23 brandy cocktails you can pour tonight.
Almost everyone has a bottle of brandy somewhere. Almost nobody knows what to do with it. Here are twenty-three drinks, ranked roughly by how little you have to add to the bottle you already own. Pre-Prohibition originals from the manuscripts and modern essentials from the bars that revived them.
Brandy is the bottle that ends up in the back of every home bar. Maybe it was a gift. Maybe it was an attempt at a French dinner that never got finished. Maybe a parent left it. The label says cognac or armagnac or something Spanish, the bottle is two thirds full, and most people pour it straight in a wine glass once a year on a holiday and never touch it the other 364 days.
This is a list for those bottles. None of these drinks need a stocked bar. About half need nothing more than what you'd find in a kitchen. The hardest one needs a bottle of dry vermouth and a peel.
Sixty seconds on what brandy actually is
Brandy is distilled wine, aged in oak. That is the whole definition. The variations are about which fruit, where it was made, and how long it sat in barrel.
- Cognac is grape brandy from the Charente region of France. Double-distilled in copper pot stills. VS is the youngest you can sell, then VSOP, then XO. VS for cocktails. VSOP for sipping. XO is wasted in anything mixed.
- Armagnac is the same idea from Gascony. Single-distilled, which makes it heavier and rougher than cognac. People who think they don't like cognac sometimes love armagnac.
- American brandy is the same process, no regional rules. E&J, Christian Brothers, Korbel. Cheaper. Surprisingly good in mixed drinks. Bad straight.
- Calvados is brandy from cider, made in Normandy. Apple flavor up front. Drinks differently from grape brandy. Its own category.
- Pisco is grape brandy from Peru and Chile, unaged or barely aged. Clear in the glass. Tastes more like a high-proof wine than what most people picture as brandy.
- Eau de vie is everything else: pear, raspberry, cherry, plum. Usually clear, usually expensive, usually for finishing a meal in a tiny glass.
For the cocktails below, "brandy" without a qualifier means VS-grade cognac or its American equivalent. If a recipe needs calvados or pisco specifically, the recipe says so.
What to pour tonight, if you have ten minutes
Five bare-minimum drinks with one or two ingredients beyond the brandy bottle. None require a shaker. None require a strainer. One requires ice. Start here if you've never made a cocktail.
1. Brandy and Ginger Ale (Horse's Neck)
- 2 oz brandy
- 4 oz ginger ale (or ginger beer if you want bite)
- The peel of a whole lemon, cut in one long spiral
Drape the lemon peel inside a Collins glass so it loops over the rim. Add ice, brandy, top with ginger ale. The peel is the drink's whole personality. Don't skip it.
2. Brandy Soda
- 2 oz brandy
- 4 oz cold soda water
- Lemon twist
Highball glass, ice, brandy, top with soda, twist a lemon peel over the top and drop it in. The drink the 1900 bartender would pour you while sizing up your tab.
3. Brandy Hot Toddy
- 2 oz brandy
- 1 tsp honey (clover or wildflower)
- 3 oz boiling water
- Half a lemon's juice
- Optional: a clove or two, a cinnamon stick
Mug. Stir honey into hot water until dissolved. Add lemon juice, brandy, spices. The cure for a Tuesday in February that won't end.
4. Brandy Stinger (Lazy)
- 2 oz brandy
- 0.5 oz crème de menthe (white)
If you have a rocks glass and ice: stir over ice. If you don't: just pour in any glass. The Stinger is famously the drink Reginald Vanderbilt was holding when he died, and it's still ridiculous and still good.
5. Brandy Milk Punch
- 2 oz brandy
- 4 oz cold whole milk
- 1 tsp sugar (or simple syrup)
- Grated nutmeg on top
Shake hard with ice for fifteen seconds. Strain into a wine glass. Grate nutmeg over the foam. New Orleans drinks this for breakfast on Christmas morning. They are not wrong.
The pre-Prohibition canon
These are the cocktails the manuscripts wrote down. Jerry Thomas in 1862. Harry Johnson in 1882. Boothby in 1908. Hugo Ensslin in 1917. The book on every modern cocktail bar's reference shelf comes from these names. Brandy is in almost all of them because for most of the 1800s, brandy was the spirit. Whiskey took over after phylloxera wiped out the French grape harvest in the 1870s.
