Meiji Gingu Gaien course: canelé

Just a training/body-testing run today, about 4 km total, 1.2 km of which was 10 km/h interspersed with some 8 km/h, with the final 1.5 km at 9 km/h to Marusho supermarket to get milk for canelé to use the yoke left over from yesterday's experimental cake component, which was just egg white and almond powder (basically, just an almond, unsweetened shortbread, so it was just a base). I suspect that there was an error in the book that left out more sugar that went in with the almond powder.

I include a picture of the canelé I made because these are actually new: I got a regular mold (maybe 60 ml?), so even you bake it until the outside is brown, it's still custard-like in the middle (and you can taste the rum), unlike the mini-canelés. This should tide me over as far as homemade until Friday, when I plan to make carob brownies (tomorrow, I want to run to Ginza for patisserie cake).

I should also mention that I had another chocolate from Henri le Roux that was excellent, this time the Goma (sesame), which is seasonal. Haven't had a bad one yet, though I have avoided the coffee ones and stuck to the dark coated chocolate ones. I'll do milk chocolate before coffee.

Henri le Roux (Tokyo Midtown): Kouign Amann Yuzu Matcha

Took a short run to Tokyo Midtown for the first time in a long while to visit the Henri Le Roux there, where they have kouign amann. Round trip, it's only about 6 km total, and was on the low side of 9 km/h (I don't count the vertical distance from using the pedestrian overpass twice, which is about 40 steps high). As the seasonal flavor, they just changed over to the Yuzu Matcha (powdered green tea). These are small but only 324 yen. This one was only okay. I might have gone with "good", but I was not fond of the green tea aftertaste. The yuzu was particularly detectable over the caramel taste. On the other hand, I count this as a pastry, so it does not penalize them as a great cake shop.

More importantly, I've been wrong about them: they do have cake at the Midtown store (although getting it before it sells out is a separate issue), which of course they do: they have an eat-in space. This evening, they only had one cake left around 19:30, but I should have noticed before that they have cake (the hard part is not noticing, it's retaining any memory after running). The more important information for me is they have a supposedly exclusive cake there that is only available as eat in (and is 900+ yen), so I'll definitely go back. I was planning to go to Midtown for dining over the next holiday weekend already, but I'm going to want to change the target now to them.

Tomorrow is baking, although it might just be canele to free up some eggs whites, though really I want brownies: too many competing recipes.

Viron: Éclair Chocolat

Because I needed to visit a post office on a Sunday, I switched to going to Viron today, which is one building down from the Tokyo central post office, just across from Tokyo Station. My running was almost exactly 9 km/h the whole 10 km of the trip, though the first kilometer probably started slower, peaked above, and then settled back down. This also marks an expansion, finally, of my one-week  9 km-equivalent distance (not including the 21 km of padding to credit my routine walking) from 35.2 km on the 12th to 39.2 km today. Tomorrow, I'll take that to 40.8 km, if things go as planned, and stay about there for the next week, which I've already tentatively planned out through Saturday, though I'm not sure about Sunday, when I could expand to a 15 km run, though my only idea for a destination is Dalloyau and that's not enough to do an extra loop around the imperial moat course, although I could do a lap around the Akasaka Palace course, which I haven't done for quite a while. Also, there is a holiday on the first Thursday of November where I'm not busy in the morning but will be after that through the weekend, so I should probably do something special then, too, maybe get out to a new place that takes 15 km.

Unfortunately, I didn't see the new cakes that I thought I saw last time (so I'll need to try going a different time of day or day of the week, though it could just be that the other new cakes I saw were at the ends of their seasonal runs), so I settled for the Éclair Chocolat. It was definitely good, but I struggled between giving it the benefit of the doubt and calling it "excellent" and calling it just "good", and also possibly designating it not cake. Ultimately, I decided to go with good and cake, which still leaves Viron as a "near-great" shop, just closer to falling off that list. My complaint is that, though the chocolate custard (or cream; it wasn't obvious to me which) was definitely good, the crust was not as crispy as I expected. That's probably by design, since Japanese like their "choux" cream puffs (which Viron also had) soft, so it I'm not sure that the dough they use can even be called choux dough (though choux cream puffs in Japan still look like cabbage regardless of whether they are the soft kind or the crisp kind). This was also reflected in that this éclair was injection-filled through multiple holes in the bottom rather than being piped between to separate pieces. Of course, I'm not an expert on paté a choux and they're a pretty high-class place, so I expect that this éclair is without the normal range (i.e., not a doughnut with pretensions). On the plus side, it's only 432 yen with tax, so int terms of cost and calories, it makes up for the overindulgence of Saturday.

Au Bon Vieux Temps: La France & Mogador

Cycled to Au Bon Vieux Temps in Oyamadai again and got two cakes, which was a mistake. I did multiple cakes by myself early on, justifying it with the exercise, but it's too much. I tried to think carefully in choosing, since I don't expect everything from even near-great places to be to my liking, but I've had their regulars already and I'm not that thrilled by their fancy little fruit tarts. As it turns out, I choose two very similar things, but I think I've had another similar thing to both of these before, but apparently not recently enough to post on it, because I can't find any other mention of chocolate mousse (which they use in a lot of things) and raspberry. These were 648 yen each, so also more than I originally planned to spend. Didn't see their little potato-shaped one for 300 yen this time.

