Maison g Tokyo: Fromage Cru and Manjari

Had some time in the middle of the day, so I wanted to do a training run of two laps around the imperial moat course at 11.0 km/h, but was still feeling tired from yesterday's run (when I was still tired from the day before's sprints). It ended up being one lap (5 km) at 12.0 km/h, just barely (by a few seconds seconds). I got 30 seconds ahead early on (from the 3.5 km), on the downhill part and need them on the back end.

For cake, I visited Isetan again and took advantage of Maison g Tokyo's special cakes (so many, that I'm suspecting the actual shop has a small selection). These were their Fromage Cru and Manjari (for 540 and 648 yen). The first is rare cheese cake, and had a thin fruit layer that looked like fig, though I couldn't tell. The other is named for chocolate of the famous brand Vorhona and was chocolate mousse, cream, and buiscuit (I think; the memory is fading) that was raspberry flavored, but much better balanced than my recent macaron ganache. Both of these were excellent, I think. Sorry for the shadow; I was in a hurry, as I was also heating water for coffee and tea (I didn't each two pieces alone).

So finally I have another candidate shop for the "excellent" Tokyo Patisserie list that could stay past the first cake (which I'm willing to accept, though I had been going for getting three cakes each). Still need Octobre or 14 Juillet Tokyo to pan out to really have 30 excellent shops from which I can select about 10 to be my third-tier Tokyo cake shops, after "supreme" and "superb".

14 Juillet Tokyo: Pensee

Since Sweet Sonobe posted on 14 Juillet Tokyo, I figured I might as well try it. Also, I want to go to lunch around there Saturday morning, so I wanted scope out options in the Shin Marunouchi Building and Marunouchi Building, though mostly I just looked at the latter, since I found my cake shop before many restaurants.

The run there was a fast 12 km/h, whereas the return trip was a reasonable (for carrying cake) 10 km/h, for a today of about 11 km. I didn't run yesterday, so I was in the mood. I'm busy this weekend, so I'll probably have a lot of budget for long runs at the beginning of the week, but not now. When I've got 21 km to use on a weekday, I'd like to get down to Paris S'éveille again, this time for cake. I can just barely get there, if I'm not too busy with work, which lately I often am.

The cake was Pensee (パンセ; 470 yen), which is almond cocoa biscuit sandwiching a little raspberry jam. Sorry, must not have hit the "flower" setting on my camera, so it looks a little fuzzy. It was definitely good cake, but it took me a while to convince myself that it was excellent. It certainly isn't as complex or rich as my usual favorite cakes, but it isn't light and it's well balanced between the chocolate and raspberry. I can certainly see times when this is exactly what I would want or trying to make it myself (if I were any good at making cakes, which I'm not), and that makes it excellent cake. Also, it's a first cake from them, so they get the benefit of the doubt. It was certainly much better than I was expecting, though I haven't heard anything bad about them (or really any cake shop, except from myself).

Pierre Hermé: Mille-feuille Plénitude

Decided it was time to go back to the basics with the superb shops that reliably give me great or at least excellent cake. I got the Mille-feuille Plénitude (ミルフィユ プレニチュード; 864) from Pierre Hermé. This is pretty extreme, being a mille-feuille with a fairly thick top layer of caramelized pastry leaves and some lower down, chocolate with fleur de sel (fancy sea salt), two layers (as the main filling) of chocolate mascarpone cheese cream, and caramel-based layer (the word they gives seem to be only used by them, カラメルモワルゥ (karamerumowaruu), but is a kind of caramel gelatin and is fine. It was very good and I appreciated it, but in the end I'm not sure that it was special. Certainly, it's complex and full of good things and the components work together well, so I'm going to give it the benefit of the doubt and say excellent. It's pretty expensive, but then there is a lot of it, so it's not unreasonable, even if it is more than I need.

The run was over to the imperial moat course for one lap (5 km). This was not so much a training run in terms of training my body but training for pacing myself on that track, where there are markers every 100 m, but I'm not sure about how accurate they are and I can't read the distance off them like at Meiji Jingu Gaien, so I had to research about where some of the 0.5 km and 1.0 km intervals are relative to where I start. I also tried counting markers as I went, but ended up with one extra one (assuming there are 50). My goal was just +11.0 km/h on the course, which I did, and my run there seemed to be similar, but going back was slower and I was only around 10 km/h. I'm near my current running budget limit, and will remain so through the weekend, it looks like. Currently that means about 69 km/week at 12 km/h (my actual raw distance is now 72.2 km and should break 75 km tomorrow, as I replace last Saturday's fairly fast intervals by a leisurely run down to Hiroo area). Sunday's plan is slightly less than last week, 28 km, which will let me do reconnaissance on two shops for future cake comparisons (maybe in two weeks) and then bring me back paste Octobre to try a new shop (for me) that's not available on a weekday.

