By Roger Naylor
It is the finale. An exclamation point of utter satisfaction. The perfect end of a perfect day.
Stays at Castle Hot Springs are journeys with almost an endless array of opportunities, balanced between adventure, and mindful healing. Yet all the hikes, horseback rides, Via Ferrata climbs, paddleboard yoga, massages, and languid soaks in mineral rich hot springs during the day all lead back to the restaurant Harvest in the evening. After your soul is nourished, it is time to feed the body.
Each dinner is a chef’s tasting menu created from the freshest ingredients, infused with a sense of creativity. It is an elevated farm-to-table culinary experience. Of course, the exquisite meal is only complete with the arrival of dessert. Almost. There is one more final touch and that is the wine, carefully considered, carefully chosen.
Dessert wine pairing has become something of a Castle Hot Springs specialty, helping Harvest win the Best Award of Excellence in Wine Spectator’s 2025 Restaurant Awards for the third consecutive year. These perfect moments are provided by Sarah Foote, Director of Wine and Service. The aim in pairing wine with dessert is no different than pairing wine with any dinner course.
“As with any beverage pairing, the goal is to make the individual components better when enjoyed together,” says Sarah. “It’s all about elevating the dish. Typically, the portion size of [dessert] wine is smaller as they can be fortified, meaning a higher alcohol content, or very sweet. In either case, a little goes a long way.”
The experience of dessert wine and food pairing is often enlightening for guests. Sharing her passion, enthusiasm, and knowledge, Sarah is quick to put to rest certain wine myths.
“Sugar in wine often gets conflated with low quality. Yet some of the most brilliant and expensive dessert wines in the world have extremely high levels of residual sugar—meaning they are sweet. Technically, when pairing food and wine, you want the wine to be sweeter than the dish, which is why dessert wines tend to be sweet.”
All food courses served at Harvest are rotated to take advantage of the freshest, most flavorful ingredients available. While breakfast and lunch menus change with the seasons, each dinner is far more ethereal. It is created just for that evening. The kitchen staff utilizes the bounty of the garden from that day’s harvest to create each dish, including those heavenly desserts.
Sarah consults daily with the chefs so she knows not only what dishes will be served but how they are prepared and what ingredients her wine choice will be enhancing. This allows her to delve into every corner of the expansive wine cellar at Castle Hot Springs. Her selections are part science, part artistic. She explains a couple of recent dessert wine and food pairings at the resort.
“The dessert was chocolate cake, toasted coconut gelato, mango curd, and chocolate sauce. I paired that with Graham’s Quinta dos Malvedos Porto, Portugal 2012. Vintage port is luscious and full bodied. It can stand up next to the diverse flavors of this dessert.”
In another instance when the dessert was an apple frangipane tart with apple cider caramel, vanilla rose ice cream, and spiced apple, Sarah dug deep into the cellar.
“The wine pairing was Donnafugata Ben Ryé 2021. This Sicilian wine is made in passito method in which they harvest some grapes from the vineyard and dry them out on straw mats. They add the dried grapes into the winemaking process to add depth and color. There are nutty and caramel notes that pair with the spiced apple dessert.”
For those guests yearning to recapture the dessert wine pairing magic at home following their stay at Castle Hot Springs, Sarah offers some easy advice. One of her favorite all-purpose dessert wines is Tokaji, a wine from Hungary with a backbone of acidity that can freshen many desserts. And a reminder that different kinds of chocolate require different wines, and can be off-putting when paired incorrectly. Of course, another option is to just keep it simple.
“Cheese can be a substitute for dessert at the end of a meal. Vintage port and blue cheese remain one of my favorite wine pairings of all time. Also, dessert wine can often be purchased in half bottles. I suggest this for drinking at home, as you typically only enjoy 3 ounces versus the normal 6-ounce pour of non-dessert wine.”
Ultimately, it’s all about savoring the end of the day. Embrace these moments. Take satisfaction in what has been accomplished. Reflect on good fortune. Dessert arrives and the wine is poured. What else could you possibly need?