Cake-off: Paris S'éveille's Monsieur Arnaud over Yu Sasage's Perfum

My Sunday plan for a cake-off worked, other than falling asleep too late and waking up too early. I hope to better tonight. First was a run to Paris S'éveille, by way of Takeshita, so I could get some pictures I forget yesterday. Note sure either of these places qualifies, as candy itself does not, and I'm not sure whether the cakes on a stick are something you make, which would also not qualify. Fortunately, the current version of the neighborhood running map doesn't depend on them either way.

At Paris S'éveille, I got the required Monsieur Arnaud and carefully verified that they have no new cakes. Because this places has the best pastries I know, I also got their Croissant d'Almonde, and, no surprise, it was great, which few are. My requirement, I discovered, was that it be baked to hardness on the outside: a soggy croissant is not a croissant, or much of a pastry (thus my problem with recent Pain aux Raisins). See the nice feet?

I took the train back and got Yu Sasage's Perfum from Isetan. The next best place I've confirmed for great pastries is Sadaharu Aoki, which only has things rarely, so I could pass up getting a fresh new one: Cannelé au Chocolat. Unfortunately, though I should have predicted, chocolate and cannelé doesn't work for me. The taste is good, but I'm not thrilled by the texture, so I'll be kind and say this was good and see what they produce next month (not that they are that frequent or have the big a back catalog).

Since I had a pastry after the first run and then after lunch, I went out running again before getting to the cakes. I'm completely redoing my running maps to add all the coffee shops and convenience stores I ignored before. Even if they don't have good cakes, they have some sort of packaged snack or energy cookie that is at least good, and they sort of define the pain points of the neighborhood, so just in terms of navigation, I should include them. What a mess though. Along this, I tried a Machi Café scone from Lawson, rather than my usual during running snack. It was okay, but I think I'll stick to my rule of ignoring packed breads/pastries, at least from convenience stores, as well as cake from Caffe Veloce (my other running snack was their cheesecake, with similar results, and only slightly better tasting than the Lawson 100 cheese tart).

Finally, cake-off. This is a fourth-round cake-off from the winners bracket. Paris S'éveille's Monsieur Arnaud is heavy decadence and Yu Sasage's Perfum is light elegance. I'm into the heavy, though it was a tough decision nevertheless. So becomes the second cake to reach four straight wins, and I'm caught up with the winners bracket at least through July.

Cake-off: Yu Sasage's Perfum over Viron's Mille-feuille

In the morning, I ran down to Viron in Shibuya by way of practicing/confirmed the two loops in the Jinnan clump of the neighborhood course and then getting roasted crushed peanuts from Nikunohanamasa, since I was running very low. Both the loops are newly revised and I failed on the smaller further away Jinnan loop but could do the simpler and closer but longer Jinguumae--Jinnan loop clockwise. This year, for the third-round cake-offs, I'm working through the list in order of the month I first sampled the versus just chronologically, so that I can match things up in the main season better and am not look for winter cakes in summer, hopefully. This time it was the Mille-feuille, which is available year round, like most of their cakes (the repeat rate on specials is pretty low, though the Fraise, for example, is strictly seasonal, though it's off the great list. I had a delay coming back, as I took the wrong exit (I'm being carefully and using the train to bring back my cakes) and was briefly trapped north of the Shinjuku Marathon runners.

After a half-lunch, I went out again to go to Yu Sasage and was trapped longer on the east side of slower runners, though eventually they let us through. As in other recent outward forays, I took a several photos that are aspirationally future sites on neighborhood loops, should I ever add loops that far out. Yu Sasage still doesn't have either of the other two great cakes of theirs, which have never been available for a cake-off since their appearances in '16 and '17, but they had Perfum.

I like to give honest reviews, so while Viron's mille-feuille was excellent, as a traditional mille-feuille, I wasn't feeling the need to have it in the great list at this time. I've had a lot of mille-feuille since I've last had this one, and though none of those was great, maybe I'm becoming more demanding. Or it could just be natural variation. Perfum remains a combination of fruit, pistachio tart, and meringue that I appreciate, so I don't mind giving it the win, though it's a lot less convenient to report them with an additional visit for a new cake (but the only way I visit these days, so they need the visit more).

