Pairings | Whisky

What to drink with cake (updated)

Posted by Fiona Beckett on September 5 2007 at 09:42

A recent email from a reader asked me to suggest a wine to go with “a triple coconut cake with a tangy pineapple icing served with fresh fruit salsa that has kiwi, strawberry, mandarine oranges, blueberries and fresh pineapple in it”.

Quite a challenge (I suggested demi-sec Champagne or a peach-flavoured liqueur topped up with fizz) but it got me thinking that there are many possible pairings for cake beyond a cup of tea or coffee, particularly if you’re serving it as a dessert.

Drink Pairings for Popular Cakes

Here are my latest thoughts on what to drink with cake. Bear in mind the overall sweetness richness and density of the cake and whether there are any accompanying ingredients such as fruit or cream when you’re choosing between the options.

Plain madeira, pound cakes or almond cakes

A high quality tea like Darjeeling, a chilled 10 year old tawny port, a cream sherry or a spiced rum like Morgan’s or Sailor Jerry would be my top picks. Panettone is better with Prosecco or a Moscato d’Asti.

Orange flavoured cakes

Particularly delicious with sweet sherries. You could also try an orange-flavoured sherry liqueur (Harvey’s does one) or even a dark cream sherry served over ice with a slice of orange. A Spanish Moscatel de Valencia will work if the orange flavour in the cake isn’t too pronounced or if it has fresh oranges alongside.

Lemon cakes

Lemon can be tricky if the lemon flavour is particularly intense. A very sweet Riesling is often a good option or, if the cake is light and airy - more like a gâteau - try a Moscato d’Asti or other light, sweet sparkling wine or an elderflower spritzer. I also like green tea and Earl Grey tea with lemon flavours.

Recipe idea: Try Add Kimber’s Olive Oil Pistachio and Lemon Snack Cake with a glass of prosecco or a shot of limoncello.

Fruit cakes

A great opportunity to show off a sweet sherry or Madeira. A sweet oloroso sherry like Matusalem is delicious with crumbly, rich fruit cakes as is a sweet 5 or 10 year old Madeira. (Bual would be my favourite style here).

Photo by TalyaAL at shutterstock.com

A richly flavoured whisky aged in sherry casks - something like The Macallan - can also be great with a fruit cake. Or an Irish whiskey as you can see from this pairing of Dundee cake (above) with Midleton Very Rare. A barley wine (strong, sweet beer) works too.

Light, airy gateaux and airy pastries like mille-feuille

In general these go well with off-dry Champagne which doesn’t necessarily mean demi-sec. If the cake isn’t too sweet or is accompanied by unsweetened fruits such as raspberries or strawberries you can accompany it with a standard Champagne. (Almost all Champagnes have some sweet wine added to them at the end of the bottling process so very few are completely dry.) Rosé Champagne or sparkling wine work particularly well with berries.

If the gâteau is slightly richer and sweeter or contains ice cream you might be better off with a fruit liqueur or a liqueur topped up with sparkling wine as I suggested to the lady who contacted me. Or, if you’re feeling brave with a matching fruit beer! A peach gâteau, for example could be served with iced shots of a peach-flavoured liqueur like Archers or with a peach, passion fruit or mango-flavoured beer. (The best ones come from Belgium.)

Iced cakes such as cupcakes

The extra sweetness from the icing may strip out the sweetness of a dessert wine. I’m not sure this isn’t one for a milky coffee such as a cappucino or a latte (unless they’re chocolate in which case see below). Cupcakes are comfort food after all.

Gingerbread

One of those like-meets-like combinations but ginger wine (Stone’s is a good brand) or a ginger liqueur works well. Or even a Whisky Mac (a 50/50 mixture of whisky and ginger wine). For contrast try a liqueur Muscat or sweet sherry.

Chocolate cake

Usually needs something to cut through the richness though the sweet-toothed may go for the matching sweetness of a sweet sherry or a liqueur Muscat. Personally I like it with something bitter like a double espresso, a porter or a coffee beer .

An alternative route, particularly if the cake contains cherries is to go for deep red fruit flavours - a Late Bottled Vintage or Vintage Character port, a Banyuls or Maury from the south of France or even a chilled shot of cherry brandy (very good with intensely rich, dark chocolate cakes and puddings).

A lighter chocolate cake like a roulade can be delicious with a cherry beer (Kriek) or raspberry beer (frambozen), particularly if it includes those fruits. Or try this fabulous pairing of a frozen milk chocolate and raspberry cake with light, sparkling Brachetto d’Acqui

Orange flavoured liqueurs such as Grand Marnier are also good with anything made from dark chocolate.

Recipe idea: Serve this chocolate and cherry roulade with a Recioto della Valpolicella

Coffee, toffee and walnut cakes

Good with sweet sherry, Madeira and aged tawny port (a 20 year old is particularly good with coffee cake). Or an Australian liqueur Muscat which would work really well with the cake below

Recipe idea: Try Rosie Sykes delicious Queen Elizabeth Cake.

