Let’s get one thing straight: Not everything that goes in an oven is a pastry. A brick is not a pastry, no matter how long you bake it. A pastry, in the strict sense, is a dough made from fat, flour, and water, often layered or flaky. Think pie crust, puff pastry, or a danish that makes you want to write poetry.
A cookie, on the other hand, is a drop of sweet, buttery rebellion. It’s a free-form, one-bite wonder. The FDA has no official ruling on this—because they’re too busy arguing about what counts as a “healthy” granola bar. So we’re left to settle this like adults: with logic and a little bit of frosting.
