Wednesday, February 2, 2011

Coffee??

Yesterday I read a whole chapter in Lebovitz's "The Sweet Life in Paris" about the awful coffee in Paris.  And how to request the dreadful stuff in the proper French manner.  And this struck fear in my heart - after all it is the promise of coffee in the morning that gets me through some of these cold nights of tossing and turning.  All I remember of coffee in Paris is that we brewed our own instant (ugh! but this is what Mitch did when he traveled) in the room  and when we stopped during the day it was very expensive.
So I looked carefully at the photos of our apartment's kitchen, and, yes, there on the far left is what looks like a Mr. Coffee!  But wait!  Lebovitz claims that "the cafes are forced to buy their beans from the same supplier, described as an Auvergnat Mafia."  Does that mean there is no good ground coffee for purchase?  Should we bring our own? - I know someone would definitely want the best Colombian.  Perhaps we should pack coffee instead of those scarves to make us look more Parisian.
But then in a stroke of brilliance I goggled Starbucks and Paris, and, yes, there is a Starbucks Saint Paul just past the metro station.  Now we have a back up!
He also has nothing positive to say about Franprix so I guess we better take that right off our Google map and just shop markets....although in March the pickings may be a bit slim

3 comments:

  1. Well, we can surely bring coffee (I'll make sure we grind it) and Fernando does have that French press that he bought in Edinburgh and the espresso pot he bought in Barcelona...Maybe he'll pick up something in Paris too. I'm not sure if we can absolutely trust David Lebovitz on coffee but even at Starbuck's we'll watch to make sure they are not reusing the coffee grounds. We never had a bad cup of coffee in Spain. Why should it be worse in France? Lebovitz has good things to say about Italian coffee. You don't think we could buy a pound of Illy coffee in the Monoprix? I'm going to check out some other Paris blogs. Maybe we can ask the lady that does Paris Breakfasts if the French coffee is really that bad.

    ReplyDelete
  2. Oh my! I remember that espresso pot Fdo bought in Barcelona, and that wonderful hardware store! And I too have a plastic French press for travel (but it won't make enough for all of us American coffee drinkers). It's hard to believe we can't find some good ground coffee, but that's not what David has to say!

    ReplyDelete
  3. Bring that French press! Now wait a second, why is it called a "French" press if those Frenchies don't know how to make coffee??

    ReplyDelete