Jean-Paul Hévin: Macaron Chocolat a l'Ancienne, Feuilletine Praliné

Was at Tokyo Midtown and picked up pieces of the two cakes I haven't blogged yet (but I've had multiple times before): Macaron Chocolat a l'Ancienne (マカロン ショコラ　ア ランシエンヌ, 699 yen) and Feuilletine Praliné (フィユティーヌ プラリネ, 624 yen). These are "Saisonnier", but regulars. The first is just what it sounds like, a cake-sized macaron of dark chocolate with extra dark chocolate around it as decoration. As a macaron, it is on the dry side, both the filling, which is pretty solid, and the shell part, but as cake it is decadently chocolaty. I'm going to say this is great, but I can't be objective about it and actually I've had times when I was tired of it from getting it too often. I really need to compare it to something else.

But the second doesn't really help, because I like it about the same. It's similar in being meringue, though is very airy (it's hard to cut and keep the dome intact when you're trying to split it with someone) compared to the crisp shell of the macaron ancienne and it's milk chocolate, along with the obvious nuts, but one has the same impression of eating something more decadent than a usual cake, though still more substantial than a mousse cake. I'll also say this is great and look forward to comparing with other great cakes. These put me at 26 cakes posted for JPH, so it's going to take a while for me to catch up with other shops, probably next year, but I'm getting close. I don't recall there being that many more regular seasonal cakes. Perhaps there will be a couple new weekend-only specials for the holidays. Still, there's the one coffee-flavored cake over at Marunouchi, which I will give a try for the sake of completeness.

I ran later, over to the imperial moat and around once. Not many people at 8 pm on a Sunday night. Passed one couple going the other way twice, which is a first, I think, and means they presumably left the course on the north end and ran on the other side of the road for that part, since it's narrow and marked as one way, the one part that is. Also on the north end, it was a little unsettling having someone running behind me, matching my pace, for about the last quarter of the 5 km loop, but the north end is pretty lonely (though there are police stationed a couple places along there), so I don't blame her for preferring to have someone else in sight. I'm rotating through my injuries and have come around to having some foot pain (and I walked a lot today, thus Tokyo Midtown), so I was focusing on rolling heel to toe rather than just straight-legging it pendulum-like. My first kilometer might actually have been closest to only 7 km/h, but the average to the course was 8 km/h, and the course and coming back made it into 9 km/h territory. I've having to adjust my planned course down to remain within my budget. I'm going to try a 16 km run on Wednesday, which is a holiday, but still want to get back to Asterisque this week. Tomorrow I'll hit Isetan for a second Le Jardin Bleu cake and do some training running, which is relatively short distance, if there isn't heavy rain.

Imperial moat course and Shiseido: Amaretto Raisin

Got my cake first, from the Shiseido Parlour counter at Isetan. I'm not sure whether they have cake at any of their other outlets. Haven't see it if they have. I got the Amaretto Raisin for 453 yen, which is reasonable. They only have a few cakes and the milli feuille, mont-blanc, short cake, and shu cream (puff) are usually going to be among them, so not a huge selection, but worth being aware of.

Jogged comfortably over the the imperial moat course and timed myself for one lap: 25'38''09, which is consistent with my best times elsewhere, even using my older heavy shoes. Special features of the course are that, starting from the middle of the west side, where Shinjuku Road runs into it and there's a park and a guard post, it's at its steepest going downhill. It's maybe flat along the south side, but then turns to a steady uphill for the next half the course, even after you turn the corner onto the west side from the north. Also, it's crowded, although I didn't run into huge problems. At one corner, there were a couple people holding signs promoting some race Jan 29, so maybe it was the Shinjuku half marathon, although I didn't recognize that as what they were saying.

Back home, I had the Amaretto Raisin, which is named for the liquor, which it has, but it was not noticeably alcoholic. I didn't know it was so I asked, which made the clerk look it up. Actually, what she told me was apricots, which is what amaretto is made from, that and almonds usually, I guess. Actually, she confirmed last that I was okay with it having alcohol before finalizing the sale: she's not irresponsible. Now, if only clerks did that for things with coffee in them. Lots of fruit in this cake, including raisins, of course, with just an outer wrapping of mousse, which worked for me: excellent cake. I'll have to go back and read the description, but I wonder if the actual outer bottom cake part (which is shy of 1 cm thick, I think) reminded me of ginger, although maybe that's the Amaretto flavor. Counter is worth keeping an eye on.

Still got a couple counters at Isetan that I definitely need to blog/add to the map, and maybe a few others that I might eventually. Oh, and there's Rose Bakery on the third floor: I assume that you can get takeout from there.