Ryoura: Image

Still obvious that I overshot my walking limit last week, but stubbornly walked 12+ km at about 5 km/h just to prove it. I rested relatively yesterday (just some unnecessary window shopping food) and plan to do so tomorrow and keep scaling back until I find a safe level I can build up from at a reasonable rate.

Today was Ryoura, which is among the newer and less visited (by me so far) apparently excellent shops. I got the Image for 520 yen (and brought it home by train). It is many kinds of chocolate: biscuit, bar, dark and milk chocolate cream, nibs in ganache,.... Stopped looking as soon as I saw this. And it was definitely excellent. I'm tempted to call it great, but this time that feels overly biased toward the ingredients. Still, I'd like to have it again.

Cycling to Paris S'éveille

Thought I needed some exercise, so I took a trip down to the hardest to reach definitely great cake shop (knock on wood), but forgot to bring their card with the list of things I've posted on. I almost gave up and went to one of the four recommended but unvisited places out that way (although, only one of those was on my portable map, and one was misplaced on my Google map).

I was fairly sure that I had never had Tarte Pomme Yuzu, so I got that for 540 yen. Used my phone camera again, which really is not bright enough for outside (something to think about next time I get a new phone, since it's not bright enough outside all the time). As the name implies, this is a tart with apple and yuzu. It was well constructed and the flavors balanced well, or they would if I liked yuzu more. This was a harder call than yesterday's pistachio and cherry, but I'll still say that this was excellent. I'm not sorry for having had it and would be curious to have it again, but hopefully shared with someone, along with something less citrus sour.

The need for the exercise goes back to having made brownies, using my brioche forms (which I just bought 3 more of). When fresh, I would call these excellent, although the problem is that they don't stay fresh. And they don't say uneaten: I scarfed three of these down last night. I'm already making half a batch, so I'm just gong to have to freeze them and figure out how to defrost them so that they are still excellent. Anyway, I also need to experiment with baking time amount per form (this was half a batch, 100 g sugar and 1 egg worth, in 6 forms). Also, instead of coating in powdered sugar (which is great), I'll try frosting them with cream cheese frosting (or just cream cheese would probably be good).

In the afternoon, I went for a walk through the Shinjuku Station area department stores looking for something like what was in this wrapper, namely, dark chocolate with nibs. No luck. Actually, I don't know where to search for good chocolate in Tokyo. Tried to stop at &Market coming back from Jiyugaoka today, and found that they had ended their relationship with Bonnat (although their store front sign is still has them as a kind of subtitle to &Market). This particular by Mobar was 500 yen, which seemed really expensive in Indonesia to the buyer. If I google Monggo, besides their website, I find posts of people saying why is this so expensive in Indonesia, though not about this particular variety. To me, this was great, enough that I was searching (although not enough to stand in line to get inside Jean-Paul Hévin in Iseitan).

Finally, Kouign Amann from Fauchon. Usually, I would go to Shinjuku Takashimiya (which is actually in Shibuya-ku), but I picked this up in Keio. It was okay. In evaluating cake shops, it's hard to know whether to call this cake or bread, but I guess I should keep it as bread and evaluate shops based on their fresh cakes.

1/1 intervals to Frédéric Cassel at Ginza Mitsukoshi: Tan Gram

Today, I went to give Frédéric Cassel a second try, since the first cake was great. Took my favorite path to Mitsukoshi Ginza doing 1 min/1 min intervals of relatively slow run and sprinting (or as near as I can get and keep my running form). Was able to do about 15 sprints before I was inside Ginza and couldn't run (for lack of space: evening is a lot different from Sunday morning, which is why there are cake shops open until after midnight there, apparently). Was running relatively well, but I'm not that tired, so I don't know it was as far as training. Intervals are supposed to promote stamina, though. I'm conflicted about whether to run tomorrow or do my inside routine again. Also conflicted because the price of the cake suggests that maybe I should take a cake break tomorrow, although I strongly want to go to Isetan because the visiting patisserie sounds pretty special: an M.O.F. (Un des Meilleurs Ouvriers de France) chocolatier working with the Hyatt Regency Pastry Shop guy. But the first day might be hard to get cake after work anyway, so maybe I should wait. Don't want to leave it to the last day, though.

Anyway, I went to Frédéric Cassel again and this time got the Tan Gram (or "Tangram": can't find an official Latin character spelling) for 777 yen, which is chocolate and more chocolate: chocolate glaze over a top layer of chocolate mousse, then chocolate cream, and then a more solid part with chocolate nibs mixed in (as well as on the outside), I think, on a short bread base. Definitely great. Don't want to rush to designate them a great shop, because I've done that before, but one more great cake would convince me. Plus, it's raising the bar for other shops that I've designated great but have not been delivering so much, although in the end, it is only the great cakes that matter, whoever is selling them. Got to know where to look, though, first. Don't have time or money to try everything from everywhere, sadly.