Although one day isn't enough time to spend in many of the cities I visit, it's definitely a good start. And if you choose a day-trip destination that has a good or growing specialty coffee scene, you can combine sight-seeing with coffee-shop hopping.

September is perhaps my favourite month to visit Paris but although I hope for russet- and orange-hued leaves and bright, sunny days, the weather gods don't always smile on me. Sometimes, however, they do and when I visited my friends last month, it was gloriously sunny and unseasonably warm; perfect conditions for a long-weekend trip.


I've visited Paris an average of two or three times a year since I was small, which means I don't have to rush around trying to visit all the prime tourist sights. But Paris's city centre is relatively small and best explored on foot, which means I tend to spend a lot of my time there strolling around the grand Haussmannian boulevards and characterful side streets. I also usually spend time exploring the city's speciality coffee scene, and you can read about the coffee shops I visited in this post. Read on for some of the other things I got up to during my recent visit.

FOOD & DRINK
On Friday night, we dined at eels, chef Adrien Ferrand's new restaurant on rue d'Hauteville in the hip 10th arrondissement. The small restaurant, with its pared-back, rustic décor and welcoming staff, was a lovely place to spend the evening. We all opted for the €56 tasting menu, which included two starter courses, two mains and a pudding. As a formerly picky eater, I am sometimes nervous about tasting menus, but more often than not, I end up trying and loving dishes that I wouldn't otherwise have ordered. The titular smoked eels, accompanied with hazelnut, liquorice and raw apple, was a prime example of this. Each subsequent course involved impeccably cooked classic French dishes with Japanese twists. We also tried: marinated tuna with a tomato marmalade, ginger and ponzu; beautifully cooked hake with orzo and bonito jus; shoulder of lamb with aubergine caviar; and one of the most light, crisp and delicious mille-feuilles I've ever eaten. The service was a little slow (we arrived at 9 pm and finished after midnight) but the food was well worth the wait. Note: you'll probably need to book in advance.


We went to the newly opened Paris branch of the Hoxton Hotel on rue du Sentier on a couple of occasions. We took in a pre-dinner aperitif at Jacques' Bar, an elegant, Moroccan-themed hideaway, on Friday night. As we were a little short on time, we both selected the same drink from the short but well-thought-out list, the Jacques Snapper (a spicy, gin-based twist on a Bloody Mary), which was very well mixed. Curiously, before we ordered, the waiter came over to dispense hand sanitiser into our hands from an ornamental silver vessel.


The following day, after discovering that there was a four-hour wait at Biglove (a popular — potentially overhyped — Marais brunch spot), we went back to the Hoxton and had brunch at the ground-floor Rivié restaurant. Actually, the main restaurant was full (there was a big group there) so we ate in the stylish lobby. The lunch menu included both French classics and more American-brunch-style dishes. The cheeseburger (€15) was excellent — perfectly à point (medium rare) — although perhaps a little cynically priced, especially as we weren't eating in the restaurant proper.


We experienced similar brunch anxiety on Sunday. A lot of the most interesting brunch spots don't take booking and thus require a long wait unless you arrive before 10 am (too early for a proper brunch, in my view). The Marais was very busy so we decided to head further north and secured a table at NOLA, one of two lovely Southern US comfort food restaurants, collectively known as Two Stories, located right alongside the Canal Saint Martin. Our table overlooked the canal and with live piano and an elegant but relaxed setting, we really enjoyed our meal. I had an omelette with Cajun pork, new potatoes and mature cheddar (€14), which was delicious. Had I not already fulfilled my burger quotient for the weekend, I would have gone for the brunch burger, served with bacon jam, cheddar and a fried egg in a pretzel bun (€16).



My trips to Paris are never complete without an eclair (or two) and this time, I enjoyed a wonderfully decadent salted caramel eclair from Ernest & Valentin — there's a branch on rue Réamur, which was located conveniently close to my friends' apartment. On previous trips, I've also indulged at Pain Pain on rue des Martyrs, L'Éclair de Génie in the Marais and Patisserie Yann Couvreur in the 10th arrondissement.


THINGS TO DO, PLACES TO GO...
When I arrived at Gare du Nord on Friday afternoon, I had a few hours to spare before I met my friends and my initial plan was to go to KB CaféShop for coffee. On the way, though, I caught a glimpse of the Sacré Cœur basilica between two buildings and decided that the late afternoon sunshine was too good to waste. I ended up climbing up to the basilica, enjoying the great views over Paris. I was not alone: there was barely a free step as Parisians and visitors came out to enjoy the warm weather.




