Jean-Paul Hévin, Kibune

Lacking enough new cakes to keep Jean-Paul Hévin even even with the next lower shops, I've been giving any excellent cakes that come back into the line-up a second chance. This time it was the Kibune, which was an exclusive in Kyoto when I had it before. Top to bottom, this is pistachio nougatine over a matcha mousse that's half the cake, then a griotte cherry flavored biscuit, a little Brazilian cacao chantilly, and then a chocolate (I assume) biscuit base. Seemed great to me this time, certainly not inferior to other great JPH mousse layer cakes. I've supposed I've had a lot more experience with green tea by this point and also found other cherry cakes that I appreciate. So after getting lucky and quickly finding a partner for one great JPH cake for a cake-off, I'm back to having another seasonal cake needing a partner (which is better than the alternative of not needing one). Guess I need to needing to prioritizing shops with the best records among the ones I'm trying to visit.

Lotus, Matcha White Chocolate

The other new cake from last Sunday was a second cake from Lotus, from which I had an excellent apple cheesecake. Selection is limited to things that slice well and probably have good shelf-life. I went for Matcha White Chocolate, knowing it was a long shot. It wasn't bad and lived up to the name that I can call it good, so I'll call this a fine shop and leave it at that.

Jean-Paul Hévin, Matcha Marron

New month, so the verrines are gone (almost: their were still some coffee ones at the side on the 2nd), which I'm not sorry about. Lots a great cakes in the line-up, and an exceptional one that I wouldn't mind having again. Importantly, there is a completely new cake, Matcha Marron, so the second day I got that. Recalling that I've fallen off with the regular Matcha, I wasn't sure how this one was going to be for me. Don't think I've had a matcha-maron pairing before from anywhere, but it totally works. Probably the bitter chocolate mousse and biscuit at the bottom helps. As even my photography shows, the matcha part is extremely light, like chiboust. Nothing else to say about it except that it was a great cake, which I hope stays around for awhile. If I'm lucky, I'll find another great cake to have a cake-off with it (or another cake that's eluded me for years will reappear, but I've been touring their shops, and no such luck this month yet).

Paris S'éveille: Tarte Matcha Mangue

Now I'm almost two weeks behind, so it's not clear when I'll catch up. I've gotten a little head of revising my new neighborhood course map, but mostly I've been wasting time on other obsessions are just exhausted from the heat. Way back on Aug. 1, I stopped in at Paris S'éveille on the way to ABVT (since it was their turn to try to enter the superb shop category, though they have the farthest to go) and happy to get this cake. Actually, it wasn't chance, as I had seen it posted online, so I suspected it was a new cake. The base is holding mango and mango cream, so it has to be pretty moisture resistant, thus it's a pretty hard tart, which it's great for texture but is necessary. The top is matcha, of course, but I forget in what, probably white chocolate, though coconut cream would fit with the theme. Sorry, I can't remember. The important thing is that it was excellent. Their new cakes are all fruity, whereas their classic great cakes are mostly nutty or chocolaty (their most fruity great cake has been out of the lineup for a while), but the new fruity cakes keep improving, so I'm actually looking forward to the next one. Still slightly behind on this one, because they don't have so many cakes and I don't have such a great way to keep up with them, plus they will a lot of cake-offs, so actually I've had more new cakes from them than any other superb shop, and two of those I'm ahead on because they got dropped down from quite superb and only gotten new cakes from cake-off wins for years.

Pierre Gagnaire: Green Tea and White Chocolate Cake

Leading text. Thursday was a holiday, as part of a four-day weekend prepared for the Olympics. I used it to visit Pierre Gagnaire and get their other new cake, Green Tea and White Chocolate Cake, which follows the same literal naming as the other cake; can't say that I mind. In fact, I started the next week's cakes early, but I expected to be busy two days, and did not actually have any cake then. White chocolate seems a much better pairing with matcha than blond chocolate, and this was excellent. There might have been some sort of custard in the middle, or maybe it was just cream. Anyway, excellent cake. It was raining, so I walked there and continued on for a second stop. This actually brings this shop level with quite exceptional shops, as far as new cake count, and it maintained its rating edge, so Lenôtre loses it's place, as expected.

