Jean-Paul Hévin: Chausson Chocolat and O de Chocolat Venezuela

As planned, I went to Marunouchi to visit the Jean-Paul Hévin chocolate bar in the Isetan Men's Salone. I had a Chausson au Chocolat reserved and also got an O de Chocolat Venezuela. The former is a traditional pastry made chocolate with a center of almond paste and chocolate (maybe 3:1). The pastry is very thick and the filling is sufficient but not too much. Very well balanced. The pastry itself, though chocolate, does not show it off much, since the butter tends to dominate, though still good. As I progressed, though, the sugary and chocolaty paste kicked in. This is really heavy and probably equal to at least 2 if not 3 pieces of cake, in terms of energy. My stomach was not too happy about running back, though it was not too bad and I recovered mostly by the end. The French means "slipper" and the most common type of chausson is apple, in my experience, though I generally choose something else as a pastry. The pastry was great, though that's partially because it was at least excellent and I have nothing close to compare it to. It's not cake, so it doesn't really effect my evaluation of the shop, although some time I'll have my pasty reviews organized enough that it will matter.

Jean-Paul Hévin usually does not have pastries, so I got this for it's rarity, because I like pastries, and because I owe JPH two items from two cake-off wins and I've already had all the current cakes. The other item I mentioned is water-based (versus milk-based) hot chocolate using the indicated source of chocolate (other options are Brazil and Columbia). The hot chocolate was good, especially as a drink, but not something I'm very interested compared to other items found at patisserie.

The run was about 5 km at about 10 km/h and 4.5 km at about 9 km/h (I took a slightly longer route back but stopped for groceries).