6. Brandy Crusta
- 2 oz brandy
- 0.5 oz orange curaçao (Cointreau works, Grand Marnier works better)
- 0.5 oz lemon juice
- 0.25 oz simple syrup
- 2 dashes Angostura bitters
- The peel of half a lemon, cut as one continuous strip
- Sugar for the rim
Wet the rim of a small wine glass with lemon, dip in sugar. Drape the lemon peel inside the glass so it spirals up to the rim. Shake the rest with ice, double-strain into the glass. The grandfather of every sour with a sugar rim. Every Sidecar, every Margarita, every Lemon Drop traces back to this one drink. More on the Crusta.
7. Sidecar
- 2 oz cognac
- 0.75 oz Cointreau
- 0.75 oz lemon juice
- Sugar rim (optional, traditional)
Sugar the rim of a coupe. Shake hard with ice, double-strain. The Crusta in a tuxedo. Should taste sharp, dry, slightly perfumed. If it tastes sweet, you used too much Cointreau or the wrong cognac.
8. Brandy Smash
- 2 oz brandy
- 0.5 oz simple syrup (or 1 sugar cube)
- 4-6 mint leaves
- Crushed ice
Muddle mint with syrup in a rocks glass. Add brandy, fill with crushed ice, stir with a spoon until the glass is frosted. Garnish with a mint sprig. Thomas wrote that the smash is "the same as a julep on a smaller scale," which is the most Jerry Thomas thing he ever wrote.
9. Brandy Sour
- 2 oz brandy
- 0.75 oz lemon juice
- 0.75 oz simple syrup
- Optional: 0.5 oz egg white
Shake hard with ice, double-strain into a coupe. The egg white turns it into a Boston Sour and adds a foam cap that makes the drink look professional. The 19th-century version skipped the egg, which is fine. Garnish with a brandied cherry.
10. Sazerac (cognac version, original)
- 2 oz cognac (the original spirit; rye took over after 1880)
- 1 sugar cube
- 3 dashes Peychaud's bitters
- Absinthe, for rinsing the glass
- Lemon peel
Chill an Old Fashioned glass, rinse with absinthe, dump the absinthe. In a separate glass, muddle sugar with bitters and a splash of water. Add cognac and ice, stir. Strain into the absinthe-rinsed glass. Express the lemon peel over the top and discard the peel. Most modern bars make it with rye now. Try the cognac version once and you'll see why it was the original. More on the Sazerac.
11. Vieux Carré
- 0.75 oz cognac
- 0.75 oz rye whiskey
- 0.75 oz sweet vermouth
- 1 barspoon Bénédictine
- 2 dashes Peychaud's bitters
- 2 dashes Angostura bitters
Stir all ingredients in a mixing glass with ice for thirty seconds. Strain into a rocks glass with a large ice cube. Twist a lemon peel over the top. The most New Orleans drink in existence: half French (cognac, vermouth, Bénédictine), half American (rye, Peychaud's), one hundred percent itself. More on the Vieux Carré.
12. Champagne Cocktail
- 1 sugar cube
- 3 dashes Angostura bitters
- 5 oz cold dry champagne (or any dry sparkling wine)
- 0.25 oz cognac, floated on top
- Lemon twist
Soak the sugar cube with bitters, drop in a champagne flute. Pour cold champagne over it. The cube should rise and fall slowly while the bubbles climb the sides of it. Float the cognac on a barspoon. Twist the lemon peel over and drop in. Drink while it's still moving.
13. Stinger (proper)
- 2 oz cognac
- 0.75 oz crème de menthe (white only; green is a different drink)
Shake hard with ice, strain into a coupe with no garnish. The proper version uses way more crème de menthe than the lazy version. It tastes like a glass of Christmas. The Stinger was the only cocktail allowed at the New York Stock Exchange luncheon in 1924, which tells you something.
14. Corpse Reviver No. 1
- 1.5 oz cognac
- 0.75 oz calvados (or applejack)
- 0.75 oz sweet vermouth
Stir with ice, strain into a coupe, no garnish. The Number 2 is more famous (gin, Lillet, Cointreau, lemon, absinthe) but the Number 1 is the brandy version and it's heavier, more medicinal, and more genuinely revivifying. Craddock noted "to be taken before 11 a.m., or whenever steam and energy are needed."
