I have always found crazy to pay £2.50 for a latte….

Sometimes I feel like I am in my home town on the ‘Côte d’Azur’ where traders double their prices in July and August because tourists arrive. So I feel a bit like a tourist except that I am not one.

If tourists are considered wealthy for restaurateurs in Nice, they are not stupid. That’s why tourists are coming less and less in Nice and Cannes… Because they are not stupid.

For a few years, traders are complaining that the business is not good… And they wonder why ? If they would be more considerate and think that also French local people are here in July and August and refuse to pay so much for average dishes, it would be different and business would still be great.

What upset me most is that they don’t take food seriously, I mean, they don’t really care about the quality of the ingredients, the seasons, they just serve food because it works, that’s it.

Being taken as a tourist doesn’t please me at all and the more I spend time in the food industry, the more I get fussy regarding the choice of restaurants and cafes. There are so many that you can take the freedom of being fussy anyway.

So £2.50 for a latte ? Just to put ground coffee in the percolator and press the button ? It is non-sense for me. Maybe the coffee beans are coming from a lost Colombian land where you can only get the access on foot and where beans are hand-picked one by one ? Or maybe they go to milk a cow every morning to make a special latte ? If that’s the case, I am happy to pay such a price! I am always happy to pay in a nice restaurant as they have the food cost, the time spent on preparation, cooking…

I exaggerate a bit but that’s the feeling I have sometimes when I pay my coffee. The irony is that most of coffee shops who go for such prices are not fairtrade. If they are fairtrade but still have a business to run and put their prices up, it’s understandable for me.  But that’s the opposite, most of  the time, cafes who are fairtrade are the less expensive. I don’t find it very logical, or you have to explain me. Maybe I should read more about fairtrade business. Still I don’t find it logical…

That was not the long introduction of a tiramisu with pure Colombian coffee’s recipe at all but just the feeling I had this afternoon when I went down the road in a new coffee shop, actually the one who offered to ‘lend’ me her cakes last time when I went there for my photo shoot. You remember my post about the grapefruit and pepper meringue tartlets ? That’s the one… I am not spitefull, that’s all.

When I paid my tea (a basic mug of hot water with a Tesco’s tea bag) £1.80 and not even a biscuit to go with, I couldn’t help but have that feeeling again.

I went home, made myself another tea. I had pears left so to go with my tea I baked those tartlets:

Shortcrust pastry (for 1 tart baking tin or around 8 tartlets) :

-220g flour

-120g icing sugar

-90g butter

-1 pinch of salt

-1 tsp of baking powder

-1 egg

Mix the flour, icing sugar, butter, salt and baking powder all together and stop when you have a fine sandy texture. Add the egg, form a ball, cover it with cling film and leave it in the fridge for at least 1h.

Then spread your dough the size you want and have fun ! I put lemon curd as I made some a few days ago and pears on the top. Now it is the great spring season, you can put whisked cream and strawberries, or cream and peaches or just fresh fruits with sprinkled icing sugar. Don’t forget to butter your mould and c’est tout ! (That’s it !)