Cake-off: Bien-être's Mont-Blanc over Viron's Gateau Chocolat

This is about two weeks behind, as worsening conditions naturally drain my enthusiasm, but still these were great cakes I had in a cake-off. These were the the last (until enough new great cakes advance) of the 5th round cake-offs for cakes with 3 wins to one loss. Getting the cake was pretty easy. Viron in Shibuya opens at 10:00 and always has their Gateau Chocolat. Matching against this was the best cake of Viron's biggest rival in terms of my own ranking, Bien-être's Mont-Blanc, which was among the few types of cakes for sale from 11:00. 

Today, maybe I wanted something softer with more texture variation, even though I love chocolate, so the underdog shop won with the Mont-Blanc. While there, I noticed a new cake I wanted, which hopefully didn't influence me.

Actually, I lied. I remember now that I was running late and went to B-E first and then to Viron. Viron open's earlier, but B-E is more likely to sell out and there was less certainty that they would have what I wanted. In pursuit efficiency, I also stopped at Scramble Square building to get a cake from a counter, which is how I suddenly remembered the order. More about that in the next post. 

 

Shiseido Parlour, Mont-Blanc

The emergency declaration for the Tokyo region as been rescinded, so Isetan is now open until 8 pm. Searching for a new great cake within this month but still working through the quite fine shops, I hit the Shiseido at Isetan. The 8 pm closing time was new, so it was pretty empty just after 7 pm and already discounts from the non-dessert areas had started. I had two shops to choose from to visit and I went with Shiseido. Actually, I may not have had a choice. At Shiseido, I definitely didn't have a choice because they only had their Mont-Blanc. As it happens, that was pretty lucky, because this was definitely lucky. The special feature of this is that the cream inside (I think) has white chocolate. The result is a mont-blanc that tastes like (not wet) ice cream to me, and not much like chestnut, which actually I'm fine with. There were actually also exercises. Besides walking, I did squats, presses, and curls. The squats were only 5 per set, but I did too many sets, I found out afterward, so I was limited the next couple days. Now I have an incentive to building up those muscles. 

Tadashi Yanagi, Mont-Blanc

Working through the quite fine shop list to get them all up to at least 4 cakes, I picked up a Tadashi Yanagi cake, Mont-Blanc, from the counter at Shinjuku Takashimiya, as they are featured there on Mondays. It was good and had a meringue base, I think, both huge improvements over my previous Mont-Blanc. Unfortunately, that probably isn't enough to keep in it the quite fine category, but we'll see.

I note that I'm also going to want to go back there to get cake from Le Jardin Bleu for the same reason. Yanagi actually isn't that far away, even for Setagaya (they used to have a shop on Aoyama-doori Ave., but that's been closed for a while), whereas Le Jardin Bleu is deep in the western suburbs. Not that far but not as close as Yanagi, I note that Noliette doesn't have their counter there any more, so I should have visited them earlier at Takashimaya.

Vie de France, Mont-Blanc

Full disclosure, since a bakery with cake moved into the Shinanomachi Station, I felt compelled to give it a chance, but I wasn't that surprised that the result was not good. It's close enough that I could actually run the entire way. This Vie de France is in the Atré café space, next to a Starbucks. Anyway, I got the Mont-Blanc, which is in the same old-fashioned early-Japan style (in my imagination, anyway: when they were just recreating western desserts in the early days before studying cakemaking in the west) or maybe it's just a café style that is more robust. Anyway, the base is dense like pound cake but overly dry for fresh cake and making up way too much of the cake, and the top has little make up for it. It's a style, I suppose, but I can't call it more than okay, so no need to every eat cake from there again, much less buy it.  
 

