Mocha Monday

 

 

Paris runs on coffee... One espresso at a time.

  

Mocha Monday

 

 

If coffee be the food of love… alors, deux express.

Mocha Monday

Expresso yourself... One macaron at a time.

 

Mocha Monday

 

View from a table.

 

Above: a café noisette (strong espresso w/its small pitcher of hot milk); an espresso

 

***

 

In France, strong black espresso is the preferred coffee after lunch or dinner and a café crème is the coffee choice of the morning. Order a café in France and you will get an espresso. Order an espresso and, while the waiter will understand, in French it’s a café express. The noisette is an express with a nice drop of milk. Sometimes I order an express with hot milk (it won’t be cream) on the side to add as I like, and it’s still considered a café noisette. In Spain the café noisette is a cortado, and while it's starting to appear under the Italian name macchiato - an excuse to make it more expensive - a café noisette should only cost slightly more than an espresso. - BPJ

 

 

Mocha Monday

 

A frothy café crème, an espresso and chaussons aux pommes pastries start the week.

Mocha Monday

 

An espresso and café crème from a back street coffee shop behind Place Clichy.

Mocha Monday

An espresso with a butter cookie caps off an October evening.

 

Espresso and Proust

 

 

A Paris cliché.

 

Mocha Monday

 An espresso balanced atop a café noisette.

 

Mocha Monday

An expresso of happiness.

*** 

 - Le bon crée du bonheur -

 

Mocha Monday

Waking up in the French countryside to an espresso and a foamy café au lait.

 

Mocha Monday

 

Espressos, tea and a neighborhood flea market on a weekend morning.

***

 - Happy Fête du Travail -

 

 

  

 

Mocha Monday

 

 

A coffee tasting.

 

On this day:

 

- Jamaican Blue Mountain

- Haitian 

 

Malongo Atelier Barista

50 rue Saint-André des Arts 75006

Mocha Monday

Two espressos and un café noisette.

The break

An espresso and smoke before getting back to work.

 

Café to go

 

 ***

 

All over Paris coffee lovers who've been cut off from their local cafés can be spotted meandering semi-conscious in search of a decent cup. But it's not just coffee they're craving, otherwise they would stay home and brew their own. No, these are the displaced, whose cafés were abruptly shuttered, thus cruelly shutting down a lifestyle, a French lifestyle, of savoring time, with coffee as the backdrop.  

 

But thankfully, with each confinement many cafés, boulangeries, pâtisseries and small shops that weren't in the business of selling drinks-to-go have risen to the task. No one is complaining about the once annoying noisiness of espresso machines, now a welcome sound. Or pointing at tourists carrying drinks while walking around, until now a very un-French habitude.

 

Parisians are finding these stop-and-go places set up to sell coffee their sole reprieve. Sometimes there will be pastries, sandwiches and crêpes. And if they happen to live in a neighborhood where many know each other, such as Montmartre, these quick coffee stops will provide a welcome excuse to speed socialize and catch up on local gossip - which makes taking a walk something to look forward to. - BPJ

 

Above: a coffee roaster shop makes use of its burlap coffee bags to show they now have coffee to go

 

Below: freezing weather doesn't deter this man in flip flops, T-shirt, and shorts; a café-turned-hot-drinks-street-food vendor w/plenty of hand gel on hand on a side table

 

Note:

 The latest curfew begins each evening at 6 p.m. and ends at 6 a.m.

(exceptions: if you have a dog to walk, a signed attestation to justify why you are out. If nature calls toilettes will be off limits - however a need to step outside for a smoke isn't.

 

  

  

 

Champagne on the side

At a local café a waiter serves up an espresso, dessert du jour, and champagne.

Carpe diem

An expresso, a café crème and to share, a luscious Saint Honoré pastry.

***
  
"The ant had wasted its life and its beauty hoarding for winter only to discover a world of beautiful, carefree grasshoppers." 😱 - Coffee partner and local philosopher J. S.

Morning meeting

A round of expressos taken standing before parting for the day.

 

Update 2021: 3 years later standing and drinking coffee has become the norm

Un café serré SVP

This tiny bit of coffee packs a punch and, in its tiny way, has come to symbolize the Parisian lifestyle.