Sadaharu Aoki, Mille-Feuille Mâtcha

The second stop Sunday morning was Sadaharu Aoki, in Marunouchi. It's taken three and a half months to get this year's exclusive cake, Mille-feuille Matcha, so I was happy to get it. The filling is matcha custard. I could find that it was an improvement, nor was it a huge difference, but it's still an excellent mille-feuille. 

Pierre Gagnaire, Green Tea Tart

Last Sunday, I found more cakes than I expected. First, I didn't expect Pierre Gagnaire's bakery and pastry shop in the ANA International Hotel to have any new cakes this month, but they had two among their small line-up, bumping their great chocolate and yuzu mousse cake, though they still had the large version. Everything is also still 20% off. More people over there, though the hotel is not crowded compared to the past. I went with what is easy to guess is the Green Tea Tart. They seem to stick to simple English for the main name; the Japanese description is matcha and blond blond chocolate, which is caramelized white chocolate. Can't say that blond chocolate seems like a good idea to me, even after this excellent tart.

Speaking of matcha, Sadaharu Aoki had another new pastry, and I keep trying them. This time it was Croissant Mâtcha aux Amonde. It was good, but too wet for my tastes in almond croissants. Let me also say, that Blogger updated their editor to some buggy thing hates images (won't let me move them next to text, and trying to makes mousse clicks into backspaces) and labels, which I'm going to have to add after publishing. 

Sadaharu Aoki, Chou au Mâtcha

I'll make an attempt to finally catch up, and start with the picture of the cake so it shows up at the top when I do a search (I give the cake in the post title, but then I have to actually read). I didn't get my second cake of the weekday until Thursday. I ran every day, though.

Tuesday, I ran down to Lattest, a latte shop on Jinguumai Shopping Street. They close at 7 pm, and were closed during most of the emergency. Cookies come from a jar rather than a wrapper, but I don't know the actual source. At 400 yen, not cheap, but certainly big. They also have a pound cake and a muffin. I would say this was excellent, as cookies go, on the hard side, to maintain shape, but not too hard. Either that day or the next day I went on to shop for nuts and garlic and did a long run back with a heavy pack.

Wednesday, I went to the same street and stopped a few doors down at Neko Neko Shokupan, where they were sold out of their signature item, of course, but they had the French toast version. Even that was very soft, softer than bread really should be for French toast, but still good.

Thursday, I went to Isetan, where my plan was to get a cake-off winner cake from PH, or a repeat cake from JPH, but Sadaharu Aoki had a something I couldn't find any record of having had (despite conflicting memories), so I got the Chou au Mâtcha shown above. It like their usual cream puff, not the "Chou Ginza" ones at Mitsukoshi now. This was definitely excellent, with a nice rich custard balanced by the pastry and definitely flavored with powdered green tea. Unless you really had green tea, it's worth a try, and if you really love it, you shouldn't miss it.

I'll mention that on Friday I ran for 2 hours (though not quickly in the heat, humidity, and mask) to do my recently created top sites neighborhood running course from Yotsuya Sta. to Shinjuku Sta. and down as far as Jinguumae 2. I need to not wear those shoes for that long a run again: they're too light and old and my right foot is not so good.

Sadaharu Aoki, Chou Ginza Chocolat Pralin, Matcha, and Saya

Sadaharu Aoki has a counter at Ginza Mitsukoshi through August 25th, so I went there last Sunday. I didn't know they would be there that long, and I was buying a snack for two, so I got three special items: Chou Ginza. I say special, because they are different from their usual variety, not being split open, and they have flavors matching their cakes, except the vanilla, though I suppose they have a vanilla mille-feuille. I got Chuu Ginza Chocolat Pralin, Chuu Ginza Chocolat Matcha, and Chuu Ginza Saya. Unfortunately, not very exciting, though all good, and the shop remains in my top three shops for now. Hopefully the vanilla is better, and hopefully they'll have other new cakes soon, either there or their main shop. Under current conditions, they are just trying to get back on their feet, so I can't blame them for doing what they can.

