Skip to main content
Dessert

Cherries Brandied, or Brandied Cherries

A preserved cherry dessert made by adding sugar and brandy to cherries, optionally with almonds, and stored for at least two months.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 4 ingredients
Jump to recipe ↓

Why it works: Brandy and almond are a kitchen classic. They rank in the top 17% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 1,969 recipes. Both carry 2-heptanol, which smells bitter, floral. The science ↓

Cherries Brandied, or Brandied Cherries

Ingredients

Directions

Prepare

  1. Cut off half or more of the stalks from the cherries.

  2. Place the cherries in clean glass bottles.

Preserve

  1. Add ¼ pound of sugar for every pound of cherries.

  2. Cover the cherries with good brandy.

  3. Add a couple of blanched bitter almonds to each bottle if desired.

  4. Cork the bottles and seal with bladder.

  5. Store for at least two months before opening.

Recipe from a historical cookbook (Internet Archive).

Transcribed from a scanned cookbook and modernised for today's kitchens. Where the book gave no heat or time, or said "a moderate oven", the temperatures and times here may be modern equivalents rather than the book's own figures.

Explore the science

The flavor team

The pairs that carry this dish. Each one is judged two ways: how much their aromas overlap, and how often cooks already put them together.

  1. Brandy + almondtop 17% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together1,969 recipes

    Shared aroma: 2-heptanol (bitter, floral).

  2. Sugar + almondtop 18% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together15,679 recipes

    Shared aroma: 1-penten-3-one (fish, pungent).

  3. Sugar + brandytop 19% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together11,939 recipes

    Shared aroma: beta-damascenone (apple, rose).

Sugar and brandy barely smell alike, yet cooks put them together in 11,939 recipes: they work on texture and structure more than aroma.

Ranks compare each pair with 20,000 random ingredient pairs on CompKitchen. How we score pairs

What each ingredient does

Morella cherries
The fruit itself; its flesh and juice soften and absorb the brandy and sugar syrup.
Sugar
Draws water out of the cherries and helps preserve them, creating a sweet syrup.
Brandy
Alcohol that helps preserve the fruit and adds its own warm flavour.

The step that matters

Cork the bottles and seal with bladder. Cherries must stay fully covered by brandy and sealed airtight, since exposure to air lets them spoil and ferment.

Swap the almond

The recipe marks almond as optional. How well each one fits the dish's main ingredients (sugar, brandy):

  1. Almondthe original
  2. Chestnutfits about as well
  3. Walnutfits less well
  4. Hazelnutfits less well

Fit is the average pairing score against sugar, brandy. Candidates are from the same food group and used in at least 100 recipes.

“What each ingredient does” and “The step that matters” were written by Claude from this recipe’s own method and reviewed in samples by CompKitchen.

You might also like

Brandy PeachesBrandy Peaches68 recipesAlmond Sponge CakeAlmond Sponge Cake26 recipesAlmond CustardAlmond Custard22 recipesAlmond WafersAlmond Wafers22 recipes