Paris S'éveille: Citron Vert/Myrtille/Lavande

Did sort of a run down to Paris S'éveille. At least the initial parts of the trip were running, with some stops for photographs of places through the same loop I've been practicing, and will probably continue practicing this week (it's more than 8 km and it takes a few kilometers to get to a starting point), but somewhere past Shibuya Station, I got lazy and mostly walked, because I had the time. I blame congestion from pollen more than the high winds and hills, because I felt, not seriously short of breath, just breathing harder than I wanted to. During the week, I'm usually in more of a hurry, at least at least until I get wherever is selling me pastry or cake.

Paris S'éveille had two new cakes this month, both of the same style, sort of a sliced log of fruit flavors (there are a couple layers of there of biscuit that presumably help keep the layers from sliding around, though I flipped it on its side fairly early on). It's a little gelatinous, which is how you get mousse to hold a shape, which I'm not thrilled by, but not unreasonable so and maybe not more than great cakes of had of other shapes. My cake was Citron Vert/Myrtille/Lavande, so lime, bilberries (or blueberries), and lavender. The other choice was orange, something, and peach. I'm prejudiced against this kind of cake, but I'm rooting for Paris S'éveille, so I hope those balanced out to get a fair evaluation, which was that this is actually an excellent cake, so I'm more optimistic about the orange one (though I should get the Choux desert sometime).

Éclat des Jours: Tarte myrtille

Started a little late, but it was cool, so I ran probably as fast as I ever had to Yoso, 12 km/h average (certainly that speed at the beginning, although I had some timing problems, just because I was stopping and starting suddenly, as the opportunity to cross the street became available), but still about 8 km/h coming back, under increasing rain.

As expected Éclat des Jours' selection was very limited, in terms of fresh cake (there were several attractive pastries), so I took the only thing available, the Tarte Myrtille (453 yen). Unfortunately, bilberries are not very exciting. The tart was competent but did not really do anything to overcome the limitations of bilberries and in the end I find that I can't rate it higher than ok, which ends Éclat des Jours' run at being promoted to a Superb shop.

I'll just have to explore other candidates. Guess I'll have to check whether Ryoco has three cakes that I'd like to try, since they have a three-cake minimum, though of course I could try to time a visit there when I can share. Before that, though, Yu Sasage is at Isetan starting Wednesday, so I'll probably take advantage of that.

Shinjuku History and Culture course

Got up early and ran the Shinjuku History and Culture course. I ran it in the official direction, although maybe I should have run it east to west, to avoid the sun, but I was more worried about avoiding crowds around Shinjuku Station, which was still busy, being the busiest station in the world, and I stand by that decision. There are markers along such routes, but you cannot count on them being easy to find, being correct (I've found ones that were mis-oriented, although not on this route), or even to exist. In my map, the routes are based on 2010 routes, which do not necessarily exactly match the routes shown on the markers, and neither of which necessarily matches where it's legal to cross the road. Today, I couldn't find the start or end marker or any markers west of Shinjuku Station (route 1, from Shinjuku Central Park to Shinjuku Station) except one north of the west entrance. I was under pressure from needing to get back and showered for a 10 am appointment, but no problem. Much of this is my old hill route, which I haven't been doing, so I'm somewhat out of practice on the steep hills, but it was not a big deal (I think: strange lump around my Achilles tendon). Total time from my original start was about 1 35' 17'', but I failed to mark my lap correctly (apparently, my watch lets you stop the chronometer even when displaying time of day, but you can't also advance the lap number). I'll estimate the Shinjuku History and Culture course time today as 53' based on at another 600+ meters my watch showing about 56'30''. I like this route, other going going by the station, but you have to cross somewhere and it shows you a lot of highlights: the center of Tokyo government, Shinjuku Station, Isetan, Meiji Gingu Gaien, Yotsuya Station, Akasaka Mitsuke Station, and various shrines and temples.

Made my appointment, but made the mistake of buying a snack at Doutor (a coffee shop chain store) without reading the ingredients. Margarine--what kind of monsters are they? Although, the butter shortage continues, based on the availability I see in the groceries. I do not know what the deal is. There is cheese, milk, and cream, no problem as far as I know, and yet the butter problems continue for more than a year. Some sort of market breakdown, I assume.

In the afternoon, I went to Lettre d'Amour [Closed], as planned. Rather than the usual course through Meiji Gingu Gaien, down Icho Avenue and through Aoyama Cemetery, I just took the Gaien West Road around just to check whether there was a marker I missed along there in the morning. Coming back, I had intended to taking my usual route, since I was running with cake, but I realized why my first route was smart: Icho Avenue was packed with people viewing the spectacle of leaves changing colors (which I don't really get), so I had to curve around the other way. The map shows the combined day's route, which was 29 km.

The cake is Myrtille for 600 yen, which is supposedly (and basically tastes like) a baked cheese-cake tart with blueberry mouse on top. The confusing part is "myrtille" is the French word for "bilberry", which is related to but different from blueberry. I guess since bilberries can be called "European blueberries", they decided not to make a distinction, so I'll assume the name is correct but the description is not precisely correct. Now I'm doubting whether other "blueberry" cakes are actually bilberry.

The cake is good. I didn't choose it because I thought it would be great, but because I intend to try everything and this was more or less next, working left to right and top to bottom (of course, they move things around) and perhaps skipping varieties I'm not that into and new things that might be temporary, although that's not a general policy of mine. I like cheese cake, but it is not a strong taste, so it is limited. The tart crust was good, the baked cheese cake inside was good, the macron on top was good, and even the slightly gelatinous "blueberry" mousse was good. I'm happy with still saying this is a great shop and was not disappointed by the cake.

Checking Joshi+ Sweet, looks like it got around to Mont-Blanc, so I added it to the map and should give it a try. Since I don't like the cake mont-blanc so much in general and there are many places in Jiyugaoka and I hadn't heard anything about this one, I hadn't visited or planned to visit before now, although I'll see it and looked inside (they are near the station and seem to do a good business).