Le Bihan [Mimi's World Tour]

Bakery: Le Bihan 
Address: 1 Chome-1-43 Abenosuji, Abeno-ku, Osaka
Website: http://www.lebihan.jp/
Style: Japanese, French 
Price: $$ 

After a few weeks of travel in Japan, I'd begun to despair that I'd never encounter another 4-star bakery along my Cake Tour. Luckily, along came Le Bihan. Regrettably, Le Bihan is yet another one of those bakeries with nearly a dozen stores nationwide, though it seems most are centred around Tokyo and Osaka and whether or not it's really headed by the older, decidedly French pastry chef on their website is worth debating. As with many patisseries, Le Bihan mostly features a fairly large selection of the usual Japanese baked goods, such that at first it doesn't seem particularly remarkable. If you look past the croquette buns and red bean treats, there are, however, a few more traditional French pastries.

Fortunately for me, repeated practice had revived my reading skills and examining the label of this lovely pastry gave me a thrill of excitement: kouign amann. Yes, the kouign amann, my most beloved of buttery French pastries. This required zero deliberation and I left the small, somewhat hectic department store bakery with my kouign amann in tow (237 yen).

This was precisely what I expected from a well-done kouign amann and French pastries, in general: the dough was flaky and buttery with a sticky sugar coating on one end and layers upon layers of rich and simple yet flavourful dough. It really was one of the best  I've had; truly a highlight not only of my Osaka leg of the journey, but also of my entire Japan trip. A well-deserved perfect rating.

Rating: ****