I then wandered around the pretty, cobbled streets of Montmartre, enjoying the views and the street scenes.



Rue des Martyrs is one of my favourite streets in Paris — almost every building houses an independent shop or café, with a particularly high representation of gourmet food shops. I popped into Ekyog, focusing on eco-friendly women's fashions, and The Cool Republic, which is good for gifts and homewares.


After an intense session of coffee-shop hopping and brunch on Saturday, we wandered through the Marais (stopping into my favourite Parisian shop, Merci) and down to Jardin du Palais Royal, an attractive, manicured park with plenty of space to sit and to stroll. We made our way to the Grand Palais, where we had tickets for the new Irving Penn exhibition. Penn is most known for his work as a fashion photographer but the exhibition included a diverse range of his work, including portraits, still life and 'debris'. If you are interested in photography, I highly recommend this very well staged exhibition; Penn was a master of his craft.





By the time we left the Grand Palais, golden hour was approaching and we walked down to the river and took a seat at one of the outdoor bars on the Left Bank, just by Pont Alexandre III. Cliché as it may be to sit with a glass of wine on the Seine with an Eiffel Tower as sunset approached, it was a wonderful experience. That night, my friends had concert tickets so I decided to go to see mother!, the new Darren Aronofsky film. I have really enjoyed most of his previous works, especially Black Swan, but I'm not quite sure whether I enjoyed mother! It was interesting, of course, and provocative, disturbing and, for the most part, completely bonkers, but I feel like I would need a second viewing to decide whether or not I think it's a good film. I'm just not sure I want to watch it again. The grand Gaumont cinema near Opéra was a suitably grand place to see the film, and the ticket price — €10.90 — was refreshing after London cinema prices.




After brunch on Sunday, we walked down from Canal Saint Martin, over the river to Saint Germain. I was on a mission to buy a gift at Café de Flore (quelle horreur! I didn't stop for coffee, of course!) and then we met some more friends at Coutume for coffee. We wandered back along rue du Bac, crossed over Pont Royal and then I continued through the buildings that surround the Louvre. There was no time for leaping but I did indulge in a quick selfie. Well, when in Paris...




I then spent a few hours shopping in the Marais, one of my favourite Paris neighbourhoods for shopping. I popped into the BHV, and spent ages browsing the three interconnected homeware stores called Fleux'. I also found a cute accessories store called Maison Clotilde and a Nordic lifestyle boutique called Nordik Market. I had also hoped to visit a cool art- and print-themed concept store called Empreintes, but alas, unlike many stores in the Marais (although just like most other shops in the city), it was closed on Sundays. One for next time!

At the behest of my French friends, who moved into their beautiful Marais apartment a few months ago, I recently returned to Paris for another long weekend. My two previous visits were rainy and cold, but this time, I was treated to glorious sunshine all weekend. I also managed to visit six new-to-me specialty coffee shops — all on the Right Bank — and two favourites from previous trips. I was also interested to see that many of the shops I visited featured guest roasters from outside Paris, so I got to enjoy a mini European coffee tour that took me from Bath to Berlin and on to Copenhagen.

After being pleasantly surprised by Paris's booming speciality coffee scene during my weekend trip last June, I had quite the to-do list to work from when I returned last weekend to stay with my friends. As our agenda for the weekend consisted mainly of eat–shop–caffeinate, I squeezed in visits to seven new-to-me cafés. I have added these to my Paris coffee map, which I created as part of my 2016 Paris coffee guide, where you will find more detailed reviews of Coutume, Télescope, Café Craft and Fragments.



Blackburn Coffee
Blackburn Coffee is a cosy coffee shop in an area of Paris variously defined as Saint Martin, and as Château d'Eau. The name refers to Bobby Blackburn, rather than the northern English city, but the café was so busy when we stopped by for Sunday brunch that I didn't get the chance to ask the friendly baristas for more information about its (possibly fictional) namesake.


Blackburn is currently using coffee from Curve, a roaster based in Margate in the UK, and my cortado was very good indeed. Aeropress- and Chemex-brewed filter coffees are also on the menu, although the staff would probably appreciate it if you didn't order them during the brunch rush. Speaking of brunch, the menu changes regularly and offers French twists on brunch classics. I had a divine œuf cocotte, served with bread for dipping and salad. There was also an avocado toast served with cheese and tuna rillettes.



