On a recent trip to the Ghibli Museum in Mitaka, we decided to walk from Ghibli to Kichjoji station to get home, rather than returning to Mitaka station. It was a lovely walk through Inokashira Park, made even better by the discovery we made! We stumbled across a cute little cafe called Cafe du Lievre (カフェ・ドゥ・リーブル) near the edge of the park.
The cafe has a rabbit theme (lièvre = hare in French), and is somehow associated with artist Kimico Yoshida. As there is a lot of glass in the building it is very light-filled, so it is a lovely place to sit and relax for a few hours. There are also french doors that I imagine are opened up when the weather is suitable.
The menu consists of savoury galettes (crepes made from buckwheat – i.e. soba flour), side salads, soups, sweet crepes and a variety of coffees, teas and juices. Personally I’m not a coffee drinker, but my friend who I went with is a coffee connoisseur and he raved about the espresso he ordered. He went as far as to say it was the best he’d had in Japan – it is obviously personal preference, but coffee lovers should definitely check this place out!
All of the food we ordered was amazing. Everything on the menu sounded delicious, so it was actually very difficult to chose what to order (we’ll definitely be going back to try the other items on the menu soon!)
In the end we decided on the ‘salad’ galette and the ‘ratatouille’ galette, accompanied by the bean salad (beans with cottage cheese and lettuce) to share. All the galettes are 950 yen. As is often the case in Japan, there are also ‘sets’ available – a galette with a soup and or a side salad. Certain drinks can be added too, for a flat price.
When it came time for dessert, we were actually very full, but we couldn’t resist, so we decided to share a sweet crepe. The menu has all the usual fillings (chocolate, lemon, caramel, maple syrup, cinnamon sugar etc), but we decided to try something slightly different – the ‘honey and sour cream’ crepe. The sweetness of the honey is perfectly balanced by the tartness of the sour cream. It was delicious. We ordered coffee and tea to go with the crepe. The menu has an extensive range of teas (leaf teas, tea lattes and herbal teas) all of which are available hot or iced.