The modern essentials
Twentieth and twenty-first century brandy drinks. Some are old recipes that found new audiences. Some came out of the cocktail revival around 2002 to 2010. All work tonight in any half-stocked home bar.
15. Brandy Alexander
- 1.5 oz cognac
- 1 oz crème de cacao (dark)
- 1 oz heavy cream
- Grated nutmeg
Shake hard with ice, strain into a coupe. Grate fresh nutmeg over the surface. Looks like a dessert. Drinks like one. Originally a wedding cocktail; the white version meant white-wedding pure, supposedly.
16. Between the Sheets
- 1 oz cognac
- 1 oz light rum
- 1 oz Cointreau
- 0.5 oz lemon juice
Shake hard, strain into a coupe. The Sidecar split with rum. Sneakier than it sounds because the rum smooths the sharp edges of the cognac and citrus.
17. French Connection
- 1.5 oz cognac
- 1.5 oz amaretto
Pour over ice in a rocks glass. Stir twice. That's the entire drink. The amaretto adds almond-marzipan sweetness and rounds out the brandy. Two ingredients, no shaker, no garnish. The unsung hero of the home bar.
18. Metropolitan
- 2 oz brandy
- 1 oz sweet vermouth
- 2 dashes Angostura bitters
- Optional: 1 dash simple syrup
Stir with ice, strain into a coupe. A Manhattan with brandy in place of rye. Heavier and rounder than a proper Manhattan; less spicy, more fruit. The 1880s drink the Astor Hotel made famous.
19. Brandy Old Fashioned (Wisconsin)
- 2 oz brandy
- 1 sugar cube (or 1 tsp simple syrup)
- 3 dashes Angostura bitters
- Splash of soda OR splash of 7-Up (sweet) or a mash of orange and cherry (press)
- Orange wheel and brandied cherry
Muddle sugar, bitters, orange wheel, cherry in the bottom of a rocks glass. Add brandy and ice. Top with soda for "sour" or 7-Up for "sweet" or muddle harder and skip the topper for "press." Wisconsin drinks more brandy per capita than any other state because of this drink. The bartender will ask you sweet, sour, or press. Sour is the right answer.
Other grape brandies, other countries
20. Pisco Sour
- 2 oz pisco
- 0.75 oz lime juice (key lime if possible)
- 0.75 oz simple syrup
- 1 egg white
- 3 drops Angostura bitters, on the foam after shaking
Dry-shake (no ice) for ten seconds. Add ice, shake hard for another ten. Double-strain into a coupe. The egg white forms a thick foam cap. Drop three Angostura dots on the foam and drag a toothpick through them for the classic art. More on the Pisco Sour.
21. Jack Rose (apple brandy)
- 2 oz applejack or calvados
- 0.75 oz lemon juice (lime works too)
- 0.5 oz grenadine (real, made from pomegranate)
Shake hard with ice, strain into a coupe. The cocktail Hemingway's narrator orders in The Sun Also Rises. Pink, sour, slightly autumnal. More on the Jack Rose.
22. Calvados Old Fashioned
- 2 oz calvados
- 0.25 oz maple syrup (real, dark)
- 2 dashes Angostura bitters
- 1 dash orange bitters
- Orange peel
Stir with ice in a mixing glass, strain into a rocks glass over a large cube. Express orange peel and drop. Tastes like a baked apple turned into a drink. The dark maple is doing a lot of work; do not substitute pancake syrup.
23. Brandy Eggnog
- 1.5 oz brandy
- 0.5 oz dark rum (optional but traditional)
- 1 whole egg
- 3 oz whole milk
- 1 oz heavy cream
- 2 tsp simple syrup
- Grated nutmeg
Shake everything except nutmeg hard with ice for twenty seconds. Strain into a tall mug or wine glass. Grate fresh nutmeg over the top. The historical version was made in batch and aged for weeks; the single-serve version is for emergencies (December 24, 25, 31). Whole egg is the play. Egg white only is just a milkshake.
