Maison Angelina.  It is a Rue de Rivoli institution.  Designed in the Belle Époque style, once frequented by Marcel Proust, famous for its Mont Blanc dessert and hot chocolate, it would be rude to visit Paris and not drop by at some stage.  Me and however many other hundreds of thousands of tourists each year.

Actually, I chose a good time to visit.  There was a queue on the pavement outside, but not a long queue.  Ten minutes, not longer, and I am being asked how many I require a table for, and I am whisked inside and found a seat in an upstairs dining room.

I was presented with a menu.  Menu?  Pah!  I already knew exactly what I wanted.  A cup of hot chocolate and a Mont Blanc.  Who went to Angelina’s and had anything different?

Well, the young American couple seated at the table next to me.  They appeared to be ordering a full breakfast.  Eggs Benedict, viennoiseries, fresh fruit juice, the works.  I was already rather anxiously checking my bank account to make sure I could pay for my own modest order; I hated to imagine how much their meal totalled.

My hot chocolate and dessert duly arrived: immaculately served; exquisitely presented; beautifully displayed. The taste?  Do you know what?  Call me a Philistine.  The hot chocolate was just too thick and rich for me.  I preferred my instant Nesquik made from a packet back home.  Didn’t stop me draining my cup, mind.  But I rated the aesthetic experience rather more highly than I did the culinary one.

The young American couple’s order arrived at the same time as mine.  I found them a fascinating character study.  They had been cooly frosty with each other, barely exchanging a word.  Of their opulent, historic surroundings, they appeared utterly unmoved.  Their food?  The young man took a couple of mouthfuls of his eggs, and then pushed his plate away as though replete.  My once in a lifetime visit was clearly their everyday; my mortgage their small change.  I can only manage a level of such studied indifference and restraint over the Premier Inn eat-as-much-as-you-like breakfast buffet, and even that has required years of self-discipline and training.

© E. C. Glendenny

E. C. Glendenny likes to get value for her money.