Monday, November 11, 2019

How sweet it is!

I like liqueurs and the lighter eaux de vie or schnapps. This is a catalogue of some of the notable ones I have found — or would like to try.

Some of my favorites are Cointreau, Chambord, Cherry Heering, Giffard Pamplemousse (grapefruit), Mathilde Framboise (red raspberry), and Lemoncellos. I also like the lighter liqueurs that are closer to an eau de vie like Berentzen Apfelkorn.

According to various websites that I looked at, the world's most popular liqueurs are Amaretto, Amarula, Baileys Irish Cream, Campari, Cointreau, Disaronno, Drambuie, Frangelico, Kahlúa, St. Germain, and Sambuca.

The top selling liqueur in the world, not too surprisingly, is Baileys Irish Cream.

The difference between liqueur and schnapps isn't exactly clear because there are so set rules and one company may call their product liqueur when we might think of it as a schnapps or an eau de vie.

A good general rule is that liqueur is made by steeping fruit in pure alcohol spirits to extract the flavour, and they tend to be sweet from the addition of sugar. Schapps is made my distilling fruit juice (and, being distilled, explains why schapps are clear), and it tends to be less sweet than liqueurs. This makes it closer to a fruit brandy. Eau de vie seems to be just the French term for schnapps.

Kirsch, the German distilled cherry liquor, would be a clear example of a schnapps. The renowned Calvados from France is a distilled drink made from apples but is called an apple brandy in France. So the classifications are not consistent or clear.

Check out this Wikipedia list of liqueurs.

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