Le Jardin Bleu: Malagasy

Today, I ran to Tokyo Midtown first, just to extend my run (since I haven't run lately) and to make sure Henri le Roux doesn't have anything there I need to know about, which they didn't. The lights are up, although I don't get what's pretty about them (the ones on the smaller trees along the path to here look better than these).



Then I went back to the Meiji Gingu Gaien course and did two+ laps, alternating between 8 and 10 km/h, and then home. Total, it was about 10 km of running, with more than two-thirds at 8 km/h (everything before the laps plus the slow intervals), 1.8 km at 10 km/h (in 300 m intervals), and then the run from the end of the intervals to home at 9 km/h.

Cake was from Le Jardin Blue (ル・ジャルダン・ブルー), who are visiting Isetan from way out west in Tokyo. Only one type of fresh cake left at 7 pm (although there was some sort of pastry/tart thing) left, the Malagasy (マルガッシュ) for only 432 yen. This is a dense chocolate cake with dense ganache. Sites I saw while trying to figure out what the Japanese name might mean (it refers to people of Madagascar) claimed it was a French version of a Sacher Torte, but I'm not convinced. Anyway, it's pretty simple in its way, but it was actually exactly what I wanted (I'm kind of sick of my carob brownies, but that's okay, because I've finally used up the carob powder on the last batch). Since it's the first cake I've had from this shop and it passes the I'd-like-to-learn-to-make-this test, I'll say it's excellent, though it's not so different from similar cakes I've had from various places that I've given various ratings, probably. I should try Le Jardin Blue cake again while they are Isetan.