So there I am, just walking around in Tokyo and minding my own business, and wham. Attacked by crazy deliciousness, completely out of nowhere.
Which is to say that I was hungry and wanted a snack, so I stopped by Melon Pan Kyuei, a bakery in the Tsukishima area of Tokyo. Most of the time, if I’m eating somewhere, it’s because I’ve looked it up and heard that it’s supposed to be good. This was a completely random drop-in. I’d never even heard of a melon pan, which is kind of like a Chinese-style pineapple bun, but a billion times better.
Oh man, this thing. It was still warm from the oven, which is always delightful, obviously. It’s got a crispy, sugary exterior that’s made all the more crispy and amazing thanks to those deep ridges, and the interior is fluffy and light as air. The inside is kind of like the lightest, fluffiest slice of white bread that you’ve ever had — it’s not all that sweet, but that’s where the crispy, crunchy, amazing exterior comes in.
I figured this was going to be more like a pineapple bun, so I wasn’t expecting much — it was actually kind of shocking how good this was. It was an unexpected sucker punch of amazingness.