(Café) Le Pommier, Mont-Blanc

I'm probably not going to catch before the weekend, but last Sunday I hit a couple local shops. Imperfect is a chocolate shop that's gotten out of the cream puff business, so they no longer have anything that qualifies as fresh cake. Next in that neighborhood was (Café) Le Pommier, from which I got a Mont-blanc. I'd probably have a bigger selection if I went to one of the regular shops, but I was only looking for a fourth cake, so this seemed good enough. It's got the meringue-type base but the unusual feature is a chocolate coating. That's not a bad idea, but wasn't really making this special. Still a good cake, but probably not enough to keep this shop in the quite fine category. 

Cake-off: Paris S'éveille's Monsieur Arnaud over Jean-Paul Hévin's Mont-Blanc

Did a run/walk down to Jiyuugaoka, as planned, and got Paris S'éveille's Monsieur Arnaud. Was about 10 minutes early, but there was still a line of several people, so different from last time I went early (though I can't remember what day of the week that was). Anyway, they had that cake and their other undefeated great cake, but this was earlier in the list, so I choose it as the opponent for Jean-Paul Hévin's Mont-Blanc, which was a priority because JPH is the top shop and the Mont-Blanc is seasonal. This is the first fifth-round cake-off, so I'm starting big. Jean-Paul Hévin's Mont-Blanc might be my favorite mont-blanc, but that's still a somewhat limited category so Monsieur Arnaud, which is also a standard cake, and the one they showcase in the article posted in the shop window, but has more of my favorite ingredients, with nuts, chocolate and fruit in a cake with a thick biscuit with good texture, cream, and sheet chocolate. I've going to have to wait for FC's undefeated great cake to come back or I could have two PS cakes battling for the top.

Cake-off: Bien-être's Mont-blanc over Pierre Hermé's Deux Mille Feuille

I'm working through the last cake-offs of the year. Saturday's was expected to be the last, a fourth round for two more two-of-three winners, both regular year-round cakes, so were never a priority until the end. One I could get at Isetan, which opens at 10am, so I did that one first: Pierre Hermé's Deux Mille Feuille, their praliné mille-feuille. Getting the other at Bien-être required a little waiting in line (only two customers at a time for ordering, though the café is available with a reservation. I ended up being lazy and going by bicycle. I can note that I went to Isetan the long way, running down the Shibuya Sta. northeast area to check out a shop that turned out to be closed despite their posted hours (it was the Stream Coffee Company shop and I caught them later; they only had chiffon cake, which I've decided doesn't qualify as fresh cake; a brownie would suit me better). I did hit the nearby WeWork café (Foru Cafe) and had the croissant, which was good, if overly fluffy for my preference. Back to Bien-être: they didn't have the Mont-Blanc showing (I could see through the glass), but I was optimistic that even if they cut the lineup during the Christmas rush season, they wouldn't cut that one, which this is especially the season for. The service person was probably inexperienced, as they had to ask the person working at actually making things (they kitchen opens directly on the shop and isn't very big). Note sure what her exact answer was other than that it would come later, which was the answer passed back to me. Questioning further, she said all they had now was what was showing, but I asked how long I needed for wait for the Mont-Blanc. At this point someone who either knew more about how things worked, or recognized me and how I operate (I know what I come for and I don't buy anything else, but I'll wait or come back if I have to), asked the same kitchen person whether she had the Mont-Blanc ready and immediately got a tray of them and told the other clerk to ring one up, so I got what I came for. 

I was satisfied with both of these as great cakes. The Mont-blanc is a straight mont-blanc, no fruit or any other bells or whistles that need to be mentioned, just what you see, whipped cream in the middle (I can't remember already whether there was any additional chestnut in the middle, but if there was, not so much compared to the top), and some sort of softish sablé or hardish cake biscuit base supporting it. The mille-feuille, on the other hand, is already a pretty complex standard, this one including three thick layers (an advantage over FC's, excellent though they are) and lots of praliné. It's a tough choice, but I have to give it to the mont-blanc, that wins with simplicity. Not sure why it beats all the similar mont-blancs, but they've been dropping out one by one, which this one seems in no danger of doing.  

