Les Cacaos, Chuao

Thursday, I took the morning off, so I stuck to just my indoor routine Wednesday night and got to bed early. After a short run to the local government building to dispose of an old power block from a printer I was getting rid of the same day, I did a run out to Chez Lui near Shimo-Kitazawa for a mid-run pastry (resisting the temptation to stop to see what Paddlers Coffee, which was open, had). I went with the standard Pain au Chocolat, and it was good in a standard kind of way, so I'll try somewhere else next time. From there, I looped back south to pick up the trail that leads to Meguro River ran along there most of the way down to Gotanda. I stopped about about 2.2 km and 30 minutes out and walked from there (still arriving before opening and before anyone else had lined up, but just after they had put out the bench, so perfect timing). I went with Chuao, which is the name of a cacao growing region in Venezuela. Though this was new to me, it seems to be their standard chocolate cake, for a chocolate shop. Top is milk chocolate cream, whereas the layers are all mostly more substantial. Balance seems perfect, but like fruit, I'm not a great judge of gourmet chocolate perhaps. Not sure whether I'll make it that far before I give myself diabetes and have to give up sugar (I'm still getting an A on my blood sugar reports, though, so I'm safe for another year). Definitely good cake, which I enjoyed. They stay an exceptional shop, and I'll look forward when it's time to get the 9th cake. 

Les Cacaos, Chocolat Noisette

Thursday, I took off the PM and went out for cake. Wasn't sure whether I would find it, since pandemic was exploding in Tokyo, but cake shops have materials, and expenses, so they go on. Under the circumstances, I changed from running and coming back by train to bicycling both ways. Still looking for a shop to promote to exceptional, I went first to Les Cacaos for a 6th cake. Chocolat Noisette seemed like a good bet, though not one that always pays off. This one had a nice thick biscuit with some toughness, reminding me of a cake from PS. For additional flavoring, this has orange, which worked for me. It's simple, but excellent, so I'm promoting them (Jun Homma will have to wait its chance).

Les Cacaos, Pistache

Went out by bicycle and confirmed a couple sites I had just added to the revised loop south of Shibuya Station, then went as far out as Oyamadai to check the line-ups of a couple shops, and returned east to get cake from Les Cacaos. It's been a while, and the one great cake I've had there has been absent for several years (probably because Cuban chocolate is not so common). This time I got Pistache, which is pistachio and a high amount of cacao, supposedly. Neither made much of an impression separately or in harmonization. This is a soft (sponge) cake, but may with some sort of fruit with seeds, because there was some of that unpleasant raspberry seed feeling, though I didn't track it down. It didn't taste bad, but especially under the new rating system, I want to say that this was just ok. Les Cacaos hold on its shop group status (which I'm going to change from excellent to exceptional, in revising to avoid overlap between cake ratings and shop ratings) was weak to begin with, but I'll have to see what the competition can manage. Specifically, it and La Vie Douce were identical before this cake, so it wouldn't take much for me to swap these two shops.

Les Cacaos: Chocolat Orange

I'm going through my list of Excellent shops and getting a fourth cake where needed. The Excellent group is a little bloated, but at the same time I'll like to promote one to Quite Excellent to fill the gap above left over from the withdrawal of Henri le Roux. There are a few Excellent shops that I can visit on a weekday, but Les Cacaos is not one of those, so I visited there today. I still get lost making the transition between the main streets radiating from Gotanda and Meguro, but it's not such a big area, so it's not such a big deal. Even though it was sunny, the temperature was forecast to peak at only 25 deg. Summer is over (and on a weekend, so no extra public holiday--bummer, but it averages out over time and holidays).

Les Cacaos seems to be expanding its lineup, though it still has the better two of the three cakes that I've had before. This time I went with Chocolat Orange. They have some non-chocolate ones now, but they are obviously first a chocolate shop, and I like chocolate, so I tried to stick with what they should do best. This is a somewhat traditional chocolate sponge layer cake with butter cream-based frosting, I think (though don't ask me to remember what the card said about it besides the obvious from the name). It was definitely good and at one point I considered rating it excellent, but I decided that this would probably not be my choice for this type of chocolate cake or for an orange chocolate cake, so I'm going to have to leave the evaluation at just good. I've demoted them down to Quite Good as a shop, but I've had one great cake from them, which will probably get used in a cake-off within this year (they're #9 of currently available cakes).

