Where to eat Escalette de Montpellier in Montpellier: 2 editor picks

A wafer-thin waffle cooked flat in cast-iron moulds over a flame, so light it shatters at the edges. The name comes from the occitan escaleta, and the biscuit is sold in stacks in flavours from orange-flower to anise.

The escalette is documented as a Languedoc recipe going back more than seven centuries, made at home over an open fire in hinged iron moulds of the kind that also produced communion wafers. It disappeared commercially and was revived relatively recently by producers working the same flat cast-iron format rather than the deep Belgian pattern. The result is closer to a brandy snap than to a modern waffle: almost no crumb, a caramelised surface, and a snap that goes soft within a day. It is a market and gift-shop item rather than a bakery one, and it travels badly, which is part of why it stayed local.