Blackburn Coffee is located at 52 Rue du Faubourg Saint-Martin in the 10th arrondissement (Métro: Strasbourg–Saint Denis or Jacques Bonsergent). Website. Instagram.

The Broken Arm
We tried to go for brunch at The Broken Arm, a Marais-based fashion boutique with an adjoining café, but it was late, rainy and Paris Fashion Week, which meant that tables for three were as rare as a seat in the front row of a catwalk show. Instead, we got a coffee to go and my piccolo, brewed with a Brazilian–Ethiopian Broken Arm blend, was exceptional — the best I've had in Paris and one of the best I've had in the past year.


We returned later on and managed to score a table and, as we had more time, I decided to try the filter coffee. The Ethiopian single-origin, brewed through the Aeropress, was prepared very well too, and paired nicely with a slice of the chocolate, hazelnut and orange cake, which was also delicious. The food menu changes daily and offers interesting small and large dishes. The décor at The Broken Arm is minimalist, with white walls, wooden tables and attractive, if slightly uncomfortable, chunky wooden chairs. The café is also so close to my friends' new apartment that I will definitely be back before long.


The Broken Arm is located at 12 Rue Perrée in the 3rd arrondissement (Métro: Temple). Website. Instagram.

Fondation Café
Just around the corner from The Broken Arm is the even-tinier Fondation Café, whose paucity of perching posts inside is supplemented by the tables underneath the awning outside. Luckily, we arrived in between rainstorms and could sit at one of the pavement tables. Cheery green coffee cups add pops of colour to the otherwise understated interiors.


The coffee is from Cuillier, a local roaster whose three coffee shops remain on my to-do list. Our couplet of cortados were made with Blend 21, a blend of coffee from Costa Rica, El Salvador and Guatemala, which was smooth and chocolatey and worked nicely with a little milk. There weren't any hand-brewed filter coffees on the menu and only limited food options, but the coffee was very good and in the summer, I'm sure those pavement tables become a hot commodity in this vibrant Marais neighbourhood.


Fondation Café is located at 16 Rue Dupetit-Thouars in the 3rd arrondissement (Métro: Temple). Facebook. Instagram.

KB CaféShop
Less than 15 minutes' walk from Gare du Nord (at my pace, anyway), is KB CaféShop, a wonderful coffee shop and roastery that I hadn't heard of before starting to research this trip. KB (formerly Kooka Boora) has been roasting since 2010, however, and during my visit they were selling retail bags of seven different single-origin coffees — two espresso and five filter — and a retail bag of Cascara. I ended up buying some Kenyan Gaturiri AA beans, which I've been enjoying at home this week brewed through my Aeropress — the juicy blueberry notes come through very clearly.


The décor is very Scandinavian-chic — there is a large, communal table; several smaller, more comfortable seats; and, for more clement days, plenty of benches outside. Although the café was busy when I visited at lunchtime on Friday, I was still able to nab a seat in the corner where I waited for the barista to prepare my piccolo. My coffee, made with a chocolatey Brazilian variety, was excellent and beautifully presented. Unfortunately, I didn't have time for a filter coffee, but they were serving five single-origin coffees at the brew bar, with Aeropress, and V60 and Kalita Wave pourover brew methods available. There are also various pastries, sandwiches and salads on offer.


If you are near Gare du Nord or in the area of Paris that is becoming known as SoPi (south Pigalle), I highly recommend that you head to KB CaféShop for great coffee served by friendly, knowledgeable baristas.


KB CaféShop is located at 53 Avenue Trudaine in the 9th arrondissement (Métro: Anvers). Website. Twitter. Instagram.

Loustic
Colourful Loustic, located on a quiet Marais side street, is the very definition of a cosy café. With its comfortable bench seating along the wall opposite the coffee bar, hexagon-heavy décor and a big selection of coffee and food magazines, Loustic almost feels as though you are having coffee in a coffee-loving friend's living room. We sat at the front, next to the window, not that the rainy Sunday afternoon provided much in the way of natural light.



Its coffee — roasted by Caffenation, based in Antwerp, Belgium — packs a serious punch too. As well as espresso-based drinks, they also serve V60-, Aeropress- and Chemex-brewed filter coffee. We decided to share a Chemex brew, with a clean and fruity Kenyan Kiriaini AA variety (there were three other single-origins available at the brew bar, all from Burundi, but the barista recommended the Kenyan). There were various sweet and savoury treats on offer too.


