You Don't Need Maraschino Liqueur For Deliciously Boozy Cocktail Cherries
If you want to prepare some cocktails at home and look like a proper mixologist, you'll need some cherries to add on top. And not just any cherries will do — the kind of cherry you see floating in your Old Fashioned is usually a maraschino cherry, which is historically made using maraschino liquor. The typical maraschino cherries you can get from the grocery store are a sugary, alcohol-free imitation that was invented in America during Prohibition, but the point is, you need cocktail cherries for cocktails.
Preparing cocktail cherries yourself isn't difficult. Making them boozier than store-bought maraschino cherries is also fairly easy. It's a simple process of simmering the cherries with sugar, water, and liquor. The standard is usually Luxardo-brand maraschino liqueur, but you don't necessarily need to use it to achieve the results you're after. Brandy, rum, or bourbon are all spirits that pair perfectly with cherries and can help you whip up drink-ready cocktail cherries to impress your friends.
Garnish-ready cherries
Recipes for cocktail cherries that don't use maraschino will often call for brown liquors — think brandy, scotch, spiced rum, or bourbon. Brandy is a close alternative that will preserve some amount of fruit flavor, as it's made from fermented fruit. A spiced rum like Captain Morgan or Kraken, on the other hand, would tone down the fruit taste a bit, instead adding hints of vanilla or cinnamon. Many homemade jars of cocktail cherries also include a cinnamon stick for an extra hint of flavor, or you can try making bourbon cherries using something like Wild Turkey or Buillet.
Exactly how boozy your cocktail cherries should be is a personal preference, but you'll likely be garnishing drinks with these rather than just popping them into your mouth (of course, you can do that, too). For a good balance, add 1 cup of alcohol for every pound of cherries. You can mix up the types of alcohol you use, as well, which would mean, for example, adding ½ cup each of two different spirits.
The story of cocktail cherries
"Maraschino cherries" aren't a specific variety of cherries you can grow — it's a name for cherries that are preserved and sweetened. They got their name because they were originally preserved using maraschino liqueur. This is a spirit made from fermented Marasca cherries, a specific type of sour cherry grown in Europe (most are grown in Croatia). Since alcohol is an effective way to preserve fruit, maraschino became a popular means of preserving cherries in the 19th century.
The bitterness and slight sweetness maraschino added to cherries made them a popular garnish for drinks, although they were strictly off-limits to Americans once Prohibition began. In response, food scientists created an artificial version that preserved the cherry using brine. They also gave the cherries a bright, almost neon red color, and they became the standard "cherry on top" for ice cream sundaes and, eventually, cocktails. Luxardo maraschino cherries are much closer to traditional maraschino cherries, although they use syrup rather than alcohol — they do, of course, make separate maraschino liqueur. You might not need either, though, if you choose to make your own cocktail cherries.