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Ran down to Au Bon Vieux Temps on Sunday, and not by the shortest way, just because I wanted to keep running rather than wait for lights to change. Got there a little bit after 10 am, which is a little late, since they open at 9 am. Their Marjolaine was down to the last piece, and that's their best cake, though I was there for new cake, not that. I'm actually two behind on them because of cake-off wins, so I decided that if they had two new cakes (and that don't seem to vary the line-up much), then I would get them, which I was able to do.
I went with two other semi-traditional cakes. One was Ali-Baba, which was closer to the original version that became the Baba in that it had custard inside rather than whipped cream, though it was still rum, which was a later change. It was good, but traditional isn't always best. Note sure whether whipped cream would have been better than custard, but that would be my choice for this type of cake, now that I've tried a custard version.
Sorry for being negative, but the other traditional cake was Belle Hélène. Of course, making this level of fruit replicas is really a new thing, a result of the ease of making silicon molds and access to refrigeration, but the desert of pear with chocolate sauce is old, or at exists independently. It was good, but the semi-solid outer covering round the pear pieces and chocolate (which is most of the cake), is pretty tasteless and doesn't have a texture I find very appealing, though it's interesting to know that pear and chocolate is nice. If I'm look for dessert and there isn't cake I want, it seems like a good option.
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.
Tuesday, I ran to Viron straight after work to get their Baba to do a cake-off versus Pierre Hermé's Tarte Infiniment Praliné Noisette that I had gotten the night before and put in the chill room of the refrigerator. I also confirmed that Viron definitely a had another new cake that I could try. By rights, Dalloyau could have been the second cake Monday, but since I was already carrying the tart the previous night, I didn't try to run down to the Dalloyau at Meguro Station, which would have still been open (these days, the Dalloyau across from Virion closes at 18:30, so useless on a workday). Also, I trust the Dalloyau cake to be around any time except maybe right at a major holiday, when it might get pushed out by specials.
Back to the cake-off, these are both super strong tasting cakes (unlike the Dalloyau cake, though I don't usually think that far ahead when setting these up), as well as being focused on a single flavor. In this case, I'll give the win to the hazelnut praliné taste, though I'm still happy for the rum kick of the Baba (in taste only, not intoxication) as part of my greats. I shouldn't forget to say that this was only a second-round cake off between two losers, and I've got other cakes waiting for both to do third rounds (though some day I hope to get to another fourth-round cake-off for the winner's bracket).
Only yesterday, I did a first-round cake-off with two cakes new this month. As I mentioned previously, this took a half marathon amount of running. This is because I first went to Éclat des Jours to give them some verrine glasses and get Croissant, which is fluffier than my ideal but still excellent. I ended up going to Shibuya, since that's the only place to get Viron's Baba. On the way there, at about the three hour mark (I'm slow and this was a long slow run), I stopped at the Caffe Pascucci and got a Bombolone Pistatcchio, which was a poor choice, as bombolone are apparently bread rather than pastry, relatively hardy bread. They only had two Baba's at Viron, which was a little ominous, but okay. As a match, I went to Jean-Paul Hévin and got the Matcha Marron. The Baba is great as a classic and the Matcha Marron is great as a JPH-type cake with a new combination of tastes. The previous sample, the matcha stood out, but this time my attention was drawn more to the chestnut and chocolate. In the end, I decided that the more complex taste of the JPH cake suited me better, but I'm not done with the Baba.
I was so behind on blogging, that I got behind on updating rankings and it wasn't Viron's turn. Lucky! I've had a baba from Viron at the Marunouchi restaurant that was great (as eat-in dessert), so I was optimistic about this take-out version, which I got from the Shibuya shop. (As it happens, it's not at the Marunouchi shop, as I found out after going there the long way, taking 17 km. Fortunately, another 7.5 km run across Yamanote was just what I wanted then.) I decided that this was also great, taking into consideration its presentation of a class. Super simple, of course, and not really anything special about it other than being perfect.
Monday, wanting to fit in a couple weekday cakes this week (since I was busy this weekend), I did my first run to Ginza Mitsukoshi and was somewhat successful. I wanted to get a cake from Lenôtre, which has two seasonal cakes that I haven't tried yet. I could get my preferred choice, but I figured that I would get to both eventually, so no worries. I got the Verrine Baba Agrume, which is a baba in a glass with lots of fruit, specifically orange, pear, and Japanese apricot. While verrine and baba aren't my preference, I found the abundance of a fruit an improvement over my previous similar cake and can say that this was definitely good. Actually, this puts the shop in danger from challengers below, so I'm not sure that I'll actually get to the other cake, but there are also cake-offs coming up, so I remain optimistic.
