Cake-off; Bien-être's Pistachio & Grapefruit Chiboust over L'Abricotier's Sicilien Figue

Saturday was cake-off day this weekend. I wasn't sure about Bien-être, which doesn't open until 11 a.m., so I first ran out to around Hatsudai to take some pictures of sights in that area for my neighborhood map. I've decided that my priority in doing (one-way) neighborhood runs is how many loop courses out they are, counting fro Samonchou, so I'll get to this one before Hiroo (though actually I went there because I could end up at Bien-être by a reasonable path). Too hot really, so I only ran about 30 minutes before it became almost completely walking and taking pictures. Got to Bien-être at opening (they don't actually have a sign to flip, just the other people outside didn't seem that intent so I just went in at 11 sharp and ordered my cake. Went to L'Abricotier by train for Sicilien Figue, which still involved walking a ways in the heat.

This was another pistachio cake comparison, this time a second-round contest between first-round losers, and this time I could confirm that the grapefruit went with the pistachio and choose the Bien-être cake for the win. Since the flavors were similar, it was hard to tell whether the other cake needed to be in the great list at all, so I've put the L'Abricotier on notice, so to speak.

In the evening, I went running again, a one-way run down to immediately north of Shibuya station, which I haven't run before, even as a local test run (without doing neighborhood paths the long way). I had to walk a lot of the new crowded bits and double-check my map, but it was fine. I reminded me that I have an untried local cake shop down there that I can use as a back-up some time (probably won't need it this week). It was maybe 100 minutes of running. Huge crowd around the Gaien Stadium due to people coming out of a fireworks competition (on the outbound, the streets weren't too crowded, but I was unfortunate with the wind and it got pretty smoky in one part, and of course noisy for quite a while). I should mention that I stopped for a large, very expensive, just okay doughnut (Van Houten Chocolate...) from Good Town Doughnuts and Coffee, so don't do that.