It's the weekend with two longish runs (compared to recent ones: I plan a near-marathon-length run for next Sunday, as part of a cake-off; wish me luck), so I got greedy and visited Il Pleut sur la Seine, partially to confirm currently available great cakes but also to sample their Bostock. It's of the soft variety with a relatively strong liquor taste. Definitely good but typical. The piece of matcha chiffon cake was okay.
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Les Cacaos: Tarte au Chocolat aux Framboises

Well, I decided that I had recovered from my cold and took a run. So far, so good. But it was pretty slow, averaging close to 9 km/h over about 21 km (it would have been shorter if I had followed the route, but I zigzagged at lot and overshot by one station). I feel looser now and got rid of the cramp I had picked up over a week of not running, but I probably should have stretched more and definitely should do some stretching tonight.

This was my third visit to Les Cacaos in Shinagawa-ku and I got their third fresh cake (though they have a few other things, such as a cream puff). Specifically, I got Tarte au Chocolat et aux Framboises (580 yen). Besides the solid chocolate and fresh raspberries, the tart shell was chocolate and the filling was raspberry ganache. It was definitely good, but not exciting. The shell was about the same thickness as the filling, which was not very strongly flavored with raspberry. Still an excellent shop, but I won't need to another cake from there for a while, with works out well with the depth of lineup. Maybe they'll have something new by the time I visit again, which probably isn't that long away long (months, not years).

For energy, I stopped on the way back at Dalloyau at Meguro Station (which does not currently have a café) and got Pain au Pistache et au Chocolat (or so I imagine it was named, but don't really recall; 281 yen), which was excellent, for having a strong pistachio taste, which it manages by having only a little chocolate, so I wouldn't mind if they upped the chocolate a little more. A superb place for pastries.

Les Cacaos: Cuba

Went back to Les Cacaos for a second cake, but on the way I stopped by Lily Cakes to verify their location (which I had conflicting information on) and that they were worth visiting, which they seem to be, though I didn't quite get the route right, so I need to make an earlier left turn or end up needing to plow through the crowd around Shinagawa Station (versus taking the tunnel north of the station to cross the tracks).

The cake that I chose this time was Cuba, which is a chocolate (what else) mousse dome flavored with orange. The orange is more subtle than I expected, or at least less acidic, which is probably good thing, and the chocolate had an usual usual but somehow nostalgic  flavor. I have to wonder whether it tastes like American chocolate, even though USA ('Hersey process') chocolate is famous for tasting like crap. It had a sort of syrup-like taste, though I was not other conscious that it was overly sweet, so I'm not sure what that means. In any case, it was clearly definitely excellent, and since the taste was unusual and I'd like to have it again, that qualifies it as great. So this place is quite excellent so far, but I'm not sure that they have more than one actual cake left for me to try (a tart, actually), their other similar items that I can recall being a cream puff (which I consider no more cake than ice cream in a cone is cake) and a verrine, which I've disparaged in the past but am willing to give a new look.

Les Cacaos: Madagascar

As my Saturday run, I tried a new place down in Higashigotanda, Shinagawa-ku (since Toni Coni is closed and F.O.B.S. is now open later on weekdays). It would be 8 km if I could follow a route, but ended up 10 km each way, for different reasons, at the fairly standard speeds of 11 km/h out and 10 km/h coming back.

The place, Les Cacaos, is actually a chocolate shop mostly, but they have a few cakes and related items. I took my chances with their chocolate mousse cake, which is a type I have a love-hate relationship with (they attract me, but often disappoint). In this case, it was the Madagascar (550 yen), which has red fruit gelatin inside, but nice gelatin/fruit and not a lot. The chocolate flavor was quite good and went with the fruit, so as far as chocolate mousse cakes go, this seemed excellent, especially giving the benefit of the doubt to the first cake, so I should go back next week and try the chocolate tart, for example. I should be able to get the distance down below 9 km each way, now that I'm more familiar with the area (if I'm patient enough to wait at the pedestrian signals).