Simply cut and serve to your guests, or you can decorate the outside with smaller chocolate macaroons.

But I bet that with her eyes closed, she couldn't taste the difference between chocolate macaroon and bananas Foster.

With one exception: four fragrant ounces of pure gourmandise, the elegant, four-inch chocolate macaroon from La Maison du Chocolat, the chocolate shop just down the street from my apartment.

Soon, Ms. Tambasco will be presenting coffee macaroons with coffee filling and chocolate macaroons with praline in the center, as well as a pistachio-on-pistachio version.

But he also offers a range of all-chocolate pastries that would make a chocoholic dizzy - the chocolate tartlet and chocolate macaroons are especially well done.

For Dr. Hesse, whose favorites include a baptismal cake and chocolate macaroons, food has become the lens through which he looks at Scriptures.

The list avoids heavy hitters in favor of light, fruity dishes, with one exception, the multi-part chocolate dessert that includes chocolate milk, a liquid cake, chocolate macaroons and milk marmalade sauce.

Walk down any Paris street around 4 o'clock and you'll find slim blondes daintily devouring miniature lemon tarts, businessmen biting into thick chocolate macaroons, grandmothers seeking solace in individual blueberry tarts.

Michelin-starred chef Mickey experiments with textures and seasonal flavours to create taste sensations like pan-seared Arctic char with chestnuts, and divine warm chocolate macaroon with raspberry and red pepper coulis.

It also gives suggestions for serving themed teas at home, offers recipes (including one for big, shiny chocolate macaroons like the ones served at Laduree) and lists tea salons, pastry shops, tea stores, chocolatiers and sources for accessories.