Back in high school French class we must have learned about café au lait. Although most of us weren't (yet) coffee drinkers, the phrase was made up of three easy words, and there was something comforting about those pictures of those big bowls of warmish brown liquid, all sunshine streaming into a Carl Larsson-inspired kitchen nook.
It was on my second trip to France, first time in Paris (not including a one-night stopover the highlight of which was seeing one of the first 747s in operation at Orly), that I discovered there was no café au lait in Paris, at least at the Novotel I called home, the office I was working at that week (they preferred espresso), nor any of the restaurants.
The third trip was with the whole family, and our week was completely café-au-lait-less. It turns out it's something you drink at home on a lazy rainy Saturday morning. Or maybe still in the youth hostels, at least the ones I stayed at in the French part of Switzerland many decades ago. But in Paris. Get used to getting your lattes from a single-press of a button, and enjoy the rest of the city.
1 comment:
My first exposure to café au lait was in the late '80s at the Bohemian Café in the Byward Market - they offered bottomless café au lait. It felt like the height of luxury.
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