Cake-off: Éclat des Jours's Rhum Raisin over Hidemi Sugino's Améthyste

Rain front coming through, but it slowed down, so I could get out before it. I'm hoping it will speed up again, so I can go out tomorrow afternoon, though there's the next typhoon coming in behind. Ran 15+ km total at 9+ km/h average, first to Éclat des Jours, which was a little late opening (there were a few people waiting ahead of me, but not more than there were staff inside, so no problem) to get their Rhum Raisin, and then to Hidemi Sugino, where I arrived 15 min before opening and got in a long line. Lots of foreigners, like me, as the place is famous and maybe some of them don't know better (like I should have) than come here on a Saturday morning. It took me 1 hour to get cake, but maybe I could have gotten it faster if I had come earlier (to get at the front of the line) or later (to come after the line had diminished, though it did not seem to have at 11:45). I should have waited and done this when I had a day off, but I was hoping for only a 30 min wait. Well, it will probably be a couple years before I need to go back, and I won't be in such a hurry that I can't wait to do it during a personal holiday.

As you might guess from the above, Rhum Raisin won the cake-off. Améthyste was not bad but I wasn't feeling the greatness (maybe it was too cold) and the Rhum Raisin still was a nice flavor with a creaminess that I'm not sure I've had elsewhere. Haven't decided yet when I'll try to go for the follow-up cake. I had about run through the whole line-up of cakes available at the end of the day when I stopped making them a weekly thing, but I can get something other than fresh cake as follow-up for a cake-off if I don't find anything new when I go.