Posted on: Friday, November 26, 2004

Japanese cream puff all the rage

By Lee Cataluna
Advertiser Columnist

It was with some hesitation that Walter Watanabe returned the phone call.

"I hate to give you more news on this," he said.

It's a craze, a rage, a full-blown phenomenon on the second floor of Shirokiya Ala Moana, and Watanabe, the store manager, already has his team in high gear to deal with the crowds.

"This is unbelievable. I got to work at 9 this morning and there were already a hundred people in line. We had to bring them in slowly, in groups, when the store opened at 9:30 so that nobody got hurt."

The line snakes around the store, up and down aisles. It's like college kids camping out for concert tickets, except it's grandma and grandpa in line, and the big draw is Beard Papa, the oddly named cream puff franchise from Japan.

Folks are waiting an hour, sometimes two hours, to pay $7.25 for a box of five Beard Papa cream puffs.

"The Kikaida line before was the longest, but this is definitely in the top five," Watanabe says.

A team of three bakers came from Osaka to do the demonstration. One person fills the freshly baked pastry and dusts each with powdered sugar, one individually wraps each puff and the third closes the box. The crew from the Muginoho company does 300 boxes of cream puffs in the morning shift and another 300 boxes in the afternoon.

Fans say the pastry is crunchy, almost like a pie crust on the outside, but soft on the inside. The filling isn't too sweet, and has a fresh vanilla flavor. Customers are encouraged to eat the pastries immediately after purchase or at the very least, in the same day.

It isn't just Hawai'i folks going nuts over Papa. The cream puffs are highly coveted in Japan, where the company was founded in 1997. When Beard Papa opened a store in Manhattan this year, there were lines snaking down Broadway.

Karen Hironaga joined the Shirokiya line at 9 in the morning and didn't get her precious yellow box until almost 11. She did, however, make friends while waiting. "When you get near the front of the line, there are people passing by going, 'Not worth it, not worth it' but you know they're looking at you like they wish they were in your spot in line. You can tell."

Some things to consider if you're thinking of chancing the line: There's a limit of one box of five cream puffs per customer, the hours are 9:30 a.m. to 5 p.m. with a break between 12:30 and 2, and the last in-store demonstration is this Sunday.

Watanabe says perhaps Beard Papa will be back at Shirokiya next year, but plans aren't firm yet. If an investor is willing to bet the pastry isn't just a passing fad, the franchise can be purchased for $300,000.

So is the effort worth it?

"It's the best cream puff I've ever tasted," says Advertiser writer Rod Ohira. "And I'm a cream puff person."

Lee Cataluna's column runs Tuesdays, Fridays and Sundays. Reach her at 535-8172 or lcataluna@honoluluadvertiser.com.