After my absurdly horrible ramen experience at the Sapporo airport, the Food Gods clearly decided to take pity on me, basically dropping an amazing pastry right in my lap.
There’s a location of Chocolatier Masale in the Sapporo airport — it’s past the security gates in the domestic departures area, and it had a pastry I didn’t think I’d be able to eat.
I’d heard really good things about the pain au chocolat at Chocolatier Masale; I actually visited their location in the city a couple of times while I was in Sapporo. Alas, each time I went, the pain au chocolat was sold out. It’s what the shop is best known for, and it’s justifiably quite popular.
Imagine my surprise, then, when the airport location had a whole pile of them. Obviously, I immediately bought one.
It’s amazing. It’s superficially similar to the pain au chocolate I had at Choco Cro, but much, much (much much much) better. The Choco Cro version is actually pretty good, but it tastes like a fast food version of a pain au chocolat.
This one, on the other hand, could have come straight from a great bakery in Paris.
The texture is absolutely amazing, with layer upon layer of thin, shattery goodness encasing a delightfully chewy, fluffy, buttery interior.
The sweetness is remarkably restrained; there’s almost no sweetness from the pastry itself, only the chocolate and the light glaze. Though the pastry looks dark and chocolatey, it tastes like a standard croissant with mild cocoa undertones.
But then there’s the good quality chocolate in the middle — there’s just enough of it to give you that nice chocolatey hit without overwhelming.
It’s a great, great pastry. Sapporo airport: all is forgiven for serving me that shoddy bowl of ramen. We’re square.
Location: Bibi, Chitose, Hokkaido 066-0012, Japan
How to find it: It’s past security in the domestic departures area of the airport.