This is the final installment of the dessert and wine pairing series, If I had tried to put all of this in one post it would be as long as a novel, so I decided to break this up into a series of 3 posts. The first was an explanation of desserts wines and the science involved in pairing taken from Julians blog, Vino in love. Post #2 is the actual desserts and the wine recommendations,  and the third will tell you why the wines were chosen for each dish.

Below is an explanation as to why these particular wines were chosen for each dessert. Cheers!

When desserts meet wine

Only recently, I wrote about pairing wine with desserts. I have teamed up with Suzanne from apuginthekitchen to present to you awesome dessert and wine pairings. If you want to know more about the desserts that Suzanne and I picked to pair with wine then read this post on apuginthekitchen.

In the final part of this mutual collaboration, I want to talk about why I decided to pair these wines with Suzanne’s desserts.

Suzanne’s Stuffed pears en papillote pair very well with a Passito di Pantelleria. For example we could pair this dessert with the Ben Rye from Donnafugata. Why? The answers is quite simple. The pears are steamed in brown sugar and stuffed with walnuts. Sweet desserts like this one call for a wine that has a good amount of sweetness itself. It should not be overly sweet though. Furthermore, the Ben Rye has a bouquet that includes candid oranges, which pair with pears en papillote very well.

Trabucchi d’Illasi’s Recioto di Soave is a great match for a fig and goat cheese tart. The flavor of the figs and the aromas of the Recioto di Soave (elderflower, chamomile, white chocolate, aromatic herbs, etc.) pair well together. This Recioto is also not that sweet. We also need a wine with an ABV between around 10% and 13.5%. A Passito di Pantelleria would be too intense and also too strong. That would cause the wine to dominate the dessert, which we want to avoid. The Recioto di Soave however, is a very elegant wine. It has an ABV of 12.5% which is perfect for this dish.

The buttermilk panna cotta called immediately for a Moscato d’Asti Spumante. Moscato d’Asti Spumante are sweet, fruity and usually have a very low ABV (often around 7%). These wines have a little bit of acidity as welll. And with pannacotta we want exactly that. The Moscato d’Asti Spumante from Cerotto has a good quality-price ratio and is the perfect match for Suzanne’s buttermilk panna cotta.

Pasticciotti filled with vanilla cream are a traditional dessert from Apulia, Italy. These delicious pastries also call for a sparkling wine and why not pair Apulian food with Apulian wine? Sometimes it is best to go with food and wine from the same region. Therefore, I decided to pair Suzanne’s Pasticciotti (you have to try them! They are so tasty!) with a Moscato di Trani Spumante. Pasticciotti are dry and pretty sweet. One of my favorite Moscato di Trani Spumante is produced by Azienda Agricola Franco di Filippo. Both of their Moscato di Trani Spumante will work excellent with Pasticciotti. These “Champagne-like” sparkling wines (“Champagne-like” because they are manufactured after the Classic-Method process) have a long-lasting perlage, an intense nose and a great palate. They tend to have less acidity then Moscato d’Asti Spumante. However, Moscato d’Asti Spumante are usually produced after with Martinotti-Method and not with the Classic-Method.

Trabucchi d’Illasi does not only make a stunning Recioto di Soave but also an even better Recioto della Valpolicella. Recioto della Valpolicella is produced similar to Amarone. Grapes get sun-dried for around 40 days on straw-mats where they lose around 80% of their weight. This gives Trabucchi’s Recioto della Valpolicella a rich nose and an intense palate. The nose is incredible with a lots of different aromas. The finish is persistently long. I have baked Suzanne’s semolina olive oil myself and served it with Trabucchi’s Recioto della Valpolicella. A good match which I highly recommend.

Last but not least I paired the spicy chocolate panna cotta with aCognac. I am of the opinion that chocolate desserts like chocolate panna cotta or chocolate cake do not pair well with wine. A Portuguese Port wine would have worked as well but with these type of desserts your best bet are spirits like Brandy and Cognac – in fact Cognac is a type of Brandy from France. If matching chocolate desserts with alcohol then you have to go with strong spirits. Of course, we could also serve this delicious dessert with an espresso which would be the “Italian way”.

Photo Credits: Stuffed pears en papillote by Suzanne. All rights reserved
Ceretto Asti Spumante by Ceretto 
Recioto della Valpolicella – Trabucchi d’Illasi by Julian Rossello. All rights reserved.

This brings our dessert and wine pairing series to an end. I hope you have enjoyed it. Let me know what you think about these pairings. With what do you pair your favorite dessert usually with?