 

Cake-off: Viron's Baba over Pièce Montée's Mont-Blanc

There was and was not a lot of running for this cake-off, in poor weather. Friday night, I ran to Pièce Montée's and got one of the last Mont-Blanc. Weird thing this time, they asked me to pay first, which is totally normal, but by coming around the counter and (telling me) just holding out their hand for the money. Japanese use trays to pass money, so I was expecting her to bring a money tray like in JPH (though it is a pretty unstable to carry money). I visited FC (again) on the way back and confirmed their two new cakes this month. They're both petit version of their main Christmas cakes, one chocolate with some whipped cream and one strawberry of various forms, including mixed with (coating) chocolate for the outside. They might great, but I've got a lot of other shops to visit, so I'll wait until I'm in more need or they have something that looks like it could become a regular thing. I walked my cake back, though at a good pace. This shop opens and closes late, so getting cake at night for the next day is the only way to go (plus, limited selection on Saturday's and closed Sundays).

Saturday, I woke up with balance problems (still feel a little odd) that are unnoticeable when I exercise. I assume something broke off and worked its way to the wrong part of my ear. If it's bad again tomorrow I'll have to look up what one does about that (since I've seen this on a health shop, I assume I also saw some home exercise, but I can't remember what it is). Anyway, I let myself sleep in longer, so Viron was almost open by the time I left the house, and I went to the bulk grocery out that way to stock up on nuts and walked from there with an umbrella. Still no problem getting the Baba. Still no new (non-coffee flavored) cakes. Last year they had some special Christmas cakes and in their case I should indulge, since I'm just getting more behind on them, due to lack of new cakes.

The Baba and the Mont-Blanc are both standards in general. Viron's is the only one I'm calling great, and it still satisfied me with its strong taste from a generous amount of rum, and nice volume overall. The Mont-Blanc is the opposite, being rather small and being pretty plain, but not in a bad way at all. It's definitely something that, after eating, I could eat another one, which is one sign of greatness. But I liked the Baba better, so it wins. Also, the Mont-Blanc it's not really special in it's class, so while its a good enough representation of that class, I've got enough other one's, including ones that I would miss, that I can't say it's great. That's two times in a row, so it gets demoted to semi-great. Either way, it's a quite fine shop, though I've had enough of their small collection that it will probably be a long time before I get back there, if ever.

  

Presqu'île Chocolaterie, Mont-blanc

Having brought Presqu'île Chocolaterie, a quite fine shop, up to the target 4th cake level, I went back the next day to get one cake ahead with them on the grounds that it could be years before they come back to Isetan (whereas normally they are inconveniently far from central Tokyo). I went with the only cake of theirs that has no chocolate at all, the Mont-Blanc. The unique feature for me was the base, which has pastry more like what I only see with quiche: salted filo crust. Inside the base is almond cream. It's definitely excellent even among the crowded category of mont-blanc.

Ron Herman Café: Cheesecake and Mont-Blanc

I was busy on the weekend, but did a first visit to the Ron Herman Café in Sendagaya and had lunch and cake for two. The cakes were their Cheesecake, which has fresh grapes, and a Mont-Blanc. For a café, this place has a pretty good selection, which was one reason for choosing it, plus it's not in a crowded area, though fairly busy (not sure where people come from, since it's far from the standard shopping areas, and yet they continue, though obviously on people's radars). Too much gelatin on the top of the cheesecake for me, but definitely good cake, with amount of sour cream sourness that I miss in a lot of cheesecakes here. 

I thought the Mont-Blanc was also definitely, but it was pointed out that it had a sort of amateurish disorder. The base is about 1 centimeter thick of something between a dense pound cake and a sablé-type cookie, which is a bit unusually, but probably useful for a café. I suspect both the base and the cheesecake are prepared in advance at a remote location and the top parts are added locally.

