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Joyeux Noël 2014!!!

(Post from December 2014)

Merry X'Mas everybody!!!

Time to spend with Family & Friends! This year, Christmas time was really busy here. Beside of my daily job, I received many orders, such as loaf cakes and X'Mas cake, but before working on these cakes, I went to Karuizawa with my wife, to relax and escape from Tokyo.

Karuizawa is located in Nagano, at around 1hr (Shinkansen) from Tokyo. This city is famous for its Summer time, to escape the heat of Tokyo, but also for its huge premium outlet. 

During winter, you may enjoy the ski resort (not the best one, but at least closed to accommodation and shopping area. There are also some nice hot springs! 

Pastries done right after my trip.

Halloween Party

(Post from October 2014)

This year, for Halloween, my wife had a Halloween party with her friends. Of course, I couldn't miss that opportunity to experience something new! So, I baked a pumpkin cheesecake. As I thought there would have other things to eat beside of sweets and that I was not sure if everybody at the party liked pumpkin or not, I had to make a light cheesecake mixed with chocolate. 

It happened that everyone loved it and took 2 pieces. It was not heavy at all! The sweetness and smoothness of the pumpkin made it easy to swallow.

The spider next to the cake was eatable. It was made by Sonia, a friend who just gave birth to a very cute 'poupée' - doll (she treats her like a doll, always changing, mix&matching her clothes). 

CONGRATULATIONS SONIA & RACHID!

October post

Here I am, back after few busy weeks at work, but also training for my next marathon that will take place early February next year in Kyushu (Southern Japan). 

During that period, I had the opportunity to taste some of my creations. The reason was that on late August, one of my high school best friends in Paris, who is now living in Boston, came to Tokyo for holidays and to visit me, with her husband and 2 years old boy. They always drooled in front of my website or my Facebook page (well, that's what they said), and had never tried any of my pastries at that time. So, this was the good time! My wife and I invited them to our place for a gathering dinner. As they are chocolate lovers, I decided to make a dark chocolate entremet.

On early September, with my wife, we were invited to my colleague's parents' place in Saitama (Northern Tokyo). A very nice Japanese family who loves traveling and to explore new things. They regularly order many pastries from me without knowing who I was and wanted to meet me, what an honor ! The end of Summer time was approaching, so I wanted to make something original and fresh.

Be careful, the ingredients I used, might seem strange for a pastry combination at first but I was inspired by one of Philippe Conticini tart: Mango, figue, avocado, goat cheese, vanilla, mint leaves and olive oil. The surprising ingredient was of course the goat cheese, but it turned out that a tiny bit of it and particularly fresh made a very good balance with the rest. 

It was not as heavy as it can sound, on the contrary, it was fruity (with the mango and figue), smooth & healthy (avocado and olive oil), fresh (mint leaves) and crusty (almond crust). 

Little Panda for a little baby

A very good friend of mine (let's call her Sayaka) had a request from her friend who wanted to celebrate her baby's first birthday. She wanted a simple cake with strawberry and milk and wanted a "1" written somewhere in the cake. 

I came up with a strawberry mousse, a light vanilla pastry cream and a milky mousse. I covered the cake with an milk icing and decorated it with some almond paste and some chocolate chunks to form a Panda face :)

Request from a Matcha Lover

A friend of my wife ( let's call her Doris) ordered a matcha cheesecake for a daughter who came back from London for holidays. She missed matcha and green color a lot, and wanted something tasty.

The challenging part was the fact that Doris does not like texture of mousse, she's more into dense and crunchy. Her daughter was up with anything as long as it was strong in matcha. So I used my classic recipe of a cheesecake that I flavored with lots of matcha and I topped with a somewhat denser/less airy white chocolate & matcha mousse. To finish up I added a layer of matcha flavored white chocolate.

A note on the pictures: the colors seemed to vary a bit from one pic to another. That's mainly due to the angle and luminosity at which they were taken.

Friend's BDay Party!

Yesterday evening, 3 friends from my running club threw a party at a fish restaurant in Shibuya. 15 of us made it to the rendez-vous.

What would be a birthday party without a birthday cake right? So two days before the event, one of us (let's call her Mika) suggested to get a cake from a bakery shop and bring it to the party to make a surprise. I had a moment of hesitation with only 2 days left and a busy schedule at the same time. But I thought it could be a good challenge so I offered to get the cake from me instead of a random pastry shop. To my great pleasure, they happily accepted :)

As I've been really chocolatey this summer, I wanted to keep the trend but also wanted to bring a summer touch. I immediately thought of the popular combination of Passion fruits and mangos in the form of a light mousse. To which I have added some Madagascar vanilla. For the chocolate cream part, it had to be delicate, a 40% milk chocolate with a caramel note was perfect since the bitterness of a dark chocolate would make a shadow to the fruity part. Then to add a crispy and spongy texture I incorporated a light chocolate brownie and a crunchy praline biscuit in the middle. Finally a final touch of sourness was brought by a puree of Passion fruits, mangos, banana and lemon on the top. And just for the eyes, I topped the cake with a 50% dark chocolate circle with some holes. 4 in total so that the shiny orange fruit puree can be seen. I then added 3 macarons for the 3 birthday friends ! 

In the end the cake weighed almost 3kg, I was a bit afraid there would be some leftover and it wasn't the case, it was gone within a few minutes

Back from Holidays! Many things to update!

Hope everyone had a nice Summer holiday!

As you may noticed, our website hasn't been updated for a while, and we're so sorry about that!

With my wife, we went back to our hometown, Paris, to visit our relatives & friends, to do some sightseeing in our beautiful city and of course, we tasted some famous French pastries and restaurants, such as La Pâtisserie des Rêves, well-known for its Paris Brest as you can see below, but also L'Ambroisie, a 3 stars Michelin, where we celebrated our 2 years Wedding Anniversary.