Cake-off: Pierre Hermé's Tarte Infiniment Vanille over Jean-Paul Hévin's Matcha

The (previous) cake-off of the week was sourced in the morning, and it's been too long since to remember what the running was, but I'm sure there was a lot of it, working on revised loops and clumps of loops. Jean-Paul Hévin's Matcha, which was one and one coming into a third cake-off, had just entered the line-up. I matched it up against Pierre Hermé's Tarte Infiniment Vanille just because it was convenient and I was not sure how easy it would be to get to other shops. I had forgotten that Matcha had gotten a warning the previous time around. This time too, I couldn't really remember why I singled out this cake. It's definitely at least good, but I didn't think the fruit, chocolate, and chocolate were harmonizing that well. I'd rather jettison the fruit, which seems. Pierre Hermé's Tarte Infiniment Vanille remained reliably great, so it picks up a second win and should get a fourth round this year.

Jun Honma; Edo Matchi

Did a run out to Kouenji to visit the Jun Honma branch there, since it's closest. It was a longer run than necessary because I got turned around past Shinjuku Station and ended up heading back south and losing all my northern progress, though that was probably just a few minutes of running. Coming back, I didn't have trouble and actually walked from the west Shinjuku subway entrance to pass under the station, and then had shopping in Shinjuku (though that was it's own kind of exercise).

At Jun Honma, I got Edo Matchi, which is a traditional heavy (think, central/eastern Europe) layer cake with matcha, matcha ganache, chocolate, and some mandarin in there (I assume the sort of gelatin looking layers is matcha and fruit gelatin). I chose it thinking that chocolate and matcha is a good combination, but I didn't really have high expectations that it would be very exciting, based on the type and the previous two cakes from there. Certainly, it is not something that blows you away from the first bite, but it impresses over the full eating, so I can easily say that is excellent. It surprised me, though I expect most chefs to the bigger places to be able to make excellent cakes, just what I think is excellent is not necessary what sells well for them. Because of one early great cake that I've never seen again, they score high enough to challenge the bottom of the exceptional group, but now it's looking more like they have an actual chance of moving up. Of course, a different shop is at the top of the quite fine shops, but they are closed Tuesdays and there is room for two to be promoted, so Jun Honma got their chance, and did well. One nice thing about them is that they are open until 21:00, so even if they are little far and getting past Shinjuku Station takes time, there was a pretty good selection.

Croissants: Sadaharu Aoki, Fraoula, and St. Marc Cafe

Thursday, I was busy. Friday, I took the day off. Mid-day, I worked on two revised and one loop I'm adding to the neighborhood running course. I failed at the Jinguumae 5&6 loop going counterclockwise because, after stopping at the new Hotel Chocolat, I thought I needed to run farther for the turn to go by Number Sugar. Now I know. Going down to the Shibuya Stn. area to start the next loop, I got a Croissant Matcha from the Sadaharu Aoki at ShinQs. Like the plain, it was high-quality, but I thought the match was unnecessary in this case, but it was still excellent. I look forward to catching their chocolate version some time.

I was successful at the Kamiyama-chou--Tomigaya--Udagawa-chou loop counterclowise, interrupted at the north end by doing the Tomigaya--Yoyogi loop, so the latter has been reconfirmed and the former has been officially added, which is out of order, but I had to run what I had time for. Before finishing off the former, I stopped at Fraola, at got their croissant. This also was a proper pastry croissant and was definitely good, but I'm raising the bar on croissant now that I've confirmed that they can be great. They have other pastries there that I want to retry on other days, so I'm not writing them off by any means.

