Review: Wendy's Thin Mints Frosty Earns Its Badge In Cooling Delight

Wendy's famous Frosty has swirled its way into hearts (and stomachs) for generations. The frozen dessert is divinely versatile, and the fast food chain enjoys spinning tasty renditions to dress up the cup now and then. In 2024, Wendy's dabbled in salted caramel and a pineapple-y specialty for TV's favorite sea sponge. This brings us to the latest variety churning out of the machines, and it's been a long time coming: Say hello to the Thin Mints Frosty. 

Among Girl Scout cookie options, Thin Mints are the standard. The nearly century-old classic cookie is consistently the organization's bestseller, and that kind of popularity is ripe for big brand partnership. Murmurs of Wendy's rumored refresh and Girl Scouts collab started circulating at the beginning of 2025, but up until this point, we only really knew that the two forces were colliding for something deliciously-pure. Now, we know for sure — customers can try the new Thin Mints Frosty at participating Wendy's locations starting on Friday, February 21. 

But even with it set to hit menus nationwide, we couldn't wait to get a taste — does the wholesome collaboration earn its badge as a must-try? Daily Meal got first-hand access to the dessert to learn more about the Frosty's inspiration, how long it's around, and determine whether it's worth a trip to the drive-thru. 

In examining a "Girl Scout cookie-inspired" delicacy, the Wendy's Thin Mint Frosty seeks to forge the duo in a symbiotic fashion. The treat's gist, as chief marketing officer Lindsay Radkoski describes in a press statement, is "bringing together two iconic fan favorite flavors into a single spoonful." A natural instinct for chilled desserts of this sort is to crush cookies into little shards and sprinkle them on top. Instead, Wendy's pulverizes the chocolatey rounds into a filling recalling, in the chain's own words, "a crumbly, cookie butter texture."

If you've eaten traditional cookie butter, you know the spread tastes like baking spices (thanks to Speculoos, those oval morsels dispensed on flights in the States). It's very thick, with an almost crunchy peanut butter consistency. We were curious, then, to see how a Thin Mints "butter" or sauce would perform in the chain's creamy base. And speaking of the sauce, Wendy's drizzles it into the cup prior to filling it with the ice cream. The Frosty itself — regardless of whether it's a special or old faithfuls like chocolate — toggles between concrete thickness and a slurp-able shake, and is best enjoyed scooped with a spoon (or as a dip for fries) for every melty mouthful. 

A pattern emerges whenever fast food chains get the idea to shake up the menu. For a pop culture tie-in or seasonal offering no matter the occasion, it's not intended to be permanent. Wendy's largely conforms to this formula with the Girl Scout gang, as a company rep we spoke to confirmed the Thin Mints Frosty wouldn't be around for long. We're unable to confirm the exact timeframe, though, which means you'll need to buy into a smidge of FOMO in order to savor the confection to the fullest. Thankfully, the promotion is far-reaching, which means if you've got one of the nearly 6,000 Wendy's locations standing nearby, you should be able to track down the dessert with ease. 

Anyone who loves the Girl Scouts (or was once a member) knows replenishing your stash of Tagalongs and Trefoils only occurs annually between the months of January and April. Therefore, it's not hard to speculate the soft-serve's longevity will mirror the organization's calendar to an extent. Perhaps the promotion will stick around to cure winter blues until the sun finally comes out of the shadows. We do know the release date was chosen intentionally: it marks when the green-vested youngsters strut their entrepreneurial stuff, so it was a smart way for Wendy's to optimize its launch. The price-point ranges between $1.39 to about $3 for a large, in line with the usual rate. 

There are two perks to Wendy's most recent innovation that fans of the chain are going to go ham over. Typical limited promo flavors come in just one flavor — but not this one. Wendy's offers the Thin Mints Frosty in both chocolate and vanilla. The latter being included is a big deal, especially knowing it's entered and exited menus since debuting in 2006. As long as the Girl Scout version is spinning, devotees can have their ice cream and lick it, too. 

The collaboration, to some degree, is also responsible for engendering even more confectionary bliss than is advertised. Let us explain. As one of the chain's reps informed us, Wendy's soft-serve machines never churn out more than two varieties at any one time. Chocolate is the default, while the other half of the duo could be vanilla — when there's not a specialty flavor taking up real estate, that is. Considering the chain is breaking vanilla's pause in launching the Girl Scouts collab, the door is now open to four different potential desserts to tide over your tastebuds. 

