Another Indulgence.... Red Velvet Wine

A huge shout out to my good friend Jen H who, knowing about my quest for the perfect Red Velvet, discovered a Red Velvet Wine by Cupcake Vineyards, out of California.
And even better - found an awesome website that shows where it (and just about every other type of wine and spirit) is sold in Alberta!!!

Here is a description of the Cupcake Vineyard's Red Velvet wine from their website:
Red Velvet is a smooth creamy blend of Zinfandel, Merlot and Cabernet Sauvignon. It's reminiscent of a blackberry chocolate cupcake with a mocha coulis.  Shows an incredible nose of chocolate, deep rich blackberries,  red fruits and a creamy mocha finish that is unmistakable in its intensity and length.

She picked us up a bottle, and because my husband is out of town tonight, we had an impromptu girls night... actually it was more of a girls late afternoon/early evening, because we had our kids with us, and needed to be responsible.
ANYWAYS...

The label says the wine pairs well with dark chocolate fondue, bacon cheeseburgers or sweet and spicy hoisin steaks... (talk about a mixed pallette)...So, because the sun was still shining at dinner time, and DESPITE the piles of snow that still blanket my back yard, I decided to fire up my bbq and comprimise on the label's recommendations by making some homemade Hoisin Hamburgers on wholewheat buns to accompany the vino.... 

We were a little wary of the wine at first, afraid that it might not live up to our expectations (much like my first impression of the Red Velvet Cupcake from a few posts back), but I'm so happy to report that I think I've found a new favourite red wine, perfect for summer (if it ever gets here).  The wine is light, but has a beautiful rich red colour.  It went wonderfully with our dinner, but I think I could easily nurse it on it's own too.... always a good sign :).

Thanks for searching it out Jen!!!!  Here's to keeping a stash of this new indulgence on hand - and continuing to discover new ones of course :)

That's all I've got to say about that for now.... maybe tomorrow I'll post my recipe for the Hoisin Hamburgers... they were delish too, if I may say so myself.

As Always,  Dayna 

14 day Countdown to 40 - Self-Indulgence #14 (part 2)

Rrrrrred Velvet!

......Following our trip into the cheese shop, mom and I headed over to Crave Cupcakes, and I finally tasted my first ever Red Velvet Cupcake. 

Now, the first time I ever heard the term "Red Velvet" used in relation to food was on season 1 of "The Apprentice", when the challenge was for each team to create and market a new flavour of ice cream.  One of the flavours was called Red Velvet - and I instantly fell in love with the name... without actually realizing what it was.






In my mind, I had pictured Red Velvet to be a lot more sophisticated dessert than that!!



Later I did a bit of research and learned that traditional Red Velvet is really nothing more chocolate cake with a TON of red food colouring added, and topped with a cream cheese icing... apart from the icing, I thought - what a let down....
Nevertheless - I began a quest to find the perfect (in my mind) red velvet recipe.... alas, my family doesn't eat a lot of dessert, so I never actually tried to make anything red velvety, until this past Valentine's Day.  My in-laws were visiting from Ontario and we invited some friends over for Valentines Dinner to visit with them... because we had so many people dining with us, and because it was a special occasion, I decided to finally attempt my first ever red velvet ... and my first ever cheesecake.

Dessert was supposed to look like this

.

... it didn't

Well - it was an unmitigated disaster!!!!  After 6 hours of preparation and baking, my decadent "red velvet cheesecake" was the colour of a bandaid (despite 2 big bottles of red liquid food colouring), and a mushy gushy mess that had almost doubled in size, overflowing my springform pan, spilling into the water bath, in big, goopy bandaid pink clumps that looked more curdled than creamy.  In all fairness to the myrecipes.com website though - I probably shouldn't have doubled the recipe) ..... in the end except for the crust, the whole thing ended up in the garbage.  Thank goodness, I have good friends and forgiving relatives, and we all have a sense of humour -  because otherwise I would have curled up in a corner and hid, it was that bad...

Still, I remained enamoured by the name "Red Velvet" and held out hope that one day I would experience true red velvet, and that it would live up to the name and the culinary fantasy I had built around it..... SO when I learned that Crave Cupcakes makes a mean "Red Velvet Elvis" cupcake and realized that there was a Crave Cupcakes across the parking lot from Springbank Cheese Co, what could I do but INDULGE!!! (It was my actual birthday afterall)

My Mom and I walked into the store and together we oohed and aahed all of the wonderful flavours of cupcakes, but really that was just for show on my part - I already knew what I was going to have.
So we bought our cupcakes, went outside to sit in the sun and sink our teeth into the decadence, and after all these years, waiting to finally tasted a piece of real, honest to goodness red velvet cake my verdict was..................................................................................
.......................................................................................m'eh.

It's true - Red Velvet really is just plain old chocolate cake with a ton of red food colouring and a rich cream cheese icing - that's it.


huh - I guess that's one more thing crossed off my bucket list.


Anyways - that rather anti-climactic cupcake has NOT stopped my quest for a perfect dessert deserving of the "Red Velvet" Moniker, only now, I guess I'll have to invent my ideal red velvet recipe(s) myself!!!
I wonder - do I dare post my experiments??  Stay tuned to find out.


Meanwhile, I'm going to wrap up this post and carry it on to part 3 of my self-indulgent birthday update....