Loustic is located at 40 Rue Chapon in the 3rd arrondissement (Métro: Rambuteau or Arts et Métiers). Website. Twitter. Instagram.

Radiodays
I know that I overuse the phrase 'petite but perfectly formed' on this blog but it really does apply in the case of Radiodays, a small café a block east of the Canal Saint-Martin. The design is beautiful too and the owner — whom I think was also the lovely, friendly barista with whom I chatted — has clearly put a lot of thought into every detail, from the design (I loved the contrast of the sleek, monochrome Kees van der Westen espresso machine and the colourful tiling) to the food and especially the coffee. The name Radiodays is, of course, a reference to the Woody Allen film of the same name and its eclectic soundtrack.



I had already eaten and didn't sample the delicious-sounding breakfast/brunch menu. Instead, I ordered a cortado, which was very good. Currently, they are using Tim Wendelboe coffee, but they like to mix things up. You can buy retail bags of coffee beans too. Radiodays is a real hidden gem and I was very grateful to baristas at Ten Belles (see below) who told me about it.


Radiodays is located at 15 Rue Alibert in the 10th arrondissement (Métro: Goncourt). Website. Twitter. Instagram.

Ten Belles
Last, but certainly not least, on this list is Ten Belles, just around the corner from Radiodays on Rue de la Grange aux Belles. You know you've arrived when you spot the colourful stools and pavement garden outside the storefront. I arrived late on a Friday afternoon and it was fairly quiet, although the tables must fill up very quickly during busy times. As well as the tables opposite the coffee bar, there is a mezzanine level with more seating and, of course, if the weather is nice, you can sit outside and enjoy the Canal Saint-Martin people-watching possibilities.


I got talking to the two lovely baristas — Quentin and Jules — after enquiring whether they served V60- or Aeropress-brewed coffee as well as French press. They didn't and when I explained that French press isn't my favourite brew method because I prefer cleaner tastes, they suggested I try the Yirgacheffe batch brew they had just whipped up. I'm normally something of a batch-brew skeptic, but the guys persuaded me to give it a go, but I also ordered a cortado just in case (at which point Jules asked whether I worked in coffee). The cortado, a single-origin San Jacinto coffee from Guatemala, was very good but — oh ye of little faith — the filter coffee was even better; a clean but flavoursome brew. The coffee is from Belleville, a roastery based just down the road, which is still on my to-do list.


Ten Belles was a lovely place to sit and plan the rest of my afternoon's activities and Quentin and Jules were both incredibly friendly, offering up various other coffee and food recommendations for me. The café is well worth the trip over the canal.

Ten Belles is located at 10 Rue de la Grange aux Belles in the 10th arrondissement (Métro: Jacques Bonsergent). Website. Twitter. Instagram.

When I booked Eurostar tickets to stay with my friends in Paris last weekend, I didn't know that it would be the sixth city and fifth country I would be visiting in just over five weeks (see also: Cologne, Barcelona, New York, Boston and Padua, or just my travel section). Although my 8:31 am train from St Pancras on Friday wasn't prohibitively early, I was rather sleepy on the journey, especially given that the lengthy queues at security at St Pancras meant that I couldn't get a much-needed second coffee (not that there is anything decent on offer after security). All of this tiredness was soon forgotten when I arrived at Gare du Nord just before noon and stepped out into the Paris sunshine.


I should have made the most of the sun because the torrential rain set in on Friday evening and didn't stop until I began to head back to Gare du Nord on Sunday evening (c'est la vie). My first priority was more coffee and luckily, there is an excellent coffee shop and roastery called KB Cafeshop just ten minutes' walk from the station. As usual, I will be doing a separate blog post about my latest efforts to find good coffee in Paris. After dropping off my tote bag at my friend's office, I went for lunch at Professore, one of my favourite Paris restaurants. The set lunch is just €15 for two courses, and I started with a plate of mortadella, followed by tortellini in what was essentially cream. I've been for dinner at Professore and it is often busy and quite loud, although still fun, but at lunchtime, it's quieter and easier to get a table. Don't miss the loos hidden behind a fake bookcase...


Although the sun had gone, it wasn't yet raining so I decided to walk up to Sacré Cœur, via rue des Martyrs, a lovely street that has dozens of great speciality food shops. I picked up a pistachio éclair from a pâtisserie called Pain Pain, and continued to climb up through the streets of Montmartre until I got to the steps that lead to Sacré Cœur. I definitely earned the view at the top — and the éclair!