Anyway, good enough that it should count as a cake shop on my local running map, but not good enough that I'll probably get back to it now that I've had two cakes.
 

Cake-off: Jean-Paul Hévin's Mont-Blanc over Frédéric Cassel's Tan Gram

Did a weekend fourth-round cake-off between two from the undefeated bracket. The chocolate cake is Tan Gram from Frédéric Cassel, and this is quite decadent. The Mont-Blanc is the one from Jean-Paul Hévin; it is only available fall and winter, which might not sound like much of a restriction, but this is maybe the best Mont-Blanc out there, in my opinion, though that's totally about what a great almond meringue base it has, which is maybe not what true mont-blanc devotees focus on. Against my usual trend, I'm not giving the win to the chocolate cake, though this agrees with the recent trend of not being as excited about the more intense cake. In Tan Gram's defense, I should have worked out longer or at least waited longer so I was sufficiently hungry for these after a full lunch. However, JPH's Mont-Blanc would be hard to beat under any circumstances. Hoping to get to it earlier in the year for the fifth round. 

 

Cake-off: Sadaharu Aoki's Chocolat Pralin over En Vedette's Mont-blanc

On my last morning off in the series, I did a cake-off, but since it was Tuesday, a couple cakes that I wanted would unavailable, so I finally did the third-round between two-time losers. That sounds bad, but these stayed among the great cakes despite losing, so I wasn't that worried about either of them. In particular, I remembered the Chocolat Pralin by Sadaharu Aoki as being definitely great, just matched against heavy hitters both times. It gets the win this time, which is not surprisingly. I really like chocolate and praline, and it's a good sized cake. It's weakness is perhaps it's simplicity, so would could get tired of it. In this case, I think I had tea and I had another cake to breakup things, really nice mont-blanc which gets a good amount of meringue in by sandwiching the cream wrapped in chestnut past between two disks. No disappointments with either.

Cake-off: Rue de Passy's Mille-Feuille Praliné Citron over En Vedette's Mont-Blanc

Three cake-offs ago, I went by Rue de Passy for their Mille-Feuille Praliné Citron, which has no problem, and then stopped at the Shibuya Scramble  Square to get the Mont-Blanc from the En Vedette counter. Unfortunately, between the heat and road vibration, the soft middle of the mont-blanc sank. It wasn't that noticeable eating it, but I feel a little bad that I have to choose the Mille-Feuille Praliné Citron. Still, this is only a second-round cake-off, so even with two losses, The Mont-Blanc can still get a third round, just it seems to be available year round, so I don't want to rush it, to keep it available for seasonal opponents. 

Cake-off: Pierre Hermé's Tarte Infiniment Vanille over Michalak's Mont-Blanc

Last Sunday, I had a 4th round cake-off between Michalak's Mont-Blanc, which was next up based on when I first sampled it (though it's actually available year round), paired against another Isetan great cake with two wins to one loss, Pierre Hermé's Tarte Infiniment Vanille. These were definitely both great, so it's hard to decide, but I'm going with the Tarte Infiniment Vanille, which might be my favorite vanilla cake of Tokyo, though there is one more contender for that title. Maybe it will get resolved in next year's cake-offs. The Mont-Blanc, though was still great. It's distinction is a little chocolate, I think, which mellows the chestnut.

Cake-off: Bien-être's Chocolat Cuit over Très Calme's Mont-blanc

Saturday, I tried again and was successful at getting Bien-être's Chocolat Cuit. I wasn't quite as early as I intended, but it didn't look like they had sold much based on other items, even though they only had two of these out. It's was too light for the trip back, even though I was half running half walking. I did come back a longer way than I needed to because, in my confusion, I stopped at the newly opened Isetan, though the counter I wanted for the other cake-off cake was not available. Still, I bought the nonfood item I wanted. Once home, I took off by bicycling to get up to Très Calme and get their Mont-blanc, as a second two-wins-one-loss cake for a fourth-round cake-off. 

