On my last few trips to Paris I remember seeing a pâtisserie shop called Aux Merveilleux de Fred selling Merveilleux (French for Marvelous), which are cakes made out of meringues sandwiched with whipped cream and covered in chocolate shavings. The desserts looked so pretty but for some reason I never bothered having a taste, which in hindsight I really regret. On the bright side I now have something to look forward to when I return to Paris, right?
Hopefully we'll be able to safely resume international travel in 2022, but until then I'll have to be content with making merveilleux chez moi. I ended up using David Lebovitz's recipe from his book, My Paris Kitchen, because it had received good reviews when I was searching for merveilleux recipes online.
The desserts aren't difficult to make and the steps can be spread out over multiple days, which is what I did, but the process to make the merveilleux can be messy. In particular the part where you fill and coat the meringues with whipped cream. If your cream isn't beaten to a stiffness similar to buttercream I can see easily foresee challenges getting it to stay intact. Next time I'll add more whipped cream in the middle and on top to get the really tall cone shape like the cakes I saw in Paris. Even if your merveilleux aren't shop display worthy don't worry because the final coating of chocolate shavings hides all kinds of imperfections.
Wanting to make as many flavors of merveilleux as possible in one go, I split the filling recipe into thirds and made stracciatella, strawberry and coffee chocolate chip. Based on it's appearance you might think the merveilleux would be really sweet, but in fact it's not. The lightly sweetened whipped cream is a really nice contrast to the crispy meringue cookie. Delicieux! An added bonus is that the cakes are 100% gluten-free which makes them perfect for anyone with a wheat intolerance. Until I can hop of a plane to the city of lights I'll be happy enjoying my homemade merveilleux.
