Free Bundt Samplings For National Bundt Day + A Kiss My Bundt Recipe

To many cupcake grubbers, a bundt cake is a thing of the past, a strangely-shaped cake with a large chunk missing from its core, a centerpiece your grandmother would plant on the dining room table next to the potpourri. To Chrysta Wilson, chef-owner of the West Hollywood bakery Kiss My Bundt, the dessert is far more than an anachronism. Sunday is National Bundt Day, and Wilson is going all out, giving away free slices from 1 - 4 p.m., just before her bundt and wine pairing class with wine critic and author Amy Reiley at 5:30 p.m. A sampling: 7UP pound cake, butter rum, pumpkin, cookies and cream, chocolate with dark chocolate glaze, red velvet, and vegan red velvet.

Kiss My Bundt

Kiss My Bundt

Mini chocolate glaze

Who knew bundts were making such a comeback? This question bothers Wilson, whose first cookbook, Kiss My Bundt comes out November 27. "In my shop, I'm regularly asked 'What's a bundt?' For someone like me, who grew up in the Southeast--North Carolina, Georgia, and Florida--bundt cakes were everywhere. I've always known what a bundt was."

Glazes poured on the cake can really accentuate its fluted edges and ridges, she explains. "This cake doesn't need extra flair: the cake is perfect as is. There's something comforting about this cake. It's like a woman with proper curves."

Another childhood memory of Wilson's involves cranberries, lots and lots of them. And, before she dies, the baker dreams of wading in a cranberry bog with boots up to her knees and a lake of cranberries grazing her elbows. Though this goal has yet to be realized, she's doing the next best thing: creating a cranberry craze bundt, just in time for Thanksgiving, soaked in either rum, whiskey or orange muscat. She hasn't decided yet. One thing at a time.

Kiss My Bundt

Red velvet