Fiorentina Pastry Boutique, Autunno

It was a hard week, so I'm behind again. Tuesday, I was late out the door, but it didn't really matter because the two local shops I want to visit were both closed already earlier than the online information I had. I had consider going back to Odakyu but decided to keep that as a backup from Wednesday and went down to Fiorentina Pastry Boutique in Roppongi Hills to recover from the previous day. I got their Autunno, which is similar in style to their Estate, which is my favorite from their. I'm not completely sure I remember what was in it, but I certainly something brulée, as their was caramelized chocolate. Also, their was alcohol, I think related to (Western) pear. It was definitely a relative sophisticated cake for adults and that was what I was in mood for, and found it excellent. Note sure that I got the spelling right, but that was closest to what I could recall of the phonetic Japanese at the time.

Pierre Gagnaire, La Panthère Rose

Thursday late afternoon, I ran down to Pierre Gagnaire's shop for a 9th cake, as a detour from the neighborhood running course Roppongi 7 loop, which I just thought I had, but found a flaw (due to allowing the taiyaki place, since they have custard-filled ones now). I took a chance and lost, but it was educational. There were actually only 3 cake types left, one of which is great but I was looking for something new. I went with La Panthère Rose, on the grounds that there is always a panther and the "verte" wasn't that impressive, but that might be more a fault of the variation. This is a mascarpone cheese cake flavored with strawberry, the flavor of the season (ending this month, according to the original plan I saw). I had trouble with the texture of this until the very end. It might have to do with how much gelatin was in it (i.e., too much), or maybe just mascarpone cheese needs to warmed up even longer than whipped cream when taken from the refrigerator, so longer than 5 minutes, according to one authority. I'll try that next time I deal with this kind of cake.

Rue de Passy, Chocolat Pistache

When they didn't have the great cake I wanted for a cake-off two Saturday's back, not to waste the trip at a time with fewer opportunities to get cake, I choose the Chocolat Pistache, on the reasoning that the other best cake I've had from there was this combination. This was a more traditional cake, though, and was maybe cream rather than ganache, so I should have eaten it at a warmer temperature. Actually, this combination is tricky, as while pistachio can accent chocolate, the latter has a strong taste that doesn't benefit from being diluted or give way to other flavors easily, so I didn't really feel like this harmonized the best, though it was still good.

Happily, I did much better on Sunday for a cake-off, which I failed to photograph, apparently. The cake-off was a third round between two cakes from the double-loser's bracket, between Pistache Chocolat from Coffee Parlor Hilltop and Concert from Lenôtre. I learned from Saturday's mistake and let the Pistache Chocolat sit out for 5 minutes from the refrigerator. It was definitely great and the light pistachio and chocolate taste was harmonizing well, though it still lost to the chocolate simplicity of Concert.

While I was at Ginza Mitsukoshi, visited Johan and got a pastry (which used to be my favor pastry source when they were in Shinjuku). Ig to the Kouign Amann. This seems to be the traditional shape, which is not my favorite, but I felt that I was recognizing it's good points finally, as this was excellent.

Pierre Gagnaire, Mousse au Chocolat Rubis et aux Fraises

The last cake of last Thursday was from an exceptional shop that is challenging for a position in the quite exceptional shop group. They've shorted their hours to closing at 19:00, is now it requires a holiday to get there. I've had an excellent ruby chocolate cake from them previously, so I went with the Mousse au Chocolat Rubis et aux Fraises, which I ate after dinner. It was good, and maybe ruby chocolate goes better with strawberries than other forms, but I wasn't feeling that any kind of special harmony was going on.

En Vedette, Tarte Fraise

Thursday, I made the last visit to bring En Vedette up to enough cakes to promote them to the exceptional list. Previous cakes were good enough that were was no chance of them failing to be promoted. Remaining choices of new cakes were 3 strawberry cakes and a unique-looking mont-blanc. Though I'd like to the try the mont-blanc, I figured one of the strawberry cakes deserved a try, so I went with the Tarte Fraise, which is pistachio. I appreciated strawberry and pistachio in a number of cakes, so it was perhaps the safest choice none the less. And it was definitely excellent. The interesting point is perhaps the tart, which was relatively soft for a tart but more like a butter/nut tart than, for example, a dacquoise. Very nice.

