Pure gold leaf has no flavor and almost no texture—once it’s in your mouth, it’s gone. Maybe it takes one bite.
But before it goes in your mouth, whatever you’re eating looks amazing. It might be a shimmery sheet draped over ice cream; it might be just one flake set on top of a shiny, rich chocolate dessert. That one flake signals Look, this is some serious chocolate going on. You do not decorate your everyday brownies with gold leaf even if you do use gold leaf at home; you do it for an extra-special dessert. And when you do, the gold against the chocolate looks so beautiful.
