Well, not really. I had a brief wild fantasy the other night, of Godzilla Marie stomping around Paris, ripping off rooftops and scooping up people’s meals. Hahaha! Actually, that sounds like a fantastic way to sample this city, only on a smaller and more polite scale.

But I did go to Paris with my friend Meg almost exactly a year ago.

And ate only a fraction of a fraction of Paris. I had high aspirations, reading through Clotilde Dusoulier’s book Clotilde’s Edible Adventures in Paris. That book made my foodie puppy tail wag in excitement.

But it didn’t quite end up that way. It started with an expensive cab ride from the airport to our hotel, three times what it should have cost. The bill was from a limousine service! When I saw the car, it looked like a perfectly normal cab with a perfectly normal cabbie. Meg later mentioned it was a Mercedes. Oops.

So that put a major crimp on our budget for anything the first few days of our trip, until my next paycheck dropped. We ate a lot of Monoprix, bread & cheese, patisserie, and street food. I never went to those places I read about. Oh well, there is always next time!!!! Eeee!!

Because this is a city I will definitely travel back to. Maybe even live in. What is it about Paris? Everyone writes about its clichés and how romantic it is. But the thing about Paris is that it’s simply beautiful.

The women are beautiful. Casually offhand stylish. The men are as stylish, maybe more so. There is something to be said about knowing how to dress. The city itself is beautiful, an old city with nary a skyscraper in sight. The only entertainment I really needed was to meander around and gawk at the ornate buildings.

Or the charming rooftops. Or the manicured gardens.

Meg and I never took the Métro. We walked. And walked. And walked. We hit most of the touristy stuff on foot. We saw the Eiffel Tower and didn’t go up. We saw Notre Dame and didn’t go in. Our hotel was around the corner from the Arc of Triumph, but we never touched it. Though it was certainly lovely lit up at night.

And of course, the food. We did do some dining out, and that was good.

Guy Savoy was right down the street from our boutique hotel. It was like discovering the White House in your backyard. I walked down at night and peeked in. A discreet cave of coveted luxury. A longing twinge ran through me. Guy Savoy is my Tiffany’s. Ridiculously expensive food, but knowing that restaurant just once would be enough.

But even with the cheapest food, it seemed care and thought went into it. We went to Monoprix a lot. It was a grocery take-out store (also a Target-like clothing and toiletries store) with pre-boxed sandwiches, salads, fruit, and bottled drinks. I didn’t see much junk food. Everything was fresh and healthy. Yeah, there were puddings, ice creams, and panna cottas…but even with those, you automatically ate less because the quality was so good.

America is a nation of processed foodstuffs. We grow up with a Big Mac in one fist and a bag of Doritos in the other. Our palates want salt, sugar, and fat in mega-doses. That trifecta obliterates flavor. We get fat. And fatter. Knowing flavor and really savoring it, you don’t fill up on more. The flavor fills you. But you must pay attention to it.

Meg teased me for always eating. There are pictures of me eating in various distinguished spots.

A lemon sorbet in front of a Place de la Concorde fountain. (The fountain statues are enviously pining for it, oui?)

Ladurée macarons on the Seine. (The caramel ones are wonderful.)

We ate hot dogs. French hot dogs are awesome because bread is wrapped AROUND the dog. Crusty french breadiness, then meat. YUM. And of course I had a crêpe. Maybe two. Chocolate and banana.

I made my own petit déjeuner yesterday. It was petit indeed, but it nearly killed me with decadence after a few bites. Here it is:

Mini Croissant French Toast with Bananas & Nutella Chocolate Sauce

Mix together an egg, cream, and some vanilla extract.

Split croissants and brush with mixture on both sides, though not too much.

The end result needs to be crispy, not soggy. Toast under broiler, then flip and re-toast.

In the meantime, melt a square of chocolate with a little cream in a pan. (I used a Valrhona bar. I wanted to be fancy!) Mix in a tablespoon or so of Nutella and add more cream until desired consistency and flavor is reached.

Top croissant with sliced bananas and sauce. Voilà!

I couldn’t finish it.