Since it was on the way, I tried to do the Takeshita clump of my neighborhood running course, but failed completely to make the correct turn on the revised Jinguumae northwest loop. In the usual spirit of sour grapes, I found one new site for the map (Sweets Paradise [Harajuku]), which nullified the previous loop. Actually, I'm going to have to split the loop to cover more of Shitatake Street (which is I'd actually like to avoid as much as a possible). Maybe next week when I'm running southwest, I'll try the clump with the two new loops again.

No running Friday, as I was busy, but I swung by the the Sadaharu Aoki counter at Isetan (which Sadaharu Aoki himself of signing, but I didn't buy that high level an item), and got a baked sweet: Cake au Chocolat Pistache. It's small, but excellent, as far as baked sweets go, versus fresh cakes. Hoping they'll have more fresh cakes, but I also wouldn't mind trying the matcha version.

Lenôtre: Carré Orange

After a long day of work, caught Lenôtre on their last day at Isetan. Only two fresh cakes left, but one was their specialty, which is great, and the other was the one that I was most interested in, the Carré Orange, which I got. This cake seems to be what you see is what you get, though I wouldn't be surprised if there is something that makes it somewhat granular, like finely chopped coconut, not that I noticed a particular coconut taste. Plenty moist despite not having any hidden cream, jelly, or sauce. I probably wouldn't want this kind of cake a lot, as I like my decadent cakes with chocolate sheets and nuts, but I enjoyed the change and will call this excellent, so the shop remains a challenger to the bottom of the quite exceptional cakes.

Running was neighborhood loops out east, same as last one, and I successfully did the same four counterclockwise, but I revised the largest one to use a path provided by the Mori building to cut the southeast corner.

Michalak, Religieuse

Monday, I was obsessed with the recently revised, than re-revised, then revised again Daikanyama-chou--Ebisunishi--Hachiyama-chou--Nanpeidai-chou--Sakuragaoka-chou--Sarugaku-chou--Shibuya--Uguisudani-chou loop. I'm still a little fuzzy on navigating the stairs at Daikanyama Stn./Dixsept shopping center, but I don't have to be so strict there. However, I noticed "it Coffee" off my course and shifted the course to add it, so Sunday's success was nullified, and I turned too soon after the new chocolate shop, so I failed Monday near the end. I was, however able to do the updated/corrected Shibuya central loop clockwise, so there was progress, and the run was really refreshing until the 10 km mark, when suddenly my hip was tired (this loop might have the most stairs, especially now, at least until I get to the part I split off from the main Akasaka loop).

Cake came on Tuesday, which is also the first day of the month, a good day to go to Isetan. I had the afternoon off, so I sent to Isetan and got two things. JPH's new cake in the lineup is an excellent one I've had before, so I didn't need get cake from them, but Michalak had their Religieuse, which I haven't had and I was two cakes behind on them. Unfortunately, they removed the almost identical Paris-Brest, which I hadn't done a third-round cake-off with yet, but I can wait a year. The other thing I got was a fresh viennoiserie (avoiding the vaguer term "pastry") from Andersen, the Choco Stripe. I had the latter first, before going out for exercise. It was good, but the concept sounds better than the practice, I think, because having the chocolate layered in loses crispness.

The exercise was once again practicing the Daita--Daizawa--Hatagaya--Kamiyama-chou--Kitazawa--Motoyoyogi-chou--Nishihara--Ooyama-chou--Shouto--Tomigaya--Uehara loop. I could go about an hour before I didn't have it memorized correctly. I added a shop with Australian sweets to the loop near Shim-Kitazawa station and shifted the course after that so I go by the Kitazawa Koushindou (a kind of traditional road-side shrine). Near the end, coming south from the northern most point near Hatagaya, I added a site marked Myōdōkai Kyōdan on a plaque, which is a Buddhist society, although the building just looks like a really nice residence. Still, I like this route more than staying on the main road, so I'll keep the change, and keep practicing until the route stabilizes and I learn it.

The Religieuse (which French and English authorities agree is a pastry but is cake for my purposes) really tasted very similar to Paris-Brest, but I prefer the latter. Still, excellent, so I don't begrudge them the variation, other than they timed it to coincide with JPH's introduction of Religieuse, which was announced a month ago. I should say that, though they told me hazelnuts, the recipe they showed me indicated, besides mostly caramel cream, pate almond. The top is whipped cream and a little fudge square.