Chocolate Heaven In One Fine Cake Form (2007-01-29)
I went past Jean-Paul Hevin Chocolatier many times on the basement level in Isetan Department Store in Shinjuku (
). The
store looks super swanky and sleek, and there is always a suited man
who opens the door for customers as if it's not a chocolate shop but a
high-class jewelry store. I never thought of going inside to
check out their chocolates even though I had wanted to see what their
1000-Yen-a-chocolate (that's almost US 10 bucks for one tiny piece of
chocolate, people) looked like.One weekend KL and I arrived at Omotesando (
)Hills (mall) several
minutes before they opened (had no idea they open at 11 am which is
kinda late for a mall to start its operation on a Saturday). We
only wanted to go to the bank in the mall and didn't plan on window
shopping, but I spotted chocolate from the corner of my eye in a shop
to the
right side as soon as I
stepped inside the building. You know, CHOCOLATE. How could
we not have a peek? Whao, the name Jean-Paul Hevin is
everywhere. We'd wandered into his shop!
The shop is quite small displaying a limited varieties of cakes and
chocolates in the counter. There are also chocolate bars
in other cases opposite the counter. An elderly man (their first
customer of the day) was busy picking out cakes and chocolates and the
lady behind the counter was busy putting his choices into pretty
boxes. The man bought over 17000Yen/$170 worth of sweets!
Our eyes were drawn to the rows of macarons beside the cakes.
We couldn't resist and got three different kinds--dark chocolate,
coffee chocolate, orange chocolate-- plus a chocolate cake for
KL. Okay, Jean-Paul is a chocolatier so naturally all the
macarons in his shop are chocolate-based which suit me just fine.
The macarons are much better than
mamourS' I must say. The
chocolate cookie is light and crisp and the filling is not heavy.
I liked the coffee one the best which has a subtle coffee flavor
without overpowering the chocolate taste. The bitter chocolate
one's too bitter for my liking and left a sour aftertaste in my
mouth although KL declared it a winner. My least favorite would
have to be the orange kind which
is very disappointing because I usually love the combination of orange
and chocolate. This one didn't taste like orange to me, it
reminded me of a spoiled star fruit and just weird.
Well, the star of our purchase is the chocolate cake, hence the
title of this post. The cake has no detectable "cake" in its
composition. It looks like a rectangular piece of ganache sided
by semi-firm but fork-tender chocolate moussey thing with a strip
of dark chocolate glaze on top flanked by a dusting of cocoa
powder. The whole thing is SO
CHOCOLATEY. You shove a tiny forkful into your mouth and
all kinds of sweet and bitter chocolateness just explode on your taste
buds. I don't usually eat cakes and I had no intention of eating
this one. All I wanted was a bite which became TWO bites and
finally half of the cake. KL's very generous to share his dessert.
Their chocolate bars are pricey but they look worthwhile to
try. The cake and the coffee and chocolate macarons totally get
our stamp of approval.
Jean-Paul Hevin http://www.jphevin.com/content.php?id_article=3
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