Higuma Doughnuts x Coffee Wrights: Cinnamon & Sugar Doughnut

Sunday morning, I went around Jinguumae on the way to some neighborhood running course loop (I think the Jinguumae 5&6), to try to complete my visits to all the food sites I put on the Jinguumae Kita-Aoyama north loop. The first thing I ate was a cake-shi (but soft/fresh/fluffy) one from Burnside Street Cafe/B Portland Cafe. It was excellent, as a fresh doughnut, but only because they heat up a plain one or fry on the spot and add the topping, so it's a restaurant, and not really a running stop (took a few minutes). I get to check them off as visited, but now I know that I didn't need to.

Actually, on the way, I stopped at what I thought would be (and might still be named) Tournage in Jinguumae 2 (versus their east shop), but I was informed that actually the shop was now an organic cafe and this was their first day with new staff. This seems to be Sunday Co-bo Kafe, so I guess just a Sunday thing and maybe I didn't get or understand the full explanation. They had soup, so it's not just baked goods. I went, not because I've never had anything from them, but because I'd never had a fresh pastry from them, but the new version didn't have pastries. They were nice though, so I bought a strawberry jam based yeast cake (basically, a coffee-cake), which was definitely good. (It didn't have a card, so I don't have a name, as they just described it rather than claiming a name.) Hope it works out for them, despite their terrible timing to open a cafe (but they can sell takeout).

The other new shop I visited was Higuma Doughnuts x Coffee Wrights. This place does count as a running site, because the donuts are already made and kept warm. I got the Sugar & Cinnamon Doughnut. It was good as a doughnut, but this was a yeast doughnut that squished to nothing when you bit into it, though I guess that's really the best a yeast doughnut is going to do.

Cake-off: Jean-Paul Hévin's Mille-feuille Chocolat over Frédéric Cassel's Mont Blanc Jewel

Sunday was a big day for running and cake. First, after doing my indoor workout, I ran to Ginza Mitsukoshi and got both cakes for the cake-off; Mille Feuille Chocolat from Jean-Paul Hévin and Mont Blanc Jewel from Frédéric Cassel. This was a third-round cake-off between two one-and-one seasonal cakes (the JPH for just 2 weeks this time but probably FC's will stick around through Christmas, I would imagine, but I'm not sure).

For running, I made my fourth attempt at running the Daita--Daizawa--Hatagaya--Kamiyama-chou--Kitazawa--Motoyoyogi-chou--Nishihara--Ooyama-chou--Shouto--Tomigaya--Uehara loop from memory, which is about 22 km long, plus a few kilometers to get there and the few kilometers that I had already run to Ginza. On the way, I noticed that I was in the right time window and there wasn't a huge line at Haritts Donuts & Coffee in Uehara, so I stopped (and waited for a couple people ahead of me) and got, I think, the Choco Plain (Donut), which despite being plain, has sugar (but not icing) on it. This is a very lightly fried, very spongy donut, though not as course a sponge as a typical yeast donut and definitely an improvement on various other donut shops, but not so exciting that I need a return trip.

Despite haven't gotten more than half way the first three attempts and making another course change that I never done even in early bicycle attempts, I was able to do it clockwise. Real time was just over 3 hours, which isn't bad considering stops (the longest to wade through the crowd to get to a shop near Shimo-Kitazawa station and back to take a picture for a site on a future side loop). I'll probably try counterclockwise next weekend, since I have three days.

The cake-off was somewhat anticlimactic. Like the previous round with the Mont Blanc Jewel, I couldn't sense why I had originally put it on the list (probably because at the time it was a mont-blanc with most of the chestnut task masked by fruit), so the Mille Feuille Chocolat, which was definitely better, wins and the Mont Blanc Jewel gets demoted to semi-great, which is still a high rating. Not sure what new cakes next month will bring out, but if nothing else, I can do what might be the last third-round of two-time winners.

