Cake-off: Pierre Hermé's Carrément Chocolat over Bien-être's Chiboust au Pistache

Tried walking to cake, to see how that would go. On the way, I stopped at some shops that showed up on a Tabelog search of the top 100 cake shops in Tokyo. #1 is actually a "hidden" French restaurant (there's a small sign, but it's a residential area and it's not clear what business the sign is for). Even the couple cakes they have are by pre-order only, so it doesn't count as a full running course site, so I'm not going to alter the enclosing course to include it.

Got the new version of the Bien-être's Chiboust au Pistache (grapefruit accented), which is less tart/pie-like and more traditional cake, which means more chiboust and less pastry base. My first choice (and next on the one-one after two cake-offs list) was Soyeux from Ryoura, but but they no longer had it at Tokyo Midtown's Dean and Deluca. I'll have to swing by the main shop and see whether it still exists, though I'm planning to do a first round next week, which may lead to a second round, depending on whether the season cake survives.
So I wasted a trip to Tokyo Midtown. I had an afternoon appoint, so I went for the easy substitute and went to Shinjuku Isetan and got Carrément Chocolat from Pierre Hermé, which has been a standard for a long time (though I had further backups to choose from at Isetan). That was too much walking. After about 1 hour, the weak points were letting me know that they were there, but not hurting, but even though time after that involved as much train (mostly standing) as walking, it was feeling less good by the time I got home 2 hours later. Then after my appointment, which was about 1 km each way and a stop for grocery shopping, I was definitely wanting to get off my feet. I'll try to avoid that much for the next couple weeks and not expect to run in June either.

As far as I can remember, I liked the old Chiboust au Pistache better, with more pastry base. The pistachio chiboust is still nice, and no one else is providing me with this good of chiboust cake, so it's staying on the great list, but it loses to Carrément Chocolat, which is somewhat standard, but still a great rich chocolate cake, which some variation in texture accents. It's been a while since I've had a new cake from Pierre Hermé (they've dropped a category in ranking since their peak), so it will be nice to get something new; I don't think I saw anything new at Bien-être). However, I saw something new at Sadaharu, which I'm behind on (after raising them a category), and yet I want to work on the huge quite good group of cake shops and busy at the end of the week, so I think I'll just make one trip to Isetan for new cake. If only I had a sponsor...

Cake-off: Très Calme's Pistache Apricot over Bien-être's Pistachio and Grapefruit Chiboust

Saturday isn't as hot as I feared, but still plenty hot. Haven't done any running yet, but am considering going out in the evening to revisit parts of my neighborhood map before getting back to adding new parts (besides the new parts I've had to add in the middle of old maps, because I found overlooked locations). Instead, I went out at about 9:30 to update pictures for the neighborhood map. Did a temple practically next to Shinanomachi Station that's been rebuilt, then down to Jinguu Gaien Ichou Namiki Avenue, where I've added a new neighborhood loop, now that the connecting pedestrian bridges are available, along with the Royal Garden Cafe Aoyama at the south end, which has good pastries. Then I went down to the loop around Hiroo, where I only managed two planned locations and picked up two previously unknown locations near them, which is not a very good ratio of success, so I've had to completely redo that loop, splitting off the northeast part as three loops (which include a lot of bread places that I overlooked previously) and merging what was left (which is most of that loop) with the loop northeast of Shibuya Bridge, near Ebisu Station. I still haven't tested any of that, so I won't be surprised if there are future changes.

Then from about 10:08, I went my bicycle and got my cake. One was Pistache Apricot from Très Calme (naturally, I visited the farthest one first, though that was because they open first) which only got slightly dented, and the other was the variously named Pistachio and Grapefruit Chiboust from Bien-être, which I had (unnecessarily) preordered the night before (they just took my name and number; they didn't make me pay ahead, unlike Sadaharu Aoki), which definitely did not like road vibration, which is not surprising for any chiboust. The later cake I've been waiting to do a first-round cake-off since last September. I also noted that Bien-être had at least two other cakes that I haven't had, a seasonal tart and a new mille-feuille and that they do not in fact seem to have verrine, just puddings.

The cake-off wasn't a blowout this time, so they were well matched in that sense, as well as being well matched in flavors (no clashing) and yet having significant design differences to make comparing them interesting. I'm deciding in favor of the denser more sophisticated Pistache Apricot from the less distinguished (by me, at least) shop over the light, homemade-like Pistachio & Grapefruit Chiboust, which I thought would be better for with less grapefruit. Both cakes are seasonal, so I'll be doing second-round cake-offs with them next, starting with the loser against Le Saint-Marc, which at least shares its lightness. Next time, perhaps I'll walk the chiboust, or at least run it, home and see if it arrives more intact.

Bien-etre: Chiboust au Pistache

Despite foot problems last night, things seemed better today. Need to get that balance between being too stiff and maybe spraining my ankle trying to stretch, I guess. I ran 5+ km each way to Bien-etre at 8+ km/h. It was a good run in that it made me feel better about my ability to run and my ability to enjoy running.

This was my fourth cake from Bien-etre, as I try to get all 18 shops in my Excellent shop list up to four cakes (there are several at three, all ones I can get too on a workday, if I want to). My goal is to have 16, so I'd like to demote one and promote one. I ate in, as I've done before, since they have a reasonable amount of space. There were even two other customers eating in. I went with the Chiboust au Pistache (a.k.a. Pistachio & Grapefruit Chiboust), because I've never seen a pistachio chiboust before, I want to like pistachio (though I'm often disappointed), and I usually have good luck with chibousts. Their cakes always have a sort of rough almost homemade feel, which usually is a bad sign but works for them. This one had a big tart base with pineapple mixed in with the filling (sorry, it's mostly hidden by the paper, though you can see some grapefruit on top) and then a thick chiboust layer, in which the pistachio was not a strong taste, but it did not need to be (and maybe can't because, because chiboust is so light). It was all good, and I'm to say it was great, even if I'm not totally confident that I won't be less impressed the next time, like I was with last weekends cake-off contestants, and that's fine. I certainly enjoyed this cake more than my weekend cakes, so it deserves some recognition.

Now that I've recovered my faith in running and my faith that I have not lost my taste for cake, so that even just Excellent shops cane impress me sometimes, I think I'll take a day off from both cake and running tomorrow, just to get some things done around the house, since I never have time for most things, like most people.