Saturday, I had more time for running, so I made an attempt at the Daita--... loop, but failed almost immediately on a new part near the beginning (with respect to counterclockwise), but at least could confirm the proper route. It was just as well, since I wasn't well prepared (hadn't charged my phone for a couple days). Coming back, I passed near Yoyogi-Uehara to confirm the Starbucks there and also found a Fujiya bakery nearby (on the route) and confirmed the route near where I previous failed. I can also say that at least I did the tiny Moto-Yoyogi-Chou loop correctly this time, so just counterclockwise to go. At the station, there is also a St. Marc Cafe, which I had a bad experience with several years ago, but since they have fresh pastries, I figured I should give them a try. I think they call this little thing a ChocoCroi.

My memories was that it was disgusting. Actually, though it is overly soft, the chocolate is fine so actually this is good. I thought adding this chain would disrupt a lot of loops, but actually I only have to revise two, the Kamiyama-chou--Tomigaya--Udagawa-chou loop that I had just done and the Ebisu-nishi west loop. I did have to add a couple tiny loops near two other loops because I couldn't incorporate them directly into existing loops, due to the needs of other sites. However, after returning home and having lunch, I went out by bicycle to confirm sites (and take pictures, though now Google maps is rejecting all my pictures) and found a dessert shop that's forcing a revision of the Akasaka-Roppongi loop again, which just doesn't seem to settle down. Most of my effort was confirming new loops east of Ebisu Station.

Sadaharu Aoki, Tarte Caramel Salé Matcha

Today, I hit Isetan for a new, 1-month only, Isetan-exclusive cake from Sadaharu Aoki, Tarte Caramel Salé Matcha. I recorded the Tarte Caramel Salé as great and haven't seen it since, so I was excited about this one.

For running, I went down to work on the loops replacing the Jinguumae--Kita-Aoyama--Shibuya loop. On the way, it's looking more doubtful that BAKERY CAFE 426 OMOTESANDO will return, but I don't want to revise that loop again, so I'm holding off until I see what's next at that location. Across the street, I got the revised Jinguumae 5 & 6 loop clockwise and am reasonably happy with it, but I won't replace the old loop and update connecting parts until I confirm counterclockwise. The Jinguuemae--Kita-Aoyama south loop next to it failed, due to an overlooked traffic signal, and I'm gong to have to further split it, into two loops. The Dominique Ansel Bakery there has closed, but it doesn't affect things because there are two other sites on the same street. That's why I need so many loops: it's a maze with lots of sites close together. I went down an did the Jinguumae--Shibuya loop clockwise, no problem. It's a biggest loop but mostly simple, though very zigzaggy next to the UN University and I'm not sure whether it will be harder counterclockwise. The running was at a 5:9 ratio walking:running. So even though I ended up doing only a little over 45 minutes of actual running, it was compressed in a shorter amount of time, though I also maybe didn't work myself as hard on the 1 min fast stretches as last time.

The tart turned about to be nice, and I'll rate it excellent for presentation and concept, but maybe my sweet tooth needed more caramel in it to be ideal for me.

Jean-Paul Hévin: Verrine Mésange, Verrine Chocolat Coco Framboise, Verrine Mascarpone Café

It took me a while to remember at least somewhat what I did on Wednesday, but I'm finally there. I got some sesame bread from Andersen for eat with olive oil. This was different from their Trekonbrod and the name was completely Japaneses (though using "pan" as the word for bread). It was good, but I didn't bother to take a picture. I was at Isetan for another errand, which I forgot to do, though I verified what the next two visiting shops are (both worth visiting, but I'm up to date on both), and saw that Sadaharu Aoki has a very promising tart for just this month at Isetan. The more important errands on the way home I did not forget. For running, I may have tried to do the revised southern Cat Street loop (and failed very early on), as I think I did the revised Jinguumae central loop (which covers northern Cat Street) counterclockwise on Monday and forget to record it.