I spent the rest of the afternoon visiting a couple of speciality coffee shops near Canal Saint-Martin and then did a bit of window shopping. Pop Market on rue Bichat is great for gifts and homewares, while back on the west side of the canal, rue Oberkampf has plenty of small boutiques and food shops — the stretch between boulevard Voltaire and boulevard des Filles du Calvaire is particularly nice. Just around the corner, on boulevard des Filles du Calvaire itself, Sœur sells chic clothing basics, and one block south is the wonderful concept store that is Merci. I spent about 45 minutes browsing the stationery, homewares and clothing at the latter, before wandering further into the Marais. Enograph, on rue de Turenne, has great posters and travel-themed gifts.






After meeting my friends at their new apartment in the Marais, we all went for an aperitif at Candelaria, a taqueria with a prohibition-style cocktail bar hidden downstairs, on rue de Saintonge. We stayed for a couple of drinks — I had the tart and almost healthy (lime? Coriander? Cucumber? Well, and tequila...) guêpe verte, which was great. We then went for an epic meat feast of a dinner at Floyd's on rue d'Enghien in the 10th arrondissement. One of my friends and I shared an amazing (and huge) prime rib, served bleu (when in France...) and served with barbecue sauce, cheesy croquettes and other things I probably didn't get to. I also managed to find room for one of my other friend's ribs. Yum. Oh, and the double-barrelled Old Fashioneds were very on-point too.



Saturday (and indeed Sunday) followed the same pattern: coffee–shopping–food and repeat. We left my friends' current apartment in Saint-Germain quite late and by the time we'd dropped a few things off at their new place, it was already well into the brunching hour, and finding a table for three was tough. We decided to go to Paris New York, a fun burger joint on rue Perrée. The décor, with its pink-and-turquoise accents and faux booths, was a modern (and Instagrammable) take on the classic diner, and the burgers (and the chocolate and peanut butter milkshake I had) were excellent.


We spent some time shopping in Le BHV's newly revamped Marais store; I picked up some gorgeous espresso cup from the extensive and tempting kitchen department, but there are great selections of clothing, accessories, stationery and gifts too. Better still was Fleux', a series of three homeware shops on rue Sainte-Croix de la Bretonnerie. As well as home accessories, kitchenwares and gifts, they have some gorgeous, modern furniture, which made me begin to question my Eurostar baggage allowance.


We planned to walk back to Saint-Germain, but just as we left the final coffee shop of the afternoon, the heavens opened again, so we Ubered over to Le Bon Marché. There was a cool art exhibit ('Where Are We Going?' by Chiharu Shiota) in the lobby and central atrium, including the ultimate cats' cradle. Exercising extreme restraint, I managed not to buy anything from the home section of Le Bon Marché or from Conran, which is just next door.



For dinner, we went to Café Trama, a sleek, modern bistro quite close to Le Bon Marché on rue du Cherche-Midi. With its simple but elegant décor and lively ambiance, it was a great spot for a fun dinner with friends. The food was great too, particularly my scallops, which were beautifully cooked, and the salted caramel rice pudding I had for dessert.



Although the rain stopped overnight, it came back with a vengeance and so after nipping out to get some pastries and bread for a quick breakfast at home, we ended up taking an Uber back to the Marais for more coffee and shopping fun. I popped into the Uniqlo store on rue des Francs Bourgeois which is in a particularly beautiful building, but, much as I normally like to wander around on foot when I'm in Paris, the inclement weather drove us to seek shelter in a series of coffee shops.


As I mentioned, the sun came out just as I started to walk back to Gare du Nord. Eurostar had already warned me by text and email that my train was going to be busy and that I should get to the station at least an hour early. When I arrived, just before 3 pm, the station was insanely busy and I soon found out that overhead power failures meant that there were severe Eurostar delays. To add insult to injury, the torrential rain soon returned and began to leak into the area of the station where we were queuing (thankfully, I had travelled light, as usual, and only had my Longchamp tote with me).



In the end, we got back to London just over an hour late, which wasn't too bad in the circumstances (and meant I could get a partial refund); as always, the Eurostar staff were professional and courteous, in the face of hundreds of grumpy travellers. The journey itself was fine (exhausted from all the walking and eating, I dozed for most of it), although it was strange to be able to arrive home and put away my passport, knowing that I won't be using it again for six whole weeks. I'm sure my feet will be itchy before too long.