It was getting late at this point, so I also got a croissant there, as my first pastry and ate that first. It had a coating of syrup, I assume, or at least a coating that ended up sweet in the overall flavor, which is what I ask for in a pastry croissant versus a bakery croissant, so I can easily call this excellent. I'm back to the new interface on Blogger, which doesn't give me an option to rotate photos before uploading (whereas, somewhere something automatically decides to rotate long pictures so they are vertically oriented).

The Chocolat Cuit, despite the name, is pretty raw, being a very rich chocolate mass, which I'm giving the win. The Mont-Blanc is distinctive in being my favorite coffee cake, which adds coffee-flavored meringue to chestnut paste with cassis accent on whipped cream  in a way that you can taste all the flavors and yet the bitternesses of the chestnut and coffee cancel out and are together pacified by the sugar in a way that makes this acceptable to someone who doesn't like coffee (me) or chestnut (the chef). It stays among the greats, no problem.

Cake-off: Atelier Kohta's Classic Chocolat over Ryoura's Mont-Blanc

Saturday, I ran out to Yoga again for a cake-off, this time for the Mont-Blanc for a third round between two one-and-one cakes. On the way, the stopped at Bigarreaux for a pastry, though they don't have much, instead making breads and meat pies. But they did have a Croissant, so I got that. It's on the bread side rather than pastry, but still well made and it was substantive rather than a soft hotel buffet style morning croissant, as I think of that type, so just good isn't so bad, if you're not looking for something sweet (though I am).

The other cake for this time was Atelier Kohta, which I first got 5 years ago, and it's probably been a couple years since it's cake-off (I have records, but don't bother to look). This is a Classic Chocolat (or at least that's how I recorded it), but if a different kind that my lass one. This is like a classic chocolate layer cake, but small. It was raining, so I walked, but it was enough.

Actually, these are both weak members of the great cakes (I didn't before the comparison, but wasn't surprised) who have one non-great evaluation. The Mont-Blanc is excellent, so I enjoyed having it again, but I still can't detect why I thought it was great. There was a period when I was just starting to get Mont-Blancs and I probably overcompensated then. Certainly, if Ryoura is in your neighborhood, it's a good choice, but I don't need in on my list. The Classic Chocolat makes me think of chocolate layer cake in the American mid-west. I manages to capture and probably improve on the basic taste in a tiny elegant form. I can't say that it is the style of cake I appreciate now, but it still has a place in my heart, so I'm keeping it in the greats list and giving it the win this time. Not sure Atelier Kohta actually has a new cake for me, though I've only had 4 from there: the shop only has about 4 cakes. I might end up giving something a second try.

Cake-off: Pierre Gagnaire's Mousse au Chocolat et Yuzu over En Vedette's Mont-Blanc

Only yesterday, on a necessary trip for food, I did neighborhood course run down through western Minami-Aoyama down to Roppongi. Coming back, I stopped for my first pastry from Nino Caffe, across the main north-south street from Nogi Park. They had various fillings, and plain, but I went with the chocolate. Note sure how they were naming this, so I'll call it a just Chocolate Croissant. The croissant is pretty soft and holds a lot of filling, which seems to be chocolate custard. Very rich and good, but of of course, not so sophisticated. It was too messy to each on the way, so I saved it for home, even though I was also carrying cake and still needed to stop at a grocery (where the shelves were pretty bare, so I just got bananas, which I was running low on).

The main event, of course, was the cake-off, though that required another trip, this time down to Shibuya through Jinguumae, where I found that Yatsudoki had built a shop deep in on a street not on the running course. In the end, adding it led to merging three loops, so I'm back to having one big loop south of Omote-Sandou Road to match the one north, for the main strip between Harajuku Stn. and Omote-Sandou Stn. That's turned this clump of loops (which include a new one using the remaining bridge over Meiji-Doori to get to a little loop under Yamanote Line that has a coffee shop and a convenience store. Under current conditions, Shibuya Scramble Square had almost no customers, so social distancing was possible.