In any case, Thursday, I definitely tried to do the southern Cat Street again and realized that my route was flawed, so I've had to revise it. I also failed to get food at Steamers for the good reason that their shops close at 6 pm, so I'll have to hit them on a holiday. Instead, I got a croissant from Natural Lawson, which I've added to routes and on the grounds that they have fresh pastries. The croissant was not special but it was not worse than an average bakery one and definitely better than some, so I'm happy to keep them on my routes. There are not that many of them and I'm not sure that I've found any that the route was not already going by for the neighborhoods covered.  They have eat-in space, which is an advantage over most bakeries, though the atmosphere is what you would expect from a convenience store.

Friday through Sunday I was busy, but I was indulged. Friday night, I sampled all three of the new verrine from Jean-Paul Hévin, though I failed to take a picture. I was busy. If you hurry, I you catch them on the website. These were Verrine Mésange, Verrine Chocolat Coco Framboise, and Verrine Mascarpone Café. The first is Peruvian chocolate mousse, matcha Mousse, and passion fruit gelatin and was not really very exciting, but good. The second is chocolate mousse and coconut mousse with raspberry and lychee gelatin in between again good but not exciting (particularly the coconut mousse). The last is basically a verrine version of tiramisu, but the mascarpone mousse and coco powder is really excellent; I would prefer it without the coffee, but it didn't make me sick, so I'll overlook that. I'm hoping for a different version without the coffee if are more verrine at the end of the summer, but I'm expected to be disappointed.

En Vedette: Rin

Saturday, despite some worries that I twisted my ankle stretching (I was trying to twist it, in a sense, but not to the point of a slightly burning numbness). There was not pain running, though it felt a little funny, but at the end I was more convinced that I should take a rest. A real sprain takes weeks to heal, so I hope that level of rest is not necessary, because I'm not that patient, but I'll test it small. Anyway, no running (or cake) Sunday. For cake, I got Rin, which seemed interesting. It's obviously matcha (I think it's matcha, or at least some form of green tea) and chocolate. Note sure what else. It's fine/good, but wasn't a good follow-up for Friday's disappointment.

In fact, I'm changing my entire numerical ranking system to simplify it and hopefully make it easier to compare shops that I've had different numbers of cake from. What I really want to know is what's the chance the next cake I get from this shop is great, so in particular I wouldn't worry so much about whether that non-great cakes were actually bad, okay, or just good. JPH comes out at 48% (even after adding 5 good cakes to each shop sample to account for selection bias), whereas supposedly superb B-E comes out at  26%, which is below a few in the next lower category. After I finish catching up on past cake-off wins, I'll probably work my way down through shops that are now at the top of their categories before getting back to reviewing quite good shops, which are going to have the same problem regardless of how I rate shops, because two cakes isn't enough to distinguish which ones should be cut.

Bien-être: Mille-Feuille au Fraises

Monday, in light rain, I went to Bien-être (double points) in response to a cake-off win for a new cake. There wasn't actually a new variety, but I had never had the Mille-Feuille au Fraises, which is much like theother five mille-feuille cakes I've had there, except with strawberries (not sure which one was the best, so I'll guess mango). All the ones previous had been excellent, though my appreciation was diminishing. This time, it dipped below excellent, though it's still pretty, and good, but not one I'm interested in having again. The run was my first attempt to verify the revised Tomigaya--Yoyogi loop. I could do the main parts but missed a sharp turn to take in AfterHours, an early turn to reach the main road to run past the pedestrian bridge next to the Cosmo Hatsudai Service Station, and a detour away from Sanguubashi Park to hook around Flotto, all fairly new additions. The second deviation was at least was an improvement and I've updated the map, but I need to fix the other too for next time.

Tuesday, with a break in the rain, I did a short run down to Tokyo Midtown and successfully got the Croissant Matcha from Sadaharu Aoki. The eating space was occupied by a promotional event for some communication company, so I ran it home. As part of the run, I reconfirmed clockwise the Minami-Aoyama east loop with a minor variation to take in NinoCaffe. They'll be a good backup in the future, since they have relatively late hours, such as for Viking Bakery F, which requires me to get off work on time and not spend too much time changing and stretching. The croissant was very nice, and matcha is an interesting change (the inside is quite green), so I can say that it was excellent.