Cake-off; Bien-être's Pistachio & Grapefruit Chiboust over L'Abricotier's Sicilien Figue

Saturday was cake-off day this weekend. I wasn't sure about Bien-être, which doesn't open until 11 a.m., so I first ran out to around Hatsudai to take some pictures of sights in that area for my neighborhood map. I've decided that my priority in doing (one-way) neighborhood runs is how many loop courses out they are, counting fro Samonchou, so I'll get to this one before Hiroo (though actually I went there because I could end up at Bien-être by a reasonable path). Too hot really, so I only ran about 30 minutes before it became almost completely walking and taking pictures. Got to Bien-être at opening (they don't actually have a sign to flip, just the other people outside didn't seem that intent so I just went in at 11 sharp and ordered my cake. Went to L'Abricotier by train for Sicilien Figue, which still involved walking a ways in the heat.

This was another pistachio cake comparison, this time a second-round contest between first-round losers, and this time I could confirm that the grapefruit went with the pistachio and choose the Bien-être cake for the win. Since the flavors were similar, it was hard to tell whether the other cake needed to be in the great list at all, so I've put the L'Abricotier on notice, so to speak.

In the evening, I went running again, a one-way run down to immediately north of Shibuya station, which I haven't run before, even as a local test run (without doing neighborhood paths the long way). I had to walk a lot of the new crowded bits and double-check my map, but it was fine. I reminded me that I have an untried local cake shop down there that I can use as a back-up some time (probably won't need it this week). It was maybe 100 minutes of running. Huge crowd around the Gaien Stadium due to people coming out of a fireworks competition (on the outbound, the streets weren't too crowded, but I was unfortunate with the wind and it got pretty smoky in one part, and of course noisy for quite a while). I should mention that I stopped for a large, very expensive, just okay doughnut (Van Houten Chocolate...) from Good Town Doughnuts and Coffee, so don't do that.

P. Asako Iwayanagi: Crème Chocolat Caramel Cake

Still cycling today, for a rare visit to a new place out near Todoroki Station on the street running parallel to the tracks, Patisserie Asako Iwayanagi. It's a new shop with a new feel and the clientele seemed a little too upscale (groups of ladies) and the clerk, or maybe it was Ms. Iwayanagi, spoke too formally for how I was dressed, so I didn't try to eat in, which is why the cake is not presented as well as it could have been. I've always had trouble finding a park in this part of town, so instead I was on a little mound with some sort of archaeological significance, although I was not the only one crammed into the green space there, probably for the same reason: nowhere else to go walk the dog (one person) or escape the house (assuming the old guy who was washing his feet at the bathroom at the base when I arrived was not just a local homeless guy, as I first thought). But I digress.

The cake I choose was the oddly named Crème Chocolat Caramel Cake, or maybe I'm making it French for no reason and it's Cream Chocolate Caramel Cake. It was 626 yen for a caramel crème brûlée above chocolate cream above chocolate sponge cake. It was good, but probably not a good choice for me, since it's not sweet or nutty. However, I don't respect soft sponge cake, so I'm going to assume that this is not the place for me. But the shop is sophisticated, so I would probably try again if it were more convenient for me, so it may actually be excellent.

I kept my greed more in check than yesterday and rather than get something pricier at Au Bon Vieux Temps, along the street to Oyamadai Station I stopped in at Vent de Ludo, a new (although I suspect there was something similar there before) bakery café that looked pretty nice. The selection was not exceptional, but the chocolate doughnut was kept in a refrigerated case (with some other fancier things) and was good for 140 yen. Better the Seven Eleven, but not dramatically (nor dramatically different in price).

Cooking today was an attempt at chocolate madeleines, but they were not an improvement on brownies. I should get some lemon zest or a workable substitute next time for normal madeleines, although I've had the scary/wild idea to try ｓansho, which is potentially a literally electrifying idea. Need to get some granulated sugar before I try anything with that recipe again, though.