In light of yesterday’s post about all of our sugar-addled wine palates, I decided to just go with the theme by tasting a dessert wine last night. A fortified fruit wine, to be more exact — the Pacific Rim Framboise. Some of you may remember this wine from the Bonny Doon portfolio years ago, which is probably the last time I had tasted it.

Made from fresh raspberries grown specifically for this wine, it is sweet, certainly, but with such intense, mouthwatering fruit flavors that the sweetness comes in second. And I was thrilled that it never ever gets at all cough-syrupy, which is always a danger with this kind of thing and one of my least favorite characteristics of poorly-made wines.

Pacific Rim NV Framboise ($14, 375 ml). Intensely aromatic and flavorful, with pure, mouthwatering sweet and tangy raspberry character that stays concentrated and focused from beginning to end. Delicious now on its own and with a wide range of desserts, especially any that feature ripe seasonal berries. Locate this wine online or in your area.

This is a delicious choice for summer berry desserts of all kinds. I had originally planned on putting together a quick favorite — slices of pound cake (store-bought, thank you very much) topped with fresh raspberries and blackberries and a dollop of sweetened mascarpone. The plan was to sip the Framboise alongside.

Instead, a friend showed up with fresh-from-the-oven shortcakes (gotta love those kinds of friends), so we naturally used those instead, along with the fresh fruit and sweetened mascarpone (simply sprinkle a tablespoon or so of  powdered sugar into about a half-cup of mascarpone and stir it up).

And although I started out sipping the Framboise alongside, I ended up pouring a little from my glass over the dessert — and that was delicious, too!

The options are endless here — I’m thinking next time of just soaking some berries in the Framboise and then pouring it all over vanilla ice cream… Or maybe I’ll make a Framboise-spiked trifle with layers of different berries and loads of whipped cream… Or perhaps soak slices of flourless chocolate cake in Framboise and serve with creme fraiche…