Cake-off: Yu Sasage's Perfum over L'Abricotier's L'Abricotier

Short post. Got Yu Sasage's Perfum  for a cake-off versus L'Abricotier's L'Abricotier. Unfortunately, its not really up to the vibration of cycling. Both cakes definitely great, but I appreciated the rose taste over the fruit taste, so Perfum took it.

Next day, I went back to  Yu Sasage and got a Saint Honoré Ananas Citron Vert, which is self-explanatory if you speak cake (otherwise, the fruits are pineapple and lime), which got messed up worse than even Perfum, when I fell over, spraining my right forearm. It was still good and should look like this photo from the shop Facebook page.

Cake-off: Yu Sasage's "Perfum" over Hidemi's "Framboisier"

As expected, today's running was a little tough, so it was all around 9 km/h, which is better than it might have been. First, I went to Hidemi to get Framboisier. I dawdled preparing, so I didn't arrive until 11:05, whereas 10:50 might have been better. Still, I waited only about 15 min, but most of that outside in the sun. For this cake, it was close enough that I ran it back, though, with the lights, I didn't make it within the 40 min that they recommended. It was +11 km round-trip.

For the second cake, I went out to Yu Sasage, which was actually cooler, though it was now early afternoon, so probably not actually cooler. I ran about 1/4 north of the main highly, just to vary the routine (there are parks, which is convenient, and a lot of pretty old public housing apartment buildings, which are not so scenic, but fine), since I've been over to Yu Sasage a couple times recently for research and have previous stuck to the main road for simplicity (usually, I was coming back at the end, so not the best time for complications).

Both of these are fruity cakes, which are not my favorite, so hard to judge. The Framboisier, in particular, was hard to determine what I had thought was great about it, but by the last bite, I was certainly appreciating the balance of raspberry, sugar, and cream (also, may the cake needed some warm-up time, though not much in summer) and think that it is definitely excellent. The other cake, Perfum, is a pistachio tart with a fruity (soft) meringue, or at least the gelatin under the meringue was fruity. This also I liked more as I ate it (and the two cakes went well together, so it was a happy pairing). I liked the more substantial base, even if the three components, tart, meringue and gelatin tended to separate (as did the layers of Framboisier) and the actually lighter flavor of the top worked slightly better for me. It's a weekend/holiday only trip, so I guess that will be my run tomorrow, too, though, I'll trying following the train line south of the main road rather than north. Like today, though, I think I'll take the train back with the cake, at list to SHinjuku Station, because I've been running pretty heavy and the heat is not great for me or the cake.

Yu Sasage: Gaien Walk

Got a second cake from Yu Sasage during their visit to Isetan before running.

For the run, I did the east half of the Shinjuku History and Culture course, Gaien Walk and Outer Moat, before following the Shibuya course to the Inner Moat and coming back through Akasaka-Mitsuke and up past Yotsuya Station. Mostly, I was really slow about it, although the point was more to get some hills in. There was 0.2 km of very fast at the beginning, and I managed a moderate speed 6.4 km for the Shinjuku H&C (despite the hills and stairs) and a little extra to cross the main road (and because I overshot the turn onto the Shibuya course), but there was 2.7 km of slow and 2.4 very slow after that, for a total about about 11.7 km.

The cake was the Perfum, which they list as a specialty. This is a tea tart with raspberry cream and jelly with rose-scented meringue and was 486 yen. I can't say that I could pick up on most of this. Certainly, there was a tart that was good, but I couldn't tell you the flavor, and the cream/meringue was raspberry. I wanted to like it, so I did and will call it great, which means that I need make a priority of getting over to Yu Sasage itself, since they are done at Isetan. Also I was reminded that shops have Isetan-only cakes, so I should check out the visiting patisserie even when it's some place that isn't otherwise a priority, just to see if there is anything special.