But, the purpose of our trip to Europe this year, was for our best friend's wedding in Portugal, which was wonderful!!!

The couple is living in Hong Kong for more than 4 years now. Because of their international background, all their guests came from all around the world. It was also a good opportunity for us to see all our common friends, as we are all living in different countries... Anyway: Perfect event for a nice gathering!!! 

The wedding took place in Caldas da Rainha in the north of Lisbon (~1hr by car) from a Friday evening to Sunday afternoon. After the wedding, we had an adventurous road trip with 2 other good friends who were at the wedding too, but living in Hong Kong and Sydney. 

We drove from Caldas da Rainha to Nazaré, to Aveiro, to Porto, then we split in 2 groups as our trip in Portugal was shorter. So we took the train back to Lisbon. The weather, transportation, food, people, were great! So, I will recommend you this country! I don't detail too much here, as the post itself is becoming longer and longer, so if you have any question, put it in the comments!

Once back to Japan, we left Tokyo for a weekend with some runner friends. We went to hike the second highest mountain Alps after Mount Fuji. It was an intense effort, but really worth it!

Potluck Party @ Mami's Place

On last Wednesday, Doris had a Potluck party at her friend's English School in Hiroo. To celebrate the opening of the school, they ordered a cake and let me decided whatever I wanted to do.

So I did a pistachio cheesecake covered by a lime and lemon mousse.


Father's Day!

Sunday 15, June, was Father's Day in Japan. 

Doris, a friend of my wife wanted to celebrate this special day with her daughter and husband. I had the opportunity to meet her and her husband, an exceptional, very funny and happy couple.

Doris' husband likes fruity and sour flavor, not too sweet, not creamy, not even chocolate. He's not really into sweets and pays lots of attention on what he eats. It was the first time they ordered a desert from me so I had to make sure I come up with something that goes with their taste. After asking Doris more precisely what she wanted, she said "not too sweet, not too fatty and vegetarian if possible"... Well, I jokingly told her "if you remove sugar, butter, and eggs... the only thing left is flour and water, so you basically want me to bake a piece of bread for you?" She eventually gave up and trusted me on what to do :P

So I came up with something very fruity and delicate. A mix of exotic fruits - Passion fruits and Vanilla mascarpone mousse - a layer of cooked coconut and almond custard cream and a almond streusel (egg free almond crispy crust). The whole thing topped raspberry jelly to enhance the sourness and balance they strong taste of coconut.

 

A Birthday Cake before my First Ultra-Marathon

This post was supposed to be posted earlier this week, but I was in Hida Takayama 飛騨高山 in Gifu 岐阜 for my first Ultra-Marathon (100km).

Just to tell you a bit if you plan to go to Japan,  Hida Takama is a very beautiful, charming and friendly area, in the North of Nagoya and around 4-5hrs from Tokyo. It is also well-known for Historic Village of Shirakawa-go, one of Japan's UNESCO World Heritage Sites.

On that weekend, I escaped the rainy days of Tokyo. The day of my race was sunny and hot. I managed to finish it in 8h58 and ranked 15th among 1,640 runners. The course was very difficult, 2707m of cumulative elevation difference and the temperature peaked at 28 degrees. For a first time, I was very proud and happy with my result. Then, I enjoyed the rest of the day in a very nice Rotenburo (an outdoor hot spring) surrounded by mountains. The place for that outdoor public bath in the middle of the nature was meticulously planned by my lovely wife who took care of the whole logistics and who came to cheer me. 

Ok now back to the cake :)

My biggest fan, Sayaka asked me to do something chocolaty. My favorite type of cake ! It was to celebrate two birthday at the same time,  so lots of pressure on me. I know that her daddy likes it intense, her younger brother likes milk chocolate, and Sayaka and her mum like fruits and dark chocolate. So I came up with a cake with a Praline and chocolate base, a raspberry and dark chocolate mousse, an orange and milk chocolate cream and some dark chocolate chunks. The final result was a very intense chocolaty desert, balanced with a bit of sourness brought by the raspberries and the orange I have added. Finally, to add some crunchy/crispiness I have added some caramelized hazelnuts in a thin layer of milk chocolate ganache !

Birthday Party!

Last Sunday, with some members of my running club, we celebrated Bob's  & my birthday. Bob is the Founder/Captain of the club. I turned 31 and he turned 67. So it is always an honor for me to celebrate my birthday with him. For this reason I wanted to make a very good impression with a nice cake.

So I started to think of a design 3 weeks before and made lots of drawing each time I had some spare time. I wanted to have a strong Chocolate flavor combined with a nutty touch. Also I wanted to play with the textures as much as possible, having some crunchiness, softness, melting sensation. I have always loved the powerful duet of chocolate and hazelnut, a very masculine taste, but they are so strong together that I thought I could bring a note of sourness, a hint of femininity. The passion fruit and vanilla sounded like the ideal duet. In the form of a very light mousse with no added sugar, it would bring the perfect contrast.

 

After hours of drawing, I finally came up with this!

After hours of drawing, I finally came up with this!

As we were supposed to celebrate with my running club mates, after a 10k road race along Arakawa river (north side of Tokyo) in the premature brutal heat of pre-summer (30 deg). The cake needed to be big enough to satisfy 17 starving runners !

This was the last slice, the cake disappeared in less than 10 minutes :-)  (98 is the sum of our age)

Our Website is finally launched!

Why this blog and why you must follow us?

It often happens that I suddenly want to try something new, so I will share the pictures here instead of the website itself, as one said 'experimenting' means it might look 'experimental'. 

So, feel free to have a look here from time to time and share your comments! The more I get your feedback, the more it will help me to improve!

À bientôt!