Wendy's Frosty might not be real ice cream, but that doesn't matter where nutritional matters are concerned; it's still a goodie bound to rachet up your sweetness intake. A regular-sized chocolate Frosty contains 310 calories total, 9 grams of fat and 41 grams of sugar. Likewise, the vanilla Frosty of equal portion matches these quantities, save for a few meager dips between both flavors. Currently, we can't say for sure what the Thin Mints Frosty's makeup looks like, but it's fair to assume that it probably doesn't stray too far from the evergreen lineup, barring slight boosts in the sugar department. 

Sadly, we can confirm one dietary factor that might throw a wrench in some fans' plans: The soft-serve dish does contain soy, per one of the company reps, so foodies that follow a gluten-free regimen may have to sit this one out. Likely the crushed-up cookies are to blame; we were able to back this up by taking a cursory glimpse of the cookie box sold by the Girl Scouts. 

As chocolate fanatics, we were helpless against dunking our spoons into this variety first. On the surface, it's a chocolate-lover's dream, all the way down to the cookie trail oozing within the cup. The description of the Thin Mints sauce conjured images of hot fudge flooding the ice cream, so imagine our surprise at discovering the coarser cookie core running through it. Rather than a melty sauce, we encountered a minced, crunchy mixture that blended seamlessly into the soft-serve. Neither globby nor gritty, the substance was a kind of milled cookie powder, and the way it merged with the creamy base was quite satisfying to scoop up. Not as amply-stuffed as an Oreo Blizzard from Dairy Queen (and without the tumultuous history to boot), but chock-full of texture regardless. We preferred it that way to the chunks and gobs normally dotting such a treat. 

Besides the rich ribbon of cookie crumbles coating the surface, it basically resembled everything about the soft-serve that churns out every day — a comfort to our tastebuds. Sampling the regular chocolate Frosty on the side, sans fixings, highlighted the similarity. Other participants around us noted the "double-chocolate" taste was spot-on — and we agreed wholeheartedly. 

Full-throttle chocolate is pretty hard to beat, but we weren't ready to write off the milkshake's vanilla counterpart just yet. In our opinion, the minty essence had to work harder to make an impression on the tongue. Presentation-wise, it looked exactly the same. The vanilla was extremely crisp and possessed its airy, creamy sensibility on the palate. With the swirl of mint cookie dust, there was no doubt in our minds how folks with strong sweet-tooths would react to it. But in terms of how the combination was marketed, the cooling sensation fell a little flat. 

True, the rest of the flavors achieved a pleasant balance when sampled together. Certainly the chocolate nibbles contributed to the classic cookies-and-cream profile that's so popular. It's just that the old-fashioned vanilla, without any additional elements, simply tasted more natural than the doctored-up effort in the collaboration. Clearly there's an audience, judging by how some folks in attendance preferred the vanilla rendition over chocolate. It's still a great sweet treat to ring in the warmer months. We just preferred the original if given choice between the two. 

Akin to the old-fashioned joy of 2024's Orange Dreamsicle Frosty, Thin Mints gave us exactly what we hoped for. Pairing mint and chocolate together can be risky sometimes — it doesn't take much for the flavor to careen into toothpaste territory — but Wendy's homage marries them swimmingly with restraint and subtlety. Surprisingly, the cooling blast of the cookie was most prominent in the chocolate Frosty. Because the minty component was front-and-center, it had the effect of bolstering the cocoa, which tends to tread lighter in potency. Vanilla was an equal contender that we wouldn't pass up in a fit of craving, though shockingly, we found the cookie's spirit seemed to wane slightly. Generally, they lived up to the prospective advertising, and for that, fit the bill for convenient indulging. 

Overall, in an industry undeniably saturated with flashy campaigns, the team-up between both camps was charming to witness. Touching on such a beloved emblem of childhood growth — the Girl Scouts — definitely aligns with the retro underpinnings Wendy's embraces as a brand. Until we're relegated to making homemade dupes for the rest of the year (or picking up Keebler's copycats from the store), grab this Frosty before it's too late. Your local Girl Scout will thank you. (And buy some cookies while you're at it!).