I’ll Drink to That!

A couple of years ago I was treated to a wonderful weekend driving through the beautiful Sierra foothills, just outside of Sacramento, trying some of the wines of this historic area. Once busy with gold mining towns and prospectors anxious to become rich with their gold discoveries, this  is now a 14K area perfect for growing grapes and turning them into liquid gold - premium wine.

Boeger Winery sits on an 1850’s site that was homesteaded by the Fossati-Lombardo family. The original house, cellar and distillery are still used today. Greg and Sue Boeger purchased the ranch in 1972 and started planting vineyards and built a new state-of-the-art-winery the following year.  The old Fossati-Lombardo house was converted into a tasting room and was opened to the public in 1974. For over three decades the Boeger family has dedicated themselves to crafting some of the Sierra Foothill’s finest wines.  The old cellar has recently been restored and is now used for special events and private gatherings.

While there tasting, I picked up this recipe for Red Wine Cake and I think it would be a great dessert for any  holiday dinner. Enjoy with some red dessert wine or Port.

RED WINE CAKE

Ingredients:

1 cup butter

1 cup sugar

4 eggs

2 tsp baking powder

2  1/4 cups flour

1/2 cup Boeger Red Wine

4 Tablespoons unsweetened cocoa powder

2 teaspoons cinnamon (optional)

1 teaspoon vanilla

12 oz semi-sweet chocolate chips

Preheat oven to 350 degrees F. Grease and flour a bundt cake pan. Sift together flour, baking powder, cinnamon and cocoa. Set aside. In a large bowl cream butter and sugar till smooth. Add eggs, one at a time till incorporated. Add vanilla. In two parts each, alternatively add flour mixture and red wine,  till just mixed in.  Stir in chocolate chips.  Pour into prepared pan and bake for 45 minutes to one hour or till tester comes out clean. Cool 10 minutes in pan. Remove and finish cooling on rack.

Cake is great like this, but I have also added the following embellishments.

While cake is cooling, reduce in small pan, the liquid from 1 jar of Morello Cherries (available at Trader Joe’s), with 1/3 bottle (375ml) of red dessert wine or Port. Cool. Poke holes in cake with toothpick. Carefully drizzle from a spoon red wine/cherry liquid reduction over cake and into holes.

To serve: Warm cherries in remaining reduction. In separate pan warm hot fudge sauce. Pour a bit of each over cake slices and serve with more of the red dessert wine or port.

I’LL DRINK TO THAT!