Photo by Patricia Niven

Coconut cake

Oddly coconut and Champagne have an affinity so that’s worth considering. More conventionally I’d go for a Sauternes or similar sweet Bordeaux. Or maybe try a pina colada!

Recipe idea: Try Rukmini Iyer’s Coconut and Mango Yoghurt Cake with a late harvest sauvignon

Top image ©Patrycja Jadach at unsplash.com

Tags: noshow:highlight tropical fruit juice fruit juice espresso double espresso coffee latte cappuccino Earl Grey green tea Darjeeling chocolate beer raspberry beer cherry beer frambozen kriek coffee beer porter passion fruit beer mango beer peach beer fruit beer barley wine spiced rum rum malt whisky fruit liqueur peach schnapps peach liqueur whisky Whisky Mac ginger liqueur ginger wine cherry brandy Cointreau orange liqueur Grand Marnier passion fruit liqueur Moscato d'Asti Moscato demi-sec Champagne Prosecco rosé Champagne Champagne Maury Banyuls Vintage Character port Late Bottled Vintage port vin doux naturel liqueur Muscat Bual oloroso sherry Madeira port tawny port Pedro Ximenez cream sherry Moscatel de Valencia coconut cake coffee and walnut cake coffee cake chocolate roulade chocolate cake gingerbread fairy cakes cup cakes ice cream gâteau mille feuille fruit cake lemon cake orange cake almond cake pound cake madeira cake gâteau cake cakes food:desserts & cakes
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Japanese whisky and food

Posted by Fiona Beckett on April 19 2007 at 07:12

Whisky may have become firmly entrenched in the after-dinner slot in the Western world but Japan has always been more open to the idea of drinking it with a meal. In fact, the Japanese are much more open-minded about the drinks they enjoy with food and you’ll often find beer, sake and whisky on the table at the same time. It certainly maximises the opportunities of finding a good food and drink match.

Happily, the Western view that whisky is simply too strong and high in alcohol to be enjoyed with food is finally being challenged, as diners seek out new and more adventurous food and drink pairings. Drinking whisky with food may not be sustainable throughout a meal but with certain dishes, the spirit can offer as many intriguing flavour complexities as wine, sometimes making a better match with ingredients such as cheese and seafood.

Taste tests have also shown that whisky complements bold Asian flavours in particular. You might initially think that a typical Japanese dish like sushi is too subtle for a powerful drink like whisky? Well although the raw fish doesn’t impart much flavour, when you consider the sweet and sour element of vinegary rice, the malty depth of soy sauce, the briny notes of nori seaweed and the heat from wasabi or pickled ginger, sushi becomes a complex food package that needs a drink to stand up to it.

But it’s not about simply offering a robustness to take on the bold flavours inherent in Asian cuisine. Whisky also has the subtle complexity to combine with those less obvious tastes and flavours on the palate and that’s why Japanese whisky has a style well suited to food. Japanese whiskies are respected for their balance and finesse, meaning they can harmonise more easily with a dish while still providing a steady foundation of flavour.

The salinity detected in many whiskies can work with seafood-based dishes and that seaweed element, whilst any savoury maltiness chimes particularly well with miso or soy sauce. This could be down to ‘umami’, the lesser-known fifth taste alongside sweet, sour, bitter and salty. Caused by high levels of glutamic acid, umami roughly translates as ‘deliciousness’, and creates a meaty and intensely moreish sensation in the mouth that could be mistaken for texture. This idea of mouth feel is another factor to consider when pairing whisky and food. There are typically many different textures in Japanese food and whiskies can vary in their textual quality too, being oily or waxy.

To test the validity of the pairing concept, Number One Drinks Company recently held a whisky and food tasting at London’s upmarket Japanese restaurant, Roka, to try a selection of bite-sized dishes with a range of six single malts; three from Hanyu and three from Karuizawa.

As the whiskies were all cask strength, from 56% to 62.8%, dilution with water was needed to bring down the alcohol and open up the flavours. Starting with the red miso soup, its savoury flavours echoed the meaty elements of the Karuizawa 1988 but was perhaps too liquid to make a truly great combination whereas the lighter character of the Karuizawa 1992 paired successfully with the delicate flavours and textures of tuna tataki.

For whisky writer Dave Broom, Hanyu’s King of Diamonds whisky proved the best all-round food match: “It was excellent with the silky texture of some pork and scallop dumplings and the black cod. It then became deep and fragrant with the lamb chops.” The sweetness and spice of the King of Spades 1986 also made it a versatile accompaniment. We all agreed that food-wise, the lamb chops worked best with the whole range of whiskies. For all concerned, it was an intriguing exercise.

Kate Ennis is a freelance journalist and the drinks editor of Food & Travel. She also regularly writes for Square Meal, Fresh, and Whisky Magazine.

Image credit: Anton Cherednichenko

Tags: drink:spirits & cocktails Japanese whisky whisky
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