Baking White Wine Cake With Chardonnay

With Christmas around the corner, here is a delightful, moist, almond cake flavoured with wine!

INGREDIENTS

• 1 box yellow cake mix - substitute with golden butter cake mix, if unavailable (Refer “note”)
• 1 x 100g pack vanilla instant pudding
• ½ cup/125ml dry white wine (Refer “note” section)
• ¼ cup flaked almonds - substitute with blanched, skinned and thinly sliced almonds, if unavailable
• ¼ cup/50g granulated sugar - Substitute with light brown sugar for a deeper flavour. If you substitute, also add 1 tsp/5ml cinnamon powder for a different flavour profile.
• 4 eggs
• ¾ cup neutral-flavoured oil (like vegetable oil or canola oil)

METHOD

1. To begin with, prepare a bundt pan. Use baking spray/ melted butter, ensuring that the entire interior surface of the pan is covered. (It can be particularly difficult to unmould bundt cakes.) Then, sprinkle plain flour in the cake tin and rotate, so that the greased surface is coated with a thin film of flour. Shake off any excess flour.
2. Sprinkle half the sliced almonds in the pan and set aside. (The cake batter would be poured over these almonds. Once the cake is baked and unmoulded, the almonds would be on top, increasing its eye appeal.)
3. Preheat the oven to 165°C/ 325°F/ gas mark 3.
4. In the meanwhile, sift together the yellow cake mix and vanilla flavoured dessert mix, into a large bowl. Not only will this help mix the two products, it would also aerate them. Now add the white sugar/ brown sugar & cinnamon, white wine, eggs and oil. Beat using a wire whisk or hand mixer until the batter is uniform. Add the remaining almonds and give a thorough stir.
5. Pour into the bundt pan and bake in the hot oven for an hour, or until a skewer/ knife inserted in the cake comes out clean. (A few moist crumbs on the knife are OK too. Wet batter is not.) Let the cake cool slightly but not completely before unmoulding it. Cut into slices and serve with a scoop of vanilla ice cream and fruit, if desired!

Additional Read:

1. White Wine Food Pairing Guide
2. Different Types of White Wine You Need to Try
   

NOTE

You can prepare your own yellow cake mix, if you like. Refer one of the recipes available online.

Use any white wine for this recipe, though a buttery Chardonnay, with its vanilla notes and overall flavour profile, is probably the most reasonable choice! It also goes exceptionally with almonds.