Merendina

Merendina is the lunchbox-style soft cake filled with chocolate that sits between a snack cake and a small dessert. By our assessment, its strength is exactly that soft, neat format: it is easy to eat, has a familiar sweet centre, and does not ask for a knife or much ceremony. The trade-off is the usual one for this kind of cake, because the sponge can feel plain once the chocolate filling is gone and it is rarely a serious pastry. In practice it is the sort of wrapped sweet that gets opened quickly and finished just as quickly. Compared with dry biscuits, it is softer and more indulgent; compared with proper bakery cake, it is simpler and more industrial. The catalogue’s description matches that middle ground. Merendina is for people who want a small filled cake rather than a full slice of cake, and the ceiling is set by its snack size.