july 2009: cake and wine pairing

woman on wine with amy reiley This August, my Aphrodisiac of the Month newsletter featured an unusual selection: bundt cake! (If you aren’t already a subscriber to my newsletter, you can sign up right here). I’ve been up to my elbows in batter of late, publishing the cookbook of Kiss My Bundt, a bundt cake bakery in Los Angeles. One of the  offshoots of this project has been conducting bundt and wine pairing classes with the bakery’s owner.

Many of us still cling to conventional wisdom that cake should be served with a sweet wine. But  our classes feature dry wines served with sweet cakes, which I  believe provides a well-rounded tasting experience. In order to  broaden my repertoire of cake wines, I pull out a bottle or two every  time we have a new cake flavor to taste. Here are some of my favorite finds from the great bundt experiment.

Brander
2007 Cuvee Nicolas
Who would have thought there could be a perfect wine for vanilla cake with buttercream frosting? The Cuvee Nicolas is definitely the best  wine I could ever hope to find. With its great weight and touch of spice on the finish, it actually brings complexity to the simple, sweet cake.

Pietra Santa
2007 Amore Pinot Grigio
Through hours of laborious tasting, I found the fairly clean and racy  structure to be a good match for pretty much any citrus-flavored cake, including my new addiction, 7UP pound cake (its lemongrass flavors and refreshingly mineral finish also make it a good partner for lemon cake with lemon glaze, or zesty lime basil bundts).

Rodney Strong
2007 Estate Russian River Valley Pinot Noir
I never thought I’d find a red velvet cake wine, but this is it. Funnily enough, it’s a Pinot Noir, often called the “velvet glove” of reds, that offers those soft, cake-friendly tannins and just enough red berries to stand up to the bundt’s sour note without totally overshadowing the cake’s bite.

Peju Winery
2005 Cabernet Sauvignon
Normally, I’m not a fan of chocolate and cabernet. I don’t quite understand why chocolatiers are always pushing the combo on us. But this is my chocolate cake with chocolate ganache wine. Because it is a little lighter on tannins than typical vintages of this Rutherford-blend cab, it has become a perfect partner for warm, melting ganache.