How and with what they drink cognac and how to do it right

Reasonable question, isn’t it? What do you drink cognac with? Probably, in a folk way, with a lemon? Or maybe with Cola, it’s so fashionable to mix cognac with coca? The main thing here is not to overdo it and not to pour some 40-year-old collector’s item with meat-corrosive liquid, otherwise they will call you an idiot. I confess, I myself used to “waving” Koktebel C grade (let the earth rest in peace) inside, like ordinary vodka. But we’re not savages, are we? Not! So let’s be enlightened, mind to gain intelligence. So, how to drink brandy, and most importantly with what?

Why you shouldn’t drink cognac

Grape brandy is made in almost all countries where grapes are grown. The most famous brandy in the world is cognac, although Armagnac and good Georgian and Armenian brandies deserve no less respect. There are the most worthy examples of brandy in California, South Africa, Spain, Germany, and so on and so forth… They even make pomace, if you remember – in Italy there is grappa, and in Georgia – chacha. But that’s not what we’re talking about now. How to drink brandy? In Russia, there are many misconceptions about this.

For example, there are still people who make the Nikolashka appetizer for cognac. Tsar Nicholas, who is now extolled, was not only a completely weak-willed and senseless ruler, he was also a big not a fool to drink. And, according to rumors, he loved such an appetizer very much, hence the name. Pour ground coffee on a slice of lemon and sprinkle with sugar. Since the wife watched how he abused, he was often served cognac in a teapot (the color is the same) and with this snack. The smile on my face did not slip when I turned pages on Google for a long time with Nikolashka recipes (there is even a separate article on Wiki) – a delicacy, closed…

Maybe Nikolashka is a good appetizer, but not with cognac. For a surrogate cognac produced somewhere in Dagestan or Moldova, and, most likely, even bottled somewhere in a state farm near Moscow with a fake label of Moldavian or Dagestan cognac, this is probably suitable. A to good brandy – no way. Both lemon with its acid and essential oils, and coffee with its strongest smell completely kill the taste of cognac. Again – if you drink some kind of filth, Nikolashka will ennoble it. And coffee and zest will slightly “clog” the alcoholic “exhaust”.

Now about how to drink cognac

Let’s start with serving dishes, no matter how rude it may sound. In the common people, these glasses are called “cognacs”. In narrower, intelligent circles, such glasses are called “sniffers“(from the English. “sniff” – sniff). The glass was made specifically so that the aroma emitted by brandy and other noble drinks was concentrated in its pot-bellied walls. Cognac is poured into snifters to the level of the widest part of the glass, but in general, 30-40 ml will be enough to appreciate all the advantages of the drink that has fallen into your hands. Also, for tasting thoroughbred brandy, an ordinary tulip-type tasting glass is suitable, from which it is preferable to drink whiskey.

Now for the tasting. Pour 30-40 ml of drink into a glass and touch its outer wall with your finger. Now turn the glass upside down and check if your fingerprint is visible through the drink. If yes, then you have a good examplewell worth a drink. Then rotate the glass around its axis and follow the behavior of the cognac on the walls of the glass, that is, how quickly it flows down them. With aging, cognac becomes viscous, more dense. If trickles are visible during 5 seconds, then you have a drink of 5-8 years of aging, if 15 seconds – Approximately 20 years old. Collectibles with an exposure of more than 50 years leave a “trace” for 17-18 seconds.

A little reminder. Cognac and brandy aging classification according to Hennessy:

• AC: at least 2 years aging
• V.S. (Very Special): at least 3 years aging
• V.S.O.P. (Very Superior Old Pale): at least 4 years aging
• VVSOP Grand Reserve: at least 5 years aging
• XO (Extra Old) Hors d’age Napoleon Extra Very Old Old Reserve: at least 6 years aging

Also, “gourmets” distinguish three “waves” of smell. Light tones, vanilla, are felt at a distance of 5 cm from the glass. At the edge of the glass, you should feel fruity and floral aromas – this is the second “wave”. The third “wave” comes directly when you are completely “immersed” in a glass – it is characterized by subtle notes of violet, linden, apricot and other fruits, as well as complex “port wine” tones (I remind you that elite brandy is aged in sherry and other barrels) wine drinks). To avoid alcohol blows to the nose, try immersing the latter in a glass, but inhaling through your mouth – the effect should impress you.

Well, actually the process of drinking. You need to drink cognac in small sips, savoring it, allowing it to gradually open up. The temperature of the drink should not differ from room temperature or be slightly higher – as with whiskey, a high temperature can give a feeling of excessive alcohol content. Another “our” misconception: until now, some people believe that cognac needs to be heated in the hands, and in some dubious establishments, cognac will be heated for you in a huge cylinder on a special installation on a candle flame.

If anyone has been to major restaurants where the lads went in the nineties and the beginning of this century, such devices were there to mock cognac. You can’t heat cognac on candles – it’s better to put candles in ass. Here is what Maurice Hennessy, a descendant of the founder of the largest cognac house, said to this: “I am a Frenchman and it would never occur to me to drink wine warm. Cognac is the fruit of wine, the product of its distillation.” Now about the “snack”.

What do the French drink cognac with and what can you drink it with at all

The notorious 4C rule has probably been heard by everyone who is inclined to consider themselves at least to a minimal extent a sybarite – cognac, cigar, chocolat, coffee. True, this will not be translated into Russian as 4C – cognac, coffee, cigar and chocolate. It turns out complete nonsense – 2K, S and Sh. But we have a countermeasure, our own rule – vodka, black bread and herring. Preferably with onions – VChKhSL. This is among the snickering bourgeois, you know, 4C. But that’s not the point. There is a whole theory regarding the 3K rule, so let’s consider it.

We are so arranged that the blood, in different functional periods of our mortal daily existence, is periodically redistributed depending on the actions performed or the wishes of the actions. What does 4C have to do with it, you ask? Yes, despite the fact that we, as a rule, indulge in this notorious 4C after a good meal. When the blood in the body is redistributed to perform an important social function. It seems that Ostap Bender also claimed that “by carefully chewing I write, you help society.” When we have eaten, the blood drains from the brain and other vital organs, and rushes to the stomach, helping it to work.

Nature calls for an after-dinner rest! But our goal in itself – to know the 4Cs – usually happens after a full and decent evening meal, on a free day, when you don’t have to run to work again. When you don’t need to run anywhere. And what, so stupid, ate and sleep? An-no! This is where the 4C will help us. Who has not yet understood, cognac is a digestif, that is, a drink that should be consumed after a meal to improve digestion. The remaining 3K should help us with this.

Coffee

As you know, the main active principle of this magical drink is the alkaloid caffeine, which acts on the central nervous system as a stimulant. Even its aroma is so associated with cheerfulness that every second coffee brand bases its advertising on how steam from coffee in the morning makes its way under the door where someone is sleeping, and he (a), upon hearing this aroma, immediately wakes up and is happy and cheerful. After a cup of coffee, he runs to work.

Chocolate

The main active principle of this magical dessert dish made from cocoa beans is theobromine alkaloid, which also acts on the central nervous system and heart as a stimulant, and, according to recent studies, causes the release of “happiness hormones”. Research is now under way to make people happy using chocolate extracts. True, here we recall that alcohol and chocolate are incompatible – this combination can cause acute pancreatitis, which is not at all good for us. But this is up to you, maybe the doctors are wrong. The French are so peppy, “without pancreatitis” …

Cigars

As you know, the main active principle of this plant, Nicitiana Tabaccum, from which the pinnacle of