Cake-off: Paris S'éveille's Saint Honoré Caramel over Origines Cacao's Tarte Caramel Chocolat

Started off trying to get a cake from JPH at Isetan for a cake-off, but they've changed the line-up mid-February, despite what I was told in January. Unfortunately, the change doesn't bring back one that I was looking for, but I'm not sure how stable the line-up is now, so I should probably check to see whether they slip anything else in in coming weeks before the text announced change (Tonka remains).

I stuck with my plan for the other cake in the cake-off, the Paris S'éveille's Saint Honoré Caramel. On the way, I dropped by the Tokyo Mid-Town JPH, just in case they had it (that was where they told me, after a long search through records, that it would be around until Feb. 28), they had switched the line-up there too. I also stopped at the chocolate shop Chapon and saw that that it had some café customers, so I guess they're okay. For the Paris S. cake, it's hard to get because they make it in the afternoon (when I asked once, they said could get it it 1 pm, but it seemed like even that was hurrying things), apparently. This time I was there just after 14:00, and there were a couple left, so they don't seem excited about making a lot of them. For convenience, I went to the opposite end of the shopping area there in Jiyuugaoka and got the Tarte Caramel Chocolat from Origines Cacao.

I was not thinking ahead of time that I wanted to compare two caramel cakes, but that's the way it turned out. It took a little bit to recognize the greatness, but I definitely got there with Saint Honoré Caramel by half way through. Usually I can judge each cake on its merits, but I think the fact that I had the saint honoré Caramel meant that it was harder to appreciate the Tarte Caramel Chocolat. It's definitely excellent, but I didn't feel that the chocolate was especially complementary to the caramel, whereas the small amount of nuts with the saint honoré were. I just don't need the former if I have the latter. However, the tart won its previous round, so it will get another chance in the third round. So the Saint Honoré Caramel gets its second cake-off win in a row and I'll probably get to its third round within the next month or so. As far as a follow-up to Paris S., I was one cake ahead (some weekend when I didn't have another distance shop in mind) already, and the three untested cakes  I saw today were all coffee-flavored, so I think I'll wait a while.

Cake-off: Origines Cacao's Tarte Caramel Chocolat over Frédéric Cassel's Mille-feuille Finger Kaki

Friday, which was Labor Thanksgiving Day, I was free most of the day, so I took a long run, which ended up as 3.50 hours of running, which is the longest for a while. There was some walking and several photography stops, plus 4 snack, but most of it was a one-way neighborhood course run, so not a lot of waiting at lights until the end, when I headed from near the US Embassy to Ginza.

I did a lot of loops together, so it took so long. On the way, I headed down to Roppongi 7 again, because I had forgotten to verify a shrine. On the way back, I stopped at Mercedes Me, which is a café at the Mercedes dealer across from Tokyo Midtown, for the first snack. I got their Pain aux Raisins, which was good, though on the dry side.

Once  I got back to the main route, I could do the newly added Akasaka 8 loop, added to pick up a little park on the corner next to the elementary school. There is also a cake shop on the north end, but I think I went in too early (though the door was open), as there was nothing on display at all except samples of top designs. It's a place for decorator cakes, so I don't know yet whether they have anything ready to eat, though it's also a café, or whatever the guy there can manage, looked like. I also reconfirmed that I know the Akasaka 7 loop. Together they form a sort of shortcut across the main Akasaka-Azabudai-Roppongi-Toranomon loop, though that day I was doing the full loops back to where I started and didn't want to run twice over the same part of a loop, so I stuck to the main loop. I also reconfirmed the Motoaksaka loop and took the link up along the Akasaka Palace grounds to visit the Yotsuya East loop, though I was blocked by people directing traffic for people visiting the palace, so that part wouldn't be allowed by my rules if they were normally there. From there, I did the Akasaka 3 loop, and then over to the Nagatachou loop (though I had to double back to fix an error on the far side of the loop, since I turned to soon). From there, I went up north and did the Hirakawachou-Kioichou loop and took the long detour around Sophia University to get to my tiny Koujimachi loop, which is the farthest out on the course of the places I visited, so it's definitely out of order in terms of distance but was convenient to the other loops I was doing. After returning to Akasaka, I followed the main course down to the final loop to confirm, what I call the Akasaka east loop, which is just north of the U.S. Embassy Tokyo.

On the way there, I stopped at the Pierre Gagnaire shop and got a Pain au Chocolat. To be honest, I had eaten most of it before realizing it (because I was thinking of something else, not because I wolfed it down, which would have made quite a mess, since it had fairly delicate layering). But I'm fairly sure that it was excellent, which is why I wasn't thinking so much about it.

From there, I ran to Ginza, got my cakes, and returned home by train. I was tired, so after I organized them on the plate, my hands weren't too steady and there was an accident, so no pictures. Some caramel was lost, but I was still able to do the first-round cake-off for these too recently tried cakes and declare that I like the caramel chocolate tart best, though in my condition I was noticing that I could have used a higher drink-to-sugar ratio.

Origines Cacao, Tarte Caramel Chocolat

I'm so behind on blogging because the giant loop in the west end of my neighborhood running map has be completely reorganizing it, which has taken days. I've at least done enough to make it usable for picking out targets, at least, though I'm still also way behind on uploading photos.

Way back on Tuesday, because all the higher priority shops either did not have anything new or I had visited within the last month, I went ran out to Origines Cacao at Ginza 6 for new cake. The Tarte Caramel Chocolat is at least temporarily back in the line-up, so I got that. I've never had it before, but it seemed similar to more than one great cakes I've gotten there (and not seen since). I was rewarded by a great cake, well balanced against caramel and chocolate, which harmonized well together. The fact that I wanted a new great cake for the next cake-off might have affected my judgement, but I hope not. I should say that I haven't confirmed yet whether I have the name correct, or it's actually Tarte Chocolat Caramel, not that that matters.