Because my hip was hurting, as one reason, I bicycled to Frédéric Cassel at Ginza Mitsukoshi and got this month's inspiration: Inspiration Guava. This is very tropical, with guava, lime, lemon, baba (okay, nothing to do with the tropics), rum, and vanilla with a coconut sablé as the base. From anywhere else, I'd probably pass this up, but I can count on Frédéric Cassel and this was excellent. I ate it after coming home and doing a full indoor workout (the other reason for not running; I should really be doing these every three days), which takes me about an hour, but for 14 sets, I should be able to do them in 35 minutes, if I made more of them timed intense 1-minute workouts, which right now the weight training isn't. Maybe I'll that try once and see how it goes.
Went to the Tokyo Toshi Yoroizuka on Monday afternoon after a failed trip to Jean-Paul Hévin (the typhoon blocked the shipment of special pastry, so I reserved one for the special delivery on Wednesday) and shared three cakes: Baba, Choux à la Crème, and Saint Honore Caramel. The Baba is a repeat but worth mentioning, as I dismissed the whole cake type previously as uninteresting but am now willing to appreciate it and say that, even among baba, this one was excellent. The unusually feature (besides the strong warning about the amount of alcohol) was the fig. Another type of cake (?) that I've disparaged is Choux à la Crème, and in fact I got a really fancy one from Toshi Yorizuka just last week and was not impressed at all. This, however, was excellent. In fact, it's just what I said custard needed, something to contrast with it. I was thinking of a custard tart with a dense shell, but this cream puff was fairly thick, though not sense but rather had some air in it but it was baked enough to caramelize it much more than an one I've had before, and it really worked to make contrasting tastes that went together. (It's like, they are professionals, or something.)
The second cake was Deux Fromage ｄ’Été, which is a summer two-layer (baked and rare) cheesecake flavored with pineapple confit and passion fruit and mango gelatin. I thought the cake was a little grainy, somehow, and also, the rare was pretty soft and the baked part was harder than some I've had, so I was really not appreciating the texture and construction of this one. However, the taste was still good, so this counts as good cake.
Unfortunately, I can't say the same of the last one, which was Savarin Pêche Melba, a baba with a peach liquor and white wine based syrup, a raspberry glazing, some peach confit, vanilla cream, I think accepted with baked white chocolate somewhere, though I'm not sure where, and uncredited almond slices. This was just too dry for me and did not have much taste. Not it was was bad as sponge goes, but what's the point of a dry baba?
Not well enough to run, but I kept a reservation at Viron today for lunch. As usual, the food was excellent. For desert, they had Paris-Brest, which they said they only make twice a month and it was what they were pushing, in that they brought the whole thing around on a platter for us to see. We got the first slice, I think, and it was a huge slice (for 1500 yen). This was quite different from the little individuals I've had called Paris-Brest and I can't remember what the slice from La Salon Jacques Borie was like (I was too shy to take a picture of it). Here, the balance between pastry and filling was much more to my liking than an éclair (that is, more filling), even though really there were 6 layers, as the top and bottom both had distinct inside and outside crusts with the praliné cream between, and there was also an small inner tube filled with custard, which I had not expected. Nuts were very large pieces, maybe halves. It made a strong impression, so I'm calling it great.
The Baba was a baba, and packed a reasonable alcoholic punch. It might be great. I'm not the one who usually orders this, but I had half. That's a fig on top, I think.
Tried to go to the cafe at La Maison du Chocolat but gave up after a 40-minute wait. I don't have much experience with cafe's, but I think a 20 minutes cap is reasonable: if they can't get you in before then, get away. There is plenty of good places that I've been to that would break that, and I was okay, but not everyone is that into cake all the time, and you can get take out.
Later, at Shinjuku Isetan, got two special/seasonal cakes (which doesn't really get me to my goal of trying out all the regular cakes at all the great shops, but that's okay): Baba Infiniment Citron and Cheesecake Infiniment Citron. The second is lemon biscuit, lemon baked cheese cake, lemon cheese mousse, lemon marmalade, and sable. The baba version is lemoncello (a liquor), lemon cream, lemon whipped cream, lemon confit, and lemon gelatin. These are both great, which they should be for 700 and 800 yen, I think (although I don't now which was which).
