In the historic and trendy Marais neighborhood of Paris, pâtissier, Anais, prepares sinfully sweet cakes known as Merveilleux. The Merveilleux is made of layers of croquant meringue and lightly sweetened whipped cream. It comes in six flavors: Milk chocolate, white chocolate, coffee, speculoos, praline, cherry, and caramel, with a variety of coatings, from chocolate flakes to caramelized hazelnuts.

People often line up to buy these cakes which crumble as you bite into them. I’m not a ‘foodie’ so I would struggle to come up with some flowery description of how they taste, but a word I’ve seen a few food blogs use in relation to the Merveilleux is ‘decadent.’ I’m not sure I’d go that far, but it’s better than describing it as a “sugar bomb,” which is how I described it to my friend Jeffrey. Like I said, I’m no foodie.

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Stand outside this Patisserie using Google street view.