Today's match up was a first-round cake-off between two recent picks, and I'm still a little tentative about both, but they both are great simple cakes, chocolate mousse cake in the form of Pierre Gagnaire's Mousse au Chocolat et Yuzu and meringue mont-blanc in En Vedette's Mont-Blanc. I'm giving this one to the mousse cake, because it manages to give a real dark chocolate taste to mousse and cutting it with yuzu so it doesn't wear out it's welcome. En Vedette should get a remain yet, as their Roche also has one win.

En Vedette, Mont-blanc

Monday of last week, I had lunch at Isetan and could make buy cake in the middle of the day on a workday (and in fact would be the only such cake during the week). En Vedette was visiting, so I took advantage of the opportunity to buy their Mont-blanc. This is the usual whipped cream under chestnut paste arranged horizontally between two meringue disks, which makes for a high meringue to cream and chestnut, and a rather sweet cake, which suits me, especially for something that get verge on bitter like chestnut. In fact, I want to have it again, which is another way of saying that it was great. This puts En Vedette on a path to challenge the category above, quite exceptional shops, though this third great cake probably isn't going to be enough to take it all the way, even if it stands up under testing.

Cake-off: Pierre Hermé's Tarte Infiniment Chocolat au Lait over Pièce Montée's Mont-Blanc

Friday night, I went to Pièce Montée's Mont-Blanc for Saturday, once they confirmed that Saturday they wouldn't be selling it. They open late, so that's still within 24 hours of them putting it on display, which seems reasonable. I mostly carefully walked it back (they do not take it down, just limit its movement by a partition and icepack). My snack instead came from the Marusho, in the form of a Plecia Basque Cheesecake, which was definitely good, unlike my last coffee shop cheesecake.

Saturday, I woke much to early, so I same neighborhood course I mentioned previously, but found another little shop next to Shinanomachi selling little traditional cakes, so the map needed to be revised (the shop is Bunmeidou, and I got their Honey Castella Rolls, which was definitely good, as packaged cakes go).

That being the case, I decided that I should add the various Soga Gakkai buildings, the same as I would if they were religious buildings of other groups, even though this area is their central complex. The streets are public, so it's not really a campus or like a temple grounds, where many building might be assembled. I took a few pictures of obvious candidates for revising the map and then headed to Isetan, where I arrived just before opening and easily got my Tarte Infiniment Chocolat au Lait for a cake-off between two zero-for-one cakes.

Unfortunately, I didn't move the mont-blanc from the chiller before serving (probably should have moved it to the regular part of refrigerator an hour before eating), so it was maybe too firm for the whipped cream to express itself. I just wasn't feeling the need for this to be on the great list, so Tarte Infiniment Chocolat au Lait, which I still think deserves to be on the list easily won. The mont-blanc will get another chance this year, and I'll try to remember to be more careful about the temperature, as appropriate for a cake that depends on whipped cream.

When I was out again, confirmed more Soka Gakkai buildings, I stopped at their souvenir shop, Hakubun Eikōdō, and got a little Shinanomachi Agemochi (fried rice cake), which was good in the standard way.

Jun Honma: Waguri Mont-Blanc

Still trying to sort out the quite fine shops versus the exceptional shops, I ran to Jun Honma again. I didn't get turned around 180 degrees again, but I also didn't pick my route that well, so it took about the same time. Actually, coming back with cake took the same time, and I walked under Shinjuku as far as Isetan. Takes a couple hours total.

I went with the Waguri Mont-Blanc this time, very traditional. And it was very traditional tasting, so good but nothing special, so Jun Honma slips behind, giving a different shop a chance for the next day. I'll say that this had a sort of almond tart base, since besides using Japanese Chestnuts, the base classifies it within the Mont-Blanc family.