Friday, 11 January 2013

The French Like Their Tea as Well

"While France is well known for its coffee drinking, afternoon tea has long been a social habit of the upper middle class, famously illustrated, for example, by Marcel Proust's novels."

"French people still favour tea mostly in the afternoon. It is often taken in salons de thé. Tea is generally served with some pastries, including a family of not so sweet ones reserved for tea drinking, like the madeleine and the financier."


“I raised to my lips a spoonful of the cake . . .
a shudder ran through my whole body and I stopped,
intent upon the extraordinary changes that were taking place.”

Marcel Proust talking of madeleine's dipped in tea in "À la recherche du temps perdu".





Read excerpt from "Rememberance of Things Past" here.