5/05/2013

Pancake at Artnia, Square Enix's Official Shop /
スクウェア・エニックスのオフィシャルショップ「アルトニア」のパンケーキ





Artnia is a Square Enix's exclusive official shop in the world and located by the SE office building in Shinjuku.
This official shop doesn't only have goods but also has cafe and bar.
The name "Artnia" is a coined word; Art + Area + Near as they wanted this shop to work as a bridge between customers and goods.

The other day, I found this cafe has afternoon tea set, too, and today, May 5th, my husband and I decided to go.

We got there and it's pretty packed.
There's a board with a paper to write down names for the waiting list.
We put our name at 3:43PM and before us, there're about 5 groups on the list.

As it's a goods shop, so we looked while waiting.
We're seated at around 4:05PM and were provided menus books at counter.
They said alcohol beverages are available from 5:00PM, but it didn't matter neither of us drink.

I asked a waiter why there're open tables but people aren't seating there.
He said there'd be a group of 5 so that the table was empty, however there're some other table without any single person so I didn't understand the way they treat customers.

I realized that afternoon tea set wasn't on the menu so I researched and found out that the afternoon tea set was available till end of April.

I decided to get chocolate pancake as it has Chocobo mark (Chocobo is a character from Final Fantasy), but the menu said the stamp is random so I was hoping to get Chocobo.
Besides Chocobo, they have Mog (FF) and a logo of Shinra (FF VII)

We were waiting for someone to come and take our order but none came.
After more than 10 minutes, finally a guy came and asked if we're decided.

We ordered out pancakes at 4:15PM and waited for 10minutes or more to have pancakes.
It might have been taking longer than usual since the manager came and said, "Sorry for making you wait. Pancakes are coming soon."

This is the pancakes.


Strawberry pancake (950 JPY)
Stamp was a same character that the menu had, "Mog" from Final Fantasy.
Some slices of fresh strawberries, whole blueberries, and a raspberry.


Chocolate pancake (900 JPY)


Close look of Chocobo.

Both pancakes had 3 slices and came with vanilla ice cream and whipped cream and some fruits.
Chocolate pancake had banana slices and chocolate ganache with chocolate sauce.
You can't see in the photos but almond slices were added, too.

This pancake was ok; not bad yet just a normal pancake with game characters' stamps on the top.
I'd have enjoyed this more if it's only 500 JPY or a little bit cheaper like 700 ~ 800 JPY without those fresh fruit slices.
I'm sure there're some people who prefer just a plain pancake without those fatty toppings or fruits, so if the cafe can cut the cost of the extra ingredients, they could sell pancake much more quickly  for more reasonable price since the special aspect of this pancake is just the character stamp.

It was the most crowded day I've ever seen today and it might be one of the reason the service wasn't that good.
I actually don't know much about Square Enix games but if you like the games, this place could be really interesting to find limited goods and also enjoy the cafe.

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2 件のコメント :

  1. If you wanted to make pancakes without the toppings you could as well make them by yourself I think.

    They look adorable~

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  2. I think the special aspect of the pancake is the characters' stamps which definitely make the plate cute as I mentioned.
    It could be an option that they serve plain pancake with stamps (but no fruit or cream) for cheaper price, and it might be much faster to serve so that turnover of customers would become better ;)

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