Novelist Ogai honored with sweets
To mark the 150th anniversary of the birth of Ogai Mori, one of Japan's most famous novelists, Bunkyo Ward in Tokyo held a special project earlier this year in which it commissioned new desserts named after authors associated with the ward, such as Mori, Natsume Soseki, Ichiyo Higuchi and Takuboku Ishikawa. These desserts are now available.
Among the desserts submitted, one was picked from the Four Seasons Hotel Tokyo at Chinzan-so, and another from Chinzan-so itself: a special baumkuchen (layered cake) from the former, and a Mascarpone mousse from the latter.
The baumkuchen, named Ogai, was produced by Tomoko Tamai, a pastry chef at the hotel, and is flavored with matcha (green tea). Baumkuchen is originally from Germany, where Mori studied abroad, and its layers are intended to express his multiple talents as a novelist, physician, translator and poet. It is available for ¥ 1,470 at Pastry & Cheese Shop at the hotel.