The cakes were La France, which is a mousse cube bounded by a thin layer of solid chocolate under a layer of raspberry jelly, with some more raspberry chocolate filling in the middle. There is also a little solid chocolate cup on top filled with raspberry sauce, which I was surprised was not spilled by a couple kilometers by bicycle to get to a park. This was excellent. The solid chocolate is a good choice to avoid having just a gummy raspberry layer, although, of course, it breaks into pieces when you eat it.

The other cake was a block of chocolate mousse with thin layers of raspberry on top of a layer of what, phonetically, was written li/ri oh le/re, which I did not recognize as the French "riz au lait", which of course means rice pudding (in this case, baked, or at least allowed to set up solid). The raspberry and mousse were essentially the same as the other cake, and were good. The rice pudding was supposed to be flavored with jasmine, though even trying to eat alone, I couldn't detect anything. It was okay at the time, although not really useful except as a base, but the after-texture, if there is such the thing, I did not like (rubbery pieces of rice pudding rice grain pieces in nooks of my mouth). Still it was not bad, but I'll try to avoid such rice pudding based cakes in the future. Still, with one excellent cake to partially balance things out, I'll keep treating them as a near-great shop and eventually get back there for a 12th cake, though I'll need several cakes from various other great and near-great places before I'll ready to do that.

Frédéric Cassel, Tarte Halloween

Well, I was reasonably successful tonight, although not everything went perfectly. For the run, I was going too fast, with the first kilometer closer to 10 km/h, although I got the rest of the way out down to closer to 9 km/h. Was a little tired from yesterday, so fatigue is starting to become a factor at these speeds. On the way back, it's more uphill (though the elevation difference is still only tens of meters over 5 kilometers), and the strong wind was against me, so I just barely got it closer to 8 km/h. Tomorrow I'll rest, not only because of wanting to stay within my running budget (which is now about 40 km/week at 9 km/h), but because I'll go out several hours early on Saturday.

The cake was the Tarte Halloween from Frédéric Cassel at Ginza Mitsukoshi for their usual 756 yen. This is a chocolate ganache tart with passion fruit. I had trouble identifying the fruit when eating it and convinced myself that it was yuzu, since that's a theme this week, but I can't remember what passion fruit tastes like. Not something I've worked with or had growing up (or yuzu, either). Whatever it was, it was strong and acidic and they seemed to balancing that by a lot of sugar, so that the chocolate didn't have much of a chance. It was good, but I wasn't really into the super sweet citrus taste. This is the first cake of theirs that I didn't think was at least excellent, but they are still number two with me, after Jean-Paul Hevin, for new cakes. But, also, the orange layer on the outside was gummier than I like. This cake matches a trend I've seen more in bakery goods, that things made to meet a design goal usually aren't anything special on the taste side (usually, because they're for children). Unfortunately, I'm down to the holiday specials at Dalloyau, I think, although they have "choux" creme cubes, but though I may ultimately try one, I don't need to consider it a cake if it turns out to be basically a bread creme puff. Anyway, if Sweet Sonobe is willing to try the Dalloyau pumpkin cake, I am, although I think I'll try the ghost-shaped apple (?) one first.

(P.) Porte Bonheur: closed

Yesterday, I worked late, so ran today, to Porte Bonheur in Bunkyou ward. It is supposed to be open 10:00 to 20:00 Tuesday to Sunday according to Tabelog, which is the only detailed information I have (homepage and Facebook page are not helpful), but they were actually closed and there was no sign on the door suggesting that this was unusual. Didn't have any backup, although Atelier Kohta along Karugazaka was still open, but I was okay with just eating another of my macaron stash when I got home. Maybe I'll try Porte Bonheur again some time when I'm on my way somewhere else. L'Essentielle is nearby, but it would have to be a weekend (they close at 1900), or Heritier over in Hakusan would work, though I'd normally choose an easier route. Anyway, I'll go to Mitsukoshi Ginza or Dalloyau (or there are other backups open until 21:00) tomorrow, I hope, so I'll recover. And maybe I'll get an extra cake from Au Bon Vieux Temps Saturday, since they are inconveniently far for my current running level and some of their cakes are pretty small.

Running was okay. Just on the 9 km/h side going and slightly less, so on the 8 km/h side, coming back: 8+ km total distance.

Gaien Walk

Decided to do the Gaien Walk, for the hills, rather than the track, although it crosses through the middle of the track on it's southern most segment. This involved about 5 km total, most of it on the Gaien Walk itself, averaging closest to 9 km/h, even with some steep slopes here and there. The reward at home was finishing off the mini canele supply.

Meiji Memorial Picture Gallery in Meijijingu Gaien.

Opposite view from in front of Meiji Memorial Picture Gallery.