Musée du Chocolat Théobroma, Caramel Orange

The other cake the Sunday before last was the cake-off reward for Musée du Chocolat Théobrom's win. I went intending to get their version for Forest Noir, which I would generally avoid, as I can't expect cherry and chocolate to come out well, but their best cakes have been chocolate. However, I ended up getting a cake I hadn't seen previously, Caramel Orange. It ended up being more eastern European, though that just means east of France, as far as being heavy on almond biscuit. It was good, so I'm not disappointed, and I'm caught up with the quite fine shops that aren't tens of kilometers from central Tokyo, which are going to be a problem now that Isetan isn't rotating visiting cake shops on a weekly basis.

Cake-off: Musée du Chocolat Théobroma's San Jaunquin Dos over Viron's Baba

Not finding a new cake, I did a fourth-round cake-off for two cakes with only one win each, starting with Musée du Chocolat Théobroma, where I got their main chocolate cake, San Juaquin Dos. I wanted to test it against a new cake (for take-out), Viron's Baba. These are very different, so it's hard to choose when comparing, but I could enjoy both. In the end, I'll take the chocolate cake this time, the San Juanquin Dos. This is a milder cake than the previous JPH cake-off cake. It might be interesting to compare them some time.

You might notice that I'm now 1 cake ahead for the rest of the week, so I'm ahead, but I'm about as caught up as I'll be for the current quite fine shop list, so won't be in a big hurry the next weekend, except there's a new month coming up, so their could be new cakes. I'll be head next weekend as well but catch up the following weekend, which also won't have a day off going into it. 

Musée Du Chocolat Théobroma, Diable

Sunday, I started with this small item, which I got as my 4(+1 for a cake-off win)th cake from Musée Du Chocolat Théobroma, though most past purchases have been via their Cocoa Store shop nearer Yoyogi Park. This is Diable and is just what it looks like, chocolate custard on a chocolate puff pastry. It was definitely good, which is both better than I expected of the item just based on the concept and actually the second best "cake" I've had from this shop, so I was satisfied. 

Cake-off: Pierre Gagnaire's Mousse aux Chocolat et Yuzu over Musée du Chocolat Théobroma's San Juaquin Dos

It was a wet day that got wetter, so just walking during the day. Last week's cake-off was a third round against one-and-one cakes. First, before the season runs out (if there is a season) I got Mousse aux Chocolat et Yuzu again from Pierre Gagnaire. For the other cake, the rarely visited Musée du Chocolat Théobroma, which has one worthwhile cake that I've found, their signature chocolate cake, San Juaquin Dos.

Unfortunately, I'll have to admit, it turned out that I wasn't much in the mood for chocolate. Nevertheless, these were great cakes, so I did enjoy eating them. Neither is a top chocolate cake, but they each represent a type. In this case, maybe just because I was looking for something beyond chocolate, I had to go with the mousse cake. In some ways, the San Juaquin Dos is pretty plain, but it has a kind of advantage in that way, so I'm not willing to give it up. Still, with two losses, it will have to wait until next year to get it's fourth round.

Paris S'éveille: Saint Honoré Caramel

Well, I successfully did 31 km of my neighborhood course at the 7 min/km pace. Even knowing that I did not need to go as fast as last time at the beginning did not seem to affect the first couple kilometers, which were under 6'10'' each, just because there is no slope and no stairs along there. I did let myself go over 7 min more often later without worrying about it, but near the end I cross 7'30'' and it was relatively flat I thought (though by that point, my judgement maybe was not that good and actually I can't think where that would be true), so I made the effort to speed up and didn't have so much trouble, though I was plenty tired. Mostly I could remember the kilometer markers and I didn't really start spacing one ones until fairly late. I'll need to get started on the next batch. Probably I'll try for around 48 km.

The run ended near the café Path, around Yoyogi Koen Stn., where there were people waiting. I assume that you can just get take-out, but it wasn't obvious, so I went down Musée du Chocolat Théobroma on by way to Jiyuugaoka, walking. At Théobroma I got a Pain au Chocolate. It was definitely good, squarely qualifying as a pastry rather than just fancy bread, but maybe I've had enough of this level of Pain au Chocolate by this point that I'm more hesitant to designate new ones a excellent. They also have cake there, which is the only place I know to get cake from them.

I made it to Paris S'éveille, despite sore feet. I'm not sure whether there is any solution to that, but they seem okay now. There, I got the Saint Honoré Caramel, which I had just noticed as something that I have not had from them before (I had a different flavored saint-honoré from them previously). This is a little delicate for such a long trip, so I took a picture of the other side. I liked this enough to call it great. Coming from a favorite store and being of a type that I haven't designated great are probably big factors, but I'd like to have this again and would recommend it to others.