Perfect Pairings & Recipes for
Brandy

Exquisite brandy flavour pairings and recipes, revealed through data science.

Brandy instantly conjures the embrace of caramel and the bracing kiss of vanilla. But look beneath its obvious sweetness and you'll discover a captivating symphony of softer notes, a whisper of oak, a hint of apricot, and subtle accents reminiscent of raisin, contributing remarkable depth. The key to finding the perfect pairing for brandy is understanding how these notes harmonise.

To illuminate these harmonies, we embarked on an ambitious journey, analysing thousands of ingredients. Each was meticulously deconstructed across 150 distinct flavour dimensions, allowing us to pinpoint precisely which notes complement in both classic and unexpected ways. Our exploration reveals, for instance, how the umami, savory monosodium glutamate in enoki mushroom can enrich brandy, and how broccoli rabe's brassica notes forge a beautiful synergy with its warm sweetness.

An ingredient's flavour comes from its core characteristics, like nectarous, woody, and floral, combined with its unique aroma notes (outer bars). When pairing ingredients, aim to include a broad variety of core characteristics for a balanced dish. And choose aroma notes that complement each other for a harmonious combination.

The Art of Flavour Pairing

To understand how flavour notes harmonise, we analysed more than 50,000 popular ingredient combinations. By exploring these pairings, we identified specific flavour notes that frequently occur together, indicating they share a harmonious relationship.

The Flavours That Harmonise With Caramel Notes

Our analysis shows that the flavour of caramel is strongly associated with the flavour of cabbage. This suggests we should look for ingredients with a cabbagy flavour, such as broccoli rabe, when pairing with the caramel aroma notes of brandy.

The recipe below provides inspiration for pairing brandy with broccoli rabe.

Harmonious Flavours Of Brandy

Just as our analysis found that caramel and cabbagy notes combine harmoniously, we can identify the full profile of flavours that harmonise with each of the flavour notes present in brandy. E.g. the vanillic flavours of brandy are often used with allspice-like and plum-like accents.

The aromas linked to the various aroma notes of brandy can be seen highlighted in the pink bars below.

Matching Flavour Profiles

The flavour profile of enoki mushroom offers many of the aroma notes complementary to brandy, including glutamic and grassy aroma notes. Because the flavour profile of enoki mushroom has many of the of the features that are complementary to brandy, they are likely to pair very well together.

The chart above shows the unique profile of enoki mushroom across 150 dimensions of flavour, while the recipes below offer inspiration for bringing these flavours together with brandy.

Recipes That Pair Brandy With Enoki Mushroom

Linked Flavour Notes

Looking at the aromas that are most strongly associated with the various flavours of brandy, we can identify other ingredients that are likely to pair well.

The left side of the chart above highlights the aroma notes of brandy, along with the complementary aromas associated with each note. While the right side shows some of the ingredients that share many of the aromas complementary to brandy.

Which Fruit Go With Brandy?

Choose fruit that ground its sweetness or ground its fig sweetness. Mandarin juice and clementine offer vibrant, clean counterpoints, their verdant freshness lifting the palate. Blood orange add a gentle, oniony brightness, while green grape introduces a sophisticated, anise-tinged elegance.

Alternatively, embrace fruit that harmonise with brandy's vanilliness. The addition of cherry purée, with its subtle prunus notes, can complement the vanilla beautifully, while coconut lends a juicy aroma.

How Flavonomics Works

We've pioneered a unique, data-driven approach to decode the intricate art of flavour pairing. Our goal is to move beyond intuition and uncover the science of why certain ingredients harmonise beautifully. This rigorous methodology allows us to provide you with insightful and reliable pairing recommendations.

Our analysis begins with over 50,000 carefully selected recipes from acclaimed chefs like Galton Blackiston, Marcello Tully, and Pierre Lambinon. This premium dataset ensures our model distils genuine culinary excellence and creativity.

Each ingredient from these recipes is deconstructed across 150 distinct flavour dimensions, creating a unique numerical "flavour fingerprint." This quantification allows us to apply advanced analytical methods to identify complex patterns between flavour notes.

We identify popular ingredient combinations that frequently appear in our recipe database. Regression analysis is then performed on these pairings to statistically validate and pinpoint truly harmonious flavours.

These insights drive our predictive model, which allows us to take any ingredient (e.g., Brandy), analyse its detailed flavour profile, and accurately reveal its complementary flavours and perfect ingredient partners.