belly, the world's premier "gourmet" jelly bean, was born, and the rest is history.

Well, not exactly.

When Klein got in touch with Gut Check after we posted Battle Gourmet Jelly Beans, we leapt at the chance to interview him, but we quickly learned that Klein's road to sweets success has been fraught with controversy. We spoke with Klein about the history of Jelly Belly, the 2010 documentary Candyman, how his teeth are holding up after decades in the candy business and his plans for a jelly-bean comeback.

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Wikimedia Commons

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This week, we've zeroed in on the cause of all the ills in America's children - it's chocolate milk served in school cafeterias!

Chocolate milk! ABC News reported yesterday that dentists are joining some nutritionists in decrying the horrors of chocolate milk. Even the U.K.'s talking about the controversy over a Washington, D.C.-area school lifting their ban on chocolate milk. To which we say, simmer down!

If you want to freak out, look beyond the milk at the food being served with that chocolate milk.

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www.icanhascheezburger.com

No word on whether the cat was allergic to shellfish.

​Gimbal's Fine Candies is on a mission to make Easter baskets safe for kiddos. How does the venerable sweets maker propose to protect children from unseen dangers hidden in the candy cornucopia?

With allergen-free Gourmet Jelly Beans, of course!

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Why are these girls so cheerful? Must be the partially hydrogenated palm kernel, and/or cottonseed oils.

​Gut Check is sick and tired of people gushing about their love of Girl Scout Cookies.

We're no hectoring health-food nutjob. We eat (and drink) our share of crap that's no good for us. But by God, these Girl Scout Cookies, which you're practically held at gunpoint and forced to buy (in multiple quantities, from multiple Girl Scouts, no less) -- they're dreadful!

Today's featured Girl Scout Cookie: Peanut Butter Patties. They used to be called Tagalongs, and still are in some areas. Same shit, different bakery.

Update! Now showing at a food blog near you...Episode 2: Caramel deLites, a.k.a. Samoas

Ready? Here comes a screenshot of the label:

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Deborah Hyland

It's important that a cake blend into its surroundings. Who knew?

​Remember Perry White, editor of the Daily Planet and Superman's Clark Kent's hectoring boss?

That's the way Gut Check likes to think of our boss. (But only with the utmost fondness.)

Like on Friday night, when he re-blared a late-breaking press release from the St. Louis Symphony Orchestra--

(St Louis) - The St. Louis Symphony introduces the Powell Hall Red Velvet Cake at this weekend's concerts. The cake was specially designed for the Symphony by its sole cake vendor, Sugaree. A red velvet variety was chosen as a nod to the Powell Hall auditorium, whose seats are covered in red velvet. Pat and Jimmy (Sugaree owners/bakers), started from a German chocolate cake and worked tirelessly in developing the recipe. The result is striking in its appearance, and will be an ideal complement to the Powell Hall pastry menu.

--and ordered Gut Check to get off our divan, where we'd innocently been nibbling pâté and sipping a margarita, and make haste to Powell Symphony Hall to partake of said Red Velvet Cake.

A troubling development, though we relished the prospect of exposing our delicate, shell-like ears to a program of Shostakovich and Rachmaninoff. Dunno about you, but the onset of the latter's Symphony No. 2 never fails to throw us into a fugue state that culminates weeks later with a significant breakthrough in our ongoing psychoanalysis. It would be interesting to observe how red velvet cake would rock that particular boat. Plus, we could verify that it truly does match the seat cushions.

There ain't no flies on Sugaree Baking Company, a Dogtown stalwart that local brides-to-be have long turned to in their hour of nuptial need.

So off we did hie.

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via starbucks.com

Rocky Road to Glory: Starbucks Cake Pops

​Starbucks kills you with kindness -- one cake pop at a time.

After recently unveiling the "trenta," its colossal coffee vessel, the big 'Bucks now announces a new line of sweet treats called Starbucks Petites. Among the diminutive, under-200-calorie sugar-bombs, Gut Check is most interested in the cake pops; the concept appears to have been lifted verbatim from our "Wildest Dreams" diary.

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I was watching TV the other night when one character lobbed the insult "doughboy" at another. The next thing I know, I was thinking of the Pillsbury Doughboy and cinnamon rolls in the can.

I probably ate a thousand of those things growing up. My mom always let me peel the paper off the can, and when it didn't open -- it never opened -- she let me poke the seam with a knife or beat the hell out of the can until it obeyed me and released the sweet, raw dough inside.

Adrienne Jones

​My life hasn't been bereft of non-canned cinnamon rolls, but I figured it was a good time to turn a critical eye toward my childhood favorite. After all, it's not like all cinnamon rolls are created equal, and cinnamon plus dough plus icing doesn't automatically mean baked success.

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