Early Valentines Day 2-12-16

Since so many restaurants and other businesses are closed on Sunday, we decided to celebrate early. Deb had made reservations at Le Meurice, one of the highest end hotels in Paris, for afternoon tea. In relation to so many of it's other offerings the afternoon tea is a real bargain.  Less than twice the cost of a round of drinks at the bar, you get a selection of small sandwiches, scones, and a tray of sweets along with a pot of tea.  And for only 14 euros more you can add champagne, a steal.
But prior to our tea she also found a musical organ performance at the Oratorio de la Louvre, a 17th century church that hosted the funerals of Louis XIII and Richelieu.  It was taken over by the Revolution and then finally given to the Protestants by Napoleon I in 1811.  So it's now a Protestant church, and it's quite stark inside but it has a very lovely organ.  It was a free concert so it gave us a good excuse to see the inside of the church and hear some good organ music. It delivered on at least one count, the organ is lovely, the music was not quite up to our expectations (there is a reason why some composers are considered minor) comprised of Dutch and Swiss composers from the 16th to 20th century.  Interestingly the 20th century Swiss composer was more melodic than the 16th and 17th century composers.  Oh well, it was still interesting.
After the concert we had a couple hours before our tea reservation, so since we were directly across the street from the Louvre we knew what we needed to do.  So we went in and headed for some of the rooms full of early Mesopotamian art that we either missed or glossed towards the end of the day on earlier visits.
We went through about 5 rooms and saw some really beautiful objects from ancient Susa, Mari, and Persepolis.  There were many small sculptures, jewelry and pottery that were so carefully crafted, that they were breathtaking.  There were also glazed brick walls from Darius' royal capitol at Susa, which are very much like the glazed wall bricks of the Ishtar Gate from Babylon that we saw in Berlin.  We had an enjoyable couple hours viewing before walking over to Le Meurice.
When we walked in they greeted us very warmly, took our name and then our coats before walking us in to our waiting table.  The teas are held in the Le Dali room which is fairly large room with mirrored walls and a painted fabric ceiling, it was named in honor of the artist.  He rented a room for a month every year for around 30 years and so they named it for him.
We ordered and to begin, they brought us each a pot of tea, then followed with a glass of champagne to sip. A short time thereafter they brought out a 3 level tray covered with goodies.  The bottom level had 2 groups of 5 little sandwiches, salmon and caviar, fresh mozzarella and tomato,  grilled tuna on brioche, a rare beef, and foie gras and fig.  The next level was 4 fruit scones along with a cup each of jam, lemon curd, and clotted cream.  The final level was house made mini desserts 2 each of; a bitter chocolate eclair, thick wafer covered with a nut cream filled shell, a lemon meringue, a caramel covered soft cookie, and finally a nut covered madeleine.   I almost forgot to mention that twice during the service a chef

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 came out of the kitchen with a tray of freshly baked and buttered madeleines. Coming around to each table she passed them out, an outstanding touch.  We spent about 3 hours at tea before heading back to the apartment for the evening.