East India

A brandy produced in the wine-region surrounding Cognac, France. Cognac must be twice distilled and aged for at least two years in French oak.

A liqueur predominantly flavored with the dried peels of the laraha orange native to the island of Curaçao. Curaçao liqueur likely originated in the 1600s from the Dutch spirit company Bols after the West Indies Company controlled trade from the island. The liqueur comes in many colors with blue being the original made by Bols, however the color is only added for effect and adds no flavor. Triple Sec (ie: Cointreau) is considered a white Curaçao.

A class of bitters that a broadly made from aromatic herbs, spices, fruits and botanicals. This includes Peychuad and Angostura bitters. You can make these at home. There are plenty of recipes online for various bitters, a good book source is 'Bitters' by Brad Parsons. The only down side is they generally require hard-ish to source ingredients.

A liqueur distilled from Marasca cherries, that grow along the Dalmatian coast.

A syrup made from dissolving granulated sugar (sucrose) in water. Regular simple is made by combining 1:1 sugar:water by mass, rich simple is 2:1 sugar:water by mass although only 1.5 times as sweet as regular. We always use 1:1 syrup unless otherwise noted in the recipe itself.

In cocktails, cherries are sweetened in a brine, like maraschino cherries (marr-ə-SKEE-noh) or in brandy, like brandied cherries. They are usually used as a garnish, muddled into the cocktail, or used simple for their sweetened brine.