I've been to French cafés where the waiter places a small basket of croissants on the table and charges customers for the ones they eat. If you took your own croissant into a café, the waiter might assume it was one of theirs and charge you for it - and that would teach you not to be such a cheapskate.

Is this a money saving thing or is it a I want a good croissant from the bakery thing? If you can afford the airfare to get to France I am sure you can shell out for a pastry in a cafe with your coffee. Come on this is a bit ridicilious. Does your local starbucls, coffee shop etc let your bring your own food? It's an insult to the cafe and they probably buy them form the same bakery anyway. It's more expensive in a cafe as you are paying for the overhead i.e. premises, salaries of staff, tax and insurance. Don't do it.

I'd like to make a precision.
When I called "la Concorde" (well done Dick ;-) )I asked if they served pastries in the morning, as it is a brasserie, I imagined we could eat and drink on the premises. As the waiter told me the pastries wouldn't be ready before lunch I asked him if we could buy them from a pastry shop and take them. We didn't buy any croissant from outside, only pastries (just a pain aux raisins but they didn't serve them anyway.
It was the 1st time I did that but it was for a good reason wasn't it? (I wouldn't dare doing it by myself)
It would have been different if we could have got there in the afternoon...
When Dick comes back to Dijon, we'll surely go back there for tea time and taste all their proper pastries!

If the flat hadn't been booked I would have taken everybody there to make our own tea and coffee of course!

Dick I thought you were going to write another trip report! ;-)
Mimi, I've already put a link to Dick's posting a bit earlier (with inside a link to my pictures)
here they are again :
http://www.fodors.com/forums/threads...p;tid=34686300

http://82.235.93.13/jacquin/pastry_t..._boat_trip.htm
(still don't get why there are figures instead of myhomeindijon in the address..)

bonne journée et bon café!:-d
corinne

Charles,

Delightful string. Looking forward to your next drole query.

Despite the shock and horror expressed by some. I agree with several posters that the correct answer is "it depends."

Generally it's not a problem if the café doesn't serve food, or doesn't serve pastries at breakfast. You could always ask if it is ok.

Cato: You are telling me there are croissants that don't come from a "bakery" that are better than those which do? Are those which are eaten by opera and hotel snobs or what?

I think the underlying theme here is one that has me a little nonplussed. Someone spends at least $700 (with ground fees) per person to get there, €100 or more on a hotel room, and other fees for museums, meals, and whatnot. Then he or she tries to save €1 or 2 by smuggling croissants into a cafe that must make a profit to continue to provide its service.

Sounds like my first trip when, in Salzburg, I would get bread and meat at a shop, and then eat with the laborers at a cafe which allowed people to order only beer and then sit outside to eat and drink.

The odd part is that I was more accepted by those guys than I was elsewhere.
My German was poor, but they were curious and would actually talk to me.
I think the fact that I offered them American cigarettes helped. (Showing an ancient date there folks.)

Nor would I ever ask for a doggy bag.
So declassé

mimosa are you French? the Frenchs never ask for a doggy bag...(plates not full enough so they don't leave anything ;-) )

I do remember reading some prior threads where quite a few people said they did this in Paris, so perhaps that's what Charles read. They were similar to this thread, some did, some didn't, many said "it depends".

I'm in the camp with Louis, it depends. I know I have been frequenting some different kinds of cafes than some of the posts on here because I have been in some, as I said, where this wasn't that outrageous a concept. Cheaper places, more working class, and ones that didn't have a wide selection of pastries. I have never been in a cafe where a waiter brings over a basket of croissants, unasked, and charges you for them. I have also been in some where the croissants definitely were not that fresh and were not from the best bakery--you can't make the blanket statement as someone did on here that all cafes buy croissants from the best bakeries (I've also never had one served with butter, but don't care about that as they are about half butter to begin with). Also, as I said, the places I go for coffee have never had anything other than plain croissants--no pain au chocolat even, no other kind of pastries, no croissants aux amandes.

Some places with outdoors tables are not more expensive and coveted, either, although I understand why someone said that -- some are places where some people sit who haven't even bought anything at the establishment, as if it were a park. There are several of these kind of places on the Champs-Elysees for one place -- Brioche Doree there is like that. There is a very large area out on the sidewalk where any passerby can sit, and often does.

It is sort of a point that it really isn't any different to the cafe if you sit there and don't eat anything, versus eating your own croissant, if in both cases you would have bought the same thing -- a cup of coffee. However, this could be carried to opposite extremes where someone would bring their own lunch from a takeout place and then just buy a drink. I think some other folks on here have asked if they can bring their own wine to a restaurant (usually no, only places without a license usually allow that). However, there are lots of folks who just sit at cafes in the morning with coffee -- I am one of them.

well, I think Charles gets the idea that this is not, in general, the thing to do.

Actually GeoffHamer, if I were to follow the scenario you propose, wouldn't I replace the croissants I ate from their basket with the ones I'd brought in from outside, so making the staff - technically - none the wiser ? Since the basket of croissant still had same number of crossiants after as before ? Non ?

Just to add another perspective to this discussion, it is not only Americans who act boorish.

Many years ago we spent a winter in Spain in an apartment in a village on the Costa Blanca. Things are pretty dead in the Winter, and we became quite friendly with the folks who ran businesses in the town (Calpe).

One of their pet peeves were the French, whom the shop keepers considered terminally cheap. Families would come, camp out, and "buy nothing but milk". What infuratied the folks who ran the seaside restaurants were the French families who would descend on the outdoor tables, unpack their baskets, and proceed to spend the day monopolizing the tables, eating the food and drink they had brought, and never even buying a cup of coffee.

Well... if we have to bring our own meals on the aiplanes, have BYOB restaurants, and in Europe our own shopping bags - why not pastries to a cafe? :)) Self-service, LOL

This summer my sisters and I were in Paris. We would buy exquisite pastries fresh from the bakery and buy a coffee at the corner Cafe. The waiter never indicated that this was in any way unusual. We weren't trying to be cheap; just wanted something more than a dried up piece of baguette or plain croissant. We did buy orange juice and coffees so I don't think the Cafe lost out.

Unless you go to Paul, the regular corner Cafe doesn't offer too much variety in baked goods. We did note that other people who didn't look like tourists were doing this as well. We were sitting at an outside table and it was uncrowded.

Dear Christina and others:

I thank you for understanding that I'm trying to understand the local customs, not trying to take advantage or save a few Euros. This is more an example of exploring "When in Rome, do what Romans do" than in "How can I take advantage of an establishment."

While I must admit I was at first taken aback by the instantaneous judgments of people who did not understand the posture of my original post, I do admit that my stance may have been unclear as originally posted.

I am therefore grateful to those of you who are adept at reading between the lines and who assumed no avarice on my part.

Thanks to all of you who shared the intrinsics of your actual experience,

Charles