Jean-Paul Hévin, Bûchette Kyoto

Tuesday, as the second Jean-Paul Hévin Christmas cake, I got the Bûchette Kyoto, which has chestnut cream and matcha, as well as chocolate, but in structure is basically the same as yesterday's cake. It was also excellent, but the chocolate dominates in either case, so not a huge difference.

For the running, I tackled a clockwise runs of a new group of neighborhood course loops. As usual, I failed in the hard ones but could do the easy ones. Also as usual, I revised both the hard ones, not necessarily to make them any easier, but to make them make more sense to me, so they'll be different next time I try them. I expect I'll do all the same ones tomorrow, but better and in the opposite direction in the most cases.

Sadaharu Aoki: Paris-Brest au Marron Matcha

Need to catch up before I'm busy again. Thursday, I finally got to Sadaharu Aoki again, and got their Shinjuku Isetan exclusive, Paris-Brest au Marron Matcha, which is actually a cream puff, not a Paris-brest (it's not wheel-shaped), but what you can do. The matcha cream is hidden in the bottom (in a reasonable but necessary amount, as it provides a major part of the sweetening), and there are some hazelnuts visible there, in addition to the main flavor, chestnut. It was interesting, but in an excellent way, so they are still living up to their status as a possibly quite superb shop.

The run (which came before eating the cake) was my biggest of the week, I did a neighborhood course run down to Shibuya Station, which takes 45+ minutes, and on which I tried to verify some of the recent changes of Jinguumae--Kita-Aoyama Central loop. Then I tried to Daikanyama-chou--Dougenzaka--Ebisunishi--Hachiyama-chou--Sakuragaoka-chou--Sarugaku-chou--Shibuya--Uguisudani-chou loop, which is as complicated as the name and the last of my "11th" loops (ten loops from the Samonchou loop) that I'm doing one-way neighborhood runs for. The big change from last time I did any part of this loop (I don't think I've tried to do all of any previous version at one time) was to add a few more churches and a couple cake shops and not bother to cross back over to the west end of Shibuya Station by pedestrian bridges on the groups that the landmarks there are accessible on food through the corridors and tunnels of Shibuya Station, so Shibuya Mark City doesn't need a special visit. It took over an hour to do the loop and in fact I ran into a problem at the end: no bridge back to the station from the southeast side. The whole area is under construction and there are subway entrances that you can use to cross, so I'm not even sure that they are going to reopen that bridge ever. The north-south bridge worked to get to the loop, though it's a temp, so I'm not sure what will happen later, but it goes to a big new shopping area, so at least the people who built that have an incentive to keep that connection, but again there are (really deep) tunnels if they don't. As a result, I've split off the northeast part as a separate mini-loop (linked by a bridge that's still open); perhaps I'll separately practice it among the "12th" loops, presumably at the same time I practice the mini Ebisunishi loop again and try the Kamimeguro loop through Naka-Meguro Station.

Jean-Paul Hévin: Verrine Chocolat Singe and Verrine Matcha

No cake Saturday, as my plan to go to Cova for lunch at Shinjuku Takashimaya was foiled by them having been replaced as the third-floor café (we did eat in Takashimaya, but not at a café). Of course, nor was there running, so there is a certain fairness to that.

Sunday's plan to go to Jean-Paul Hévin at Isetan, which does not have a café (in Tokyo, you have to go to Tokyo Midtown for that), but does have a chocolate bar with a drink and verrine set, did go through and even arriving at noon, we had the place to our selves, at least initually, so early Sunday is a good time to visit there. We got two verrine sets. I got the Verrine Chocolat Singe (I'm guessing for the last word, as there is no monkey in it, just basil and yuzu) and the other was Varrine Matcha, which certainly has matcha (powdered green tea) in it. Drinks were Nature Tradition, which is a cold chocolate drink, and Thé Glacé au Yuzu (no picture), or something like that.

