One thing that whisky and cognac have in common is that they are aged in barrels: As they age, they get more and more smooth. The spirits pick up quite a lot from the wooden barrels: Color and some flavors of course. And Whiskey and Cognac share the method of distillation in pot stills.
Cognac must age at least 2 1/2 years. Most of the brandies are below six years, but can also be a hundred years old.
Cognac and brandy uses age terms such as VOP, VS, VSOP or XO. To designate age. In a modern world a simple cheat sheet for how to consume Cognac may look like this:VS = blending (mixed drinks) VSOP = blending or sipping XO = sipping, you would never mix. Big spendor factor.
If the aging of whiskey reaches two years or beyond, the whiskey is then additionally designated as "straight" e.g., "straight rye whiskey". A whiskey that fulfills all these above requirements except that it is derived from less than 51% of any one specific type of grain can be called simply a "straight whiskey" without naming a grain.
Terms you may see alone or together on a Cognac bottle.
The United States is the single biggest market for Cognac in the world, especially since the hip-hop industry embraced Cognac as its drink of choice.
Winston Churchill. Kim Jong-Il. Jay-Z. Segolene Royal....... What’s probably the one thing they have in common? Cognac.
U.S. imports more than 50 millions bottles of cognac each year.
Between 60-85% of the Cognac sales are to African Amercians. The rest usually gets sold to creepy old white guys. Side note - (my middle child happens to be named Rémy.-named after a famous Cognac or if you like a well known grape growing region.)