If you're out of cognac: the substitution table
The Speakeater app does this in real time when you scan your bar shelf, but here's the cheat sheet for tonight:
| Recipe calls for | Use instead | What changes |
|---|---|---|
| Cognac VS | Armagnac (any), American brandy (E&J VSOP, Christian Brothers VS), or Spanish brandy (Cardenal Mendoza, Carlos I) | Slightly fuller, slightly less floral. In shaken citrus drinks, the difference is small. |
| Cognac VSOP | Armagnac VSOP, American Brandy XO | Same logic. Sip the substitute first to make sure it isn't too sweet for the recipe. |
| Calvados | Applejack (Laird's bonded works), or apple eau de vie | Applejack is sweeter, less acid; works in cocktails, less good neat. |
| Pisco | Singani (Bolivian) or grappa (cleaner only) | Pisco-specific drinks lose their character with grape brandy aged in oak. The Pisco Sour without pisco is a Whiskey Sour. |
| Crème de cacao | Drambuie + a drop of vanilla, or skip entirely | Reduces the dessert character. Brandy Alexander becomes more spirit-forward. |
| Cointreau | Grand Marnier, triple sec, or curaçao | Grand Marnier is sweeter and adds vanilla; triple sec is harsher. |
What to pair with brandy
Dessert. Dark chocolate (70% or higher), crème brûlée, fruit tart, anything almond. The classic move is a Brandy Alexander after a chocolate dessert. Worth doing once if you've never tried it.
Cigar. A medium-bodied cigar (Connecticut or natural wrapper) sips nicely with cognac VSOP. Avoid the Maduro pairing unless you want both flavors fighting.
Cheese. Aged hard cheese (Comté, aged Gouda, Parmigiano). Soft creamy cheeses fight the spirit. Blue cheese is too aggressive.
Cold weather. The hot toddy, the brandy milk punch, the eggnog. These exist because brandy was the warm-up spirit for centuries before central heating made wine viable in winter.
One thing not to pair brandy with. Beer. Tried it. Nobody enjoys it.
Common questions
What's the easiest cocktail to make with brandy?
Brandy and ginger ale over ice with a long lemon peel, sometimes called Horse's Neck. Two ingredients, no syrup, no shake. Three minutes from bottle to glass. The 1890s bartenders called it a temperance drink because it photographed well in newspaper society pages.
What kind of brandy should I buy first?
VS-grade cognac if you want a single bottle that works in every cocktail in this list. Around twenty-five to thirty-five dollars. Hennessy VS, Martell VS, or Remy Martin VS all work. VSOP is smoother for sipping but is wasted in stirred drinks.
Is American brandy okay for cocktails?
Yes for warming drinks (toddies, eggnog, milk punch), classic mixed drinks (Brandy Old Fashioned, Stinger, Sidecar), and anything that gets shaken with citrus. The cognac difference shows mainly in stirred spirit-forward drinks like the Vieux Carré. E&J VSOP and Christian Brothers VS both run under fifteen dollars and pour fine.
What's the difference between cognac, armagnac, and brandy?
Cognac and armagnac are both French grape brandies from specific regions (Charente and Gascony). Cognac is double-distilled in copper pot stills, lighter, fruitier. Armagnac is single-distilled, fuller, rougher. American brandy is the same idea (distilled grape wine, aged in oak) without the regional rules. Calvados is apple, pisco is grape but Peruvian or Chilean. Eau de vie is everything else.
Can I substitute one brandy for another in a cocktail?
Mostly. Cognac and armagnac are interchangeable in shaken drinks and in most stirred cocktails. American brandy works as a one-to-one swap in everything except the most spirit-forward sippers, where the cognac character carries the drink. Pisco and calvados are not substitutes for grape brandy; they make their own drinks.
What's the oldest brandy cocktail still made today?
The Brandy Crusta. Joseph Santini, a New Orleans bartender, was making it in the 1840s. Jerry Thomas printed the first written recipe in 1862. The horseshoe lemon peel inside the glass and the sugared rim are both Crusta inventions. Every sour-style cocktail with citrus and a sugar rim descends from this drink.
How does Speakeater help me with this?
Open the camera, photograph your bar shelf, the app extracts every bottle and pulls back cocktails you can actually mix from what you already own. Same logic as the kitchen scan. The cocktail catalog is 6,539 drinks deep with the original manuscript pages keyed to the pre-Prohibition recipes. Free on Android, launching June 10, 2026.
Stop Googling "what to make with brandy."
Open your bar. Take a photo. Speakeater pulls back the eight cocktails you can pour right now from what's already on the shelf. Plus 6,539 more in the cellar, with the original 1862 manuscript pages keyed to the pre-Prohibition ones.
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