From Paris with love

I worked hard on my skat in the City of Light. If not for the Velib bicycles on which I shot around for miles and miles, and the 10 p.m. sunsets that allowed me to squeeze an extra two hours of walking into my days, I would return to New York a blob.

Here’s a tally of the damage:

Chocolate bonbons: 15 — Varying degrees of richness and outrageousness, including bite-sized pavé´s from Michel Chaudun and a chocolate bar-sized caramel buche from the gorgeous Jean-Paul Hévin.

Macaroons: 8.5 — A new indulgence for me, I sampled chocolate, praline, vanilla, pistachio, rose, fleur de sel, mango coriander and 1.5 raspberries (Patisserie Sadaharu Aoki’s was too jammy for me). The best? La Duree’s vanilla, Jean-Paul Hévin’s mango coriander and Pierre Hevin’s rose.

Croissants: 7 — 2 plain, 2 almond, 3 pain au chocolat. My morning staple.

Chocolate cakes: 2 — Green tea Bamboo from Patisserie Sadaharu Aoki and the caramel Plenitude Individual from Pierre Hermé. I should have sat down to more of these indulgences.

And 1 of each of the following: chocolate éclair, chocolate chip drop, lemon pastry, cherry cake, pear-apricot-pistachio tart, and a Nutella & banana crepe.

Pas mal. Kind of gross, but, trust me, it could have been a lot more ridiculous.