Both verrines were excellent. The first had chocolate apparently infused with basil, though I couldn't tell, with yuzu gelatine in the base. The chocolate mousse was quite good, though just plain chocolate and it took some effort to dig down to the yuzu. I suppose I could mix it all up at the beginning (which I wouldn't have done this time even if I had thought of it, since we were having halves and I ate the first half of this one). The matcha, of course, had the chocolate and matcha up top, so you didn't have to wait. The gelatine in the bottom was griotte cherry, though I couldn't identify it at the time other than fruit, which is probably good, because matcha is subtle enough that you don't want to pair it with too strong a fruit. A child of a shop specializing in green tea assured me that it this was really nice green tea, which I beleive and would expect. Jean-Paul does a good job respecting Japanese flavors, in my experience.

The Nature Tradition (cold chocolate) was also excellent. It had been a while since I had had this. Unfortunately, the cold Yuzu tea was more like icewater flavored with yuzu juice, especially by the end, so I can't recommend it, but it was good to okay.

In the evening, I went for a run (about 24 minutes) and then walk (considerably longer), first to Libertable, at which I found a new pastry and bought it, justifying this by my not having had cake or pastry Saturday. This time, it was the Feuilletée au Almonde, which was definitely exactly like an almond croissant, specifically the type where there is almond paste both inside and outside as coating, on which there were also almond slices and a lot of powdered sugar. It was excellent, but not ideal for me, somehow. It was a little moist for me, I thought, and yet my other suggestion for how to improve it would be to add almond liquor, so I probably don't know what I'm talking about. Anyway, they remain  as a top tier place for pastries for me, so I'll get back there again to try to score something else this week. They also had an apricot tart today, as well as the two pastries that I have already posted on. I asked whether they had the same line-up everyday, and the counter person said that it varied and didn't offer any details, so I left it at that. If they don't have a new pastry for me next time I go, I also want a new cake from them, which so far has not looked like a problem, despite them still having at least most of the old ones.

In other information, Toshi Yoroizuka has both their great Cassis and Saint-Marc, but the Marunouchi JPH has switched to regular JPH cakes from having their own line, so I've lost access to Orly. I hope they put it the line-up again. I've had the (non-coffee) current new cakes from JPH now, but when I was in for the verrines, the menu included a tart that won't be available until later in the month, so now I'm looking forward to that.

Cake-off: Aigre-Douce's Tarte Chocolat Caramel Salé over Jean-Paul Hévin's Matcha

Friday, I finally went inside Binowa Cafe, which is a place I found along my neighborhood running course opened by a "traditional confectionery research company". It's a little rustic as a café and the selection is small and overpriced for take-out, but they advertise canelé, so I figured they deserved to be on my map as a source of pastries/cakes. Their Canelé was excellent, having a nicely crunchy crust around a moist, flavorful, and spongy (versus dry or overly gooey) center. I can say that it was excellent, but again, I'm not sure similar quality couldn't be had much cheaper without a more direct comparison.
The run basically looped around Shibuya station and back back along Gaien, so a long run for a Friday night.

Saturday, for this week's cake-off, I set up a second round for Jean-Paul Hévin's seasonal cake Matcha against Aigre-Douce's Tarte Chocolat Caramel Salé for no other reason than the latter was the next first-round-winning cake on the list, not because they are well matched. Not a long run for a Saturday, but I did enough running during the week that it wouldn't hurt (or maybe would me hurt less) if I gave my feet some rest. Unfortunately, I wasn't feeling the Matcha today. Could be that I was eating it in too small of bites to get the full impact (though the cherry was coming through fine) or that the sweetness of the tart interfered with it, but I definitely preferred the tart, which is what matters, and that's fine: it's a great tart. I'll give Matcha another chance next year.

So it looks like I'm going back to Aigre-Douce again tomorrow instead of down to Jiyuugaoka. I wouldn't otherwise get to Aigre-Douce these days because I've had too many disappointing cakes from them, but they vary, so hopefully I'll get lucky tomorrow. They still haven't put Fraicheur Framboise back in the line-up after more than a year of looking.