Vie de France [Mimi's World Tour]

Bakery: Vie de France
Address: 3 Aioicho, Chuo Ward, Kobe, Hyōgo Prefecture (in Plico Kobe)
Website: http://www.viedefrance.co.jp/
Style: Japanese, French 
Price: $$

The first time I travelled to Kobe, I arrived through the JR Kobe station west of the main downtown area. Stepping through the gates, Vie de France, located in one of the few shopping areas in the station, is one of the first businesses you spot. It screams big chain and it really is, with hundreds of locations country-wide, most of which are in JR stations. A sort of quick (sweet) bite for people on the go.

Somehow, I never really associate train stations or airports with good, memorable food; it really is a question of quantity over quality, quickly. In this sense, I was a bit reluctant to give Vie de France a try, but I was one of the scores of people that was hungry, so I went for it. Despite the name, their selection of French-inspired baked goods is fairly limited, especially compared to other bakeries with the same business model. There was a lot of croquettes, hot dog buns, a few doughnuts; though, to be fair, they did have a couple French pastries (a raisin twist and French toast were two I remember) and their croissants are made in France.... Uh, what? I'm not exactly sure how I feel about that.

I grabbed an apple cake (161 yen). It was something different and unique; I like apple cakes, but they're seldom encountered in bakeries, much less Japanese bakeries like this. Despite my undeniable bias going in, this was actually better than I expected. Perhaps the dough wasn't as flaky nor as flavourful as it looked, but it still consisted of several thin layers stuffed with a cooked apple mass almost reminiscent of an apple sauce. Not bad, not bad at all.

Rating: **1/2