Charente Spirit · Aged Brandy
Cognac
Photo: Basile Morin / Wikimedia Commons · CC BY-SA 4.0
Cognac exists because Dutch traders taught local distillers to concentrate Charente wine for the long sea voyage north — the double-distilled result turned out better than the wine itself.
Cognac is a grape brandy distilled twice in copper stills and aged for years in Limousin oak barrels, produced only around the town of Cognac in Nouvelle-Aquitaine. It's sipped neat or on ice, often after a meal.
Why it's made this way: The region's chalky-soil grape makes thin, acidic wine that's mediocre for drinking but ideal for distilling — a 17th-century workaround that became one of France's most prized exports.
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