Ishikura Baumkuchen [Mimi's World Tour]

Bakery: Ishikura Baumkuchen (石蔵バウム)
Address: 1 Chome-2-22 Irifune, Otaru, Hokkaido
Website: n/a
Style: Japanese
Price: $$$

The baumkuchen trend still appears to be alive and well, with many commercial confectioneries and souvenir shops selling some sort of version. Unfortunately, the ones I've encountered are nearly identical: perfect, factory-made circles of soft, super spongy dough with some sort of unnatural, somewhat off-putting coating. In truth, I'm actually not that big a fan of Japanese baumkuchen and while the next bakery review will indeed contain one such example, I really wasn't all that eager to try more baumkuchen. Walking past Ishikura Baum, I was nonetheless lured in by their display of real baumkuchen: lumpy, imperfect tree-like towers of dough. I couldn't believe - authentic baumkuchen!

Inside, this little pastry shop sells rather pricey gift boxes of admittedly large chunks of cake in addition to red bean manju and some sort of cream pastries. The real deal, however, is their "scraps" left over from dividing large spindles of cake. Okay, they're not exactly cheap, but if you don't want to invest in a whole gift box, this is the way to go.

Available in five or so flavours, I tried a small chunk of the matcha (540 yen). The dough was exactly what I wanted: a harder cookie-like texture with an incredible chewy consistency. The sugar coated outside was a nice touch and definitely a highlight. Maybe a little expensive for "cake ends", but I do know that baumkuchen are never cheap.

Rating: ***1/2