Cake-off: Éclat des Jours's Cheminée over Lenôtre's Concerto

For a cake-off, started off with a trip out to Éclat des Jours to get the Cheminée. This had two losses to 1 win, so it was held back a year and this was only a fourth-round. I started running (or doing squats, if stuck at a light) and walking in 1 min and 1 min intervals, but saw that wasn't going to make it much farther than other trips, so I switched to 1 min to 2 min after 10 sets and then 1 min to 3 min after another 10 sets. So I could do 30 1 min intervals, which was more than recent, but still not clearly an improvement. For the trip back to Ginza Mitsukoshi to get Lenôtre's Concerto, I walked and then took the train back for lunch, after which I did the cake-off.

Since these are both weaker cakes among the great cakes, it was a less exciting but still nice cake. Both of these are chocolate, but Cheminée has raspberry, as the picture suggests. Actually, I had doubts about it last time, but I wasn't so worried about it this time. The Concerto is mostly similar to many of my favorite mousse cakes from JPH, but the texture wasn't quite working for me, which could be partially my fault, as how one eats a cake has an effect on the texture. I have to go with what I taste, though, and I'm back to thinking that Cheminée  might be my favorite raspberry chocolate cake and deserves the win, whereas I'm having doubts about Concerto, so I'll need to review it carefully next time.

Cake-off: Frédéric Cassel's Fraisier over Éclat des Jours' Cheminée

On the 9th day of GW, I did a cake-off. I missed the window on the seasonal Origines Cacao cake, but Frédéric Cassel still had their Fraisier so I did a third round of cakes that were 1-1. Next in the list was Éclat des Jours' Cheminée, which is conveniently on the same side of town. Usually I would go get the latter first, since it's farther away, but I wanted to double-check Origines Cacao, so I also confirmed Frédéric Cassel (since Ginza 6 does not have bicycle parking) and then decided that I might as well get the Fraisier first, since it also seemed like a more robust cake than the Cheminée anyway. It's warm now. I'm hoping I can recover enough by the time it's hot so that I can at least walk to cake shops and take the train back for cake-offs. In the photo, I was able to turn the less well preserved parts of the Cheminée toward the back. The Fraisier is a milder cake, but suited me today: pistachio cream accented by strawberries (which I don't hate). The Cheminée is a pretty strong fruity chocolate ganache (?), which I certainly like sometimes and still enjoyed today, but I'm not sure that I need to revisit on a yearly basis, so I'm questioning its need to be on the greats list. It's not going to get axed this year, but I am giving Fraisier the win, its second in a row. Now I'm really behind on visiting FC for new cake. I'd choose the chocolate and hazelnut mille-feuille, but it's weekend-only, so the window is closed. Still, I'm much further behind on Sadaharu Aoki, since they introduce new cakes much less frequently, so I'll probably get there first (the seasonal cakes were announced to end with GW, so maybe there will be something new on Tuesday).

Cake-off: Sadaharu Aoki's Noisette Chocolat over Éclat des Jours' Cheminée

I'm way behind blogging. Sunday, I cycled to Éclat des Jours and got the Cheminée, which is perhaps my favorite raspberry cake, though actually it's also chocolate cake. Then I went to Sadaharu Aoki at Isetan and got the Noisette Chocolat for a second-round cake-off before the latter leaves the line-up at the end of the month.

Floto: Blueberry and Almond Tart

Before that, I went out and did some recon, including visiting Floto for the first time, which is a sister store to Bien-être. They mostly don't have cake, being focused on gelato (which I'm not interested in) and baked goods, so I got a blueberry and almond tart. I didn't eat it under the best conditions, but it seemed quite good, so I'm going to say that it was excellent, giving them the benefit of the doubt. Certainly they are good enough for me to shift my course to go by them. Note a very good picture, but mosquitoes were a problem in that (and most) parks.

Cake-off: Noisette Chocolat over Cheminée

For the cake off, both cakes are chocolate, one fruit and one nuts. Predictably, I'm going with the nuts, though as far as I know they are both the best of their type that I've had. Certainly both are rich but have good harmonization between the chocolate and compliment flavor.

Cookie Time: Chocolate Chip Cookie

Just to pack more into this post, Monday I did a short run along with some indoor exercise. It's out of order because I originally planned to go to Nikunohanamasu but changed my mind and went to Takashibiya. Anyway, picking off minor non-cake places on my neighborhood course, I visited Cookie Time near the Harajuku Station and got a chocolate chip cookie. This was an extremely soft cookie, which I suppose is not that unusual, and is fine for a quick calorie fix, but just okay as a treat.

(Sa.) Cake-off: Éclat des Jours' Cheminée over Jean-Paul Hévin's Orly

Unfortunately, I was not fast enough with my cake-offs and JPH's Macaron Chocolat a l'Ancienne seems to have slipped away already. Instead, I switched to their Orly, although I on good authority that this one wasn't going anywhere this year, or at least until Dec. 23. I ran first to Ginza Mitsukoshi just to confirm the loss of the macaron cake. Since Orly is passion fruit and chocolate, I matched it up with Cheminée from Éclat des Jours, which is raspberry and chocolate. For various reasons (e.g., cake, health, and time), I used the train system coming back, except I walked from Otemachi to Ginza underground, which sort of wiped out a lot of those (I could have doubled back to Tokyo Station after getting the Orly, I just wanted to confirm the underground route to Ginza again.

Both cakes were still great a second time and I enjoyed them equally well, so I had to make a decision based on other factors. I'm giving the win to Chiminée on the grounds that pulled out a complicated combination or mousse, coating, and macaron, and also because JPH doesn't extra promotion, it's already the best shop.

I spent the afternoon taking pictures and the evening updating my map and making adjustments based on what I learned (running a course at night is one thing, but walking around in the day trying to find the sights that supposedly determine the course is another, and both are important).

Éclat des Jours: Cheminée

My big challenge for midweek was Thursday. After work, I ran to Éclat des Jours, which is 10+ km and requires going through the busy east Tokyo Station area, where there are also a lot of stoplights for major cross streets, so it was 9 km/h going and returning (probably, going was close to 10 km/h, but I missed hitting the "lap" button). It's not too crowded most of the way, though, and it's very easy to navigate, which is good because the Chiminée (540 yen? They gave me the wrong receipt), if "n" is the missing letter in what I actually wrote down when there, was great. It's main feature is raspberry ganache, I think surrounded by milk chocolate mousse, then raspberry sauce and a macaron on top. It's just sophisticated enough but covers the basics (getting the balance right between raspberry and chocolate is nontrivial). Also, it traveled 10+ km and still looks good, so it was well constructed and well packed.

Friday, I just did a little running for grocery shopping and got Flute Ancienne from Paul, which was way more calories than any cake (at least with butter), which I'll try to use up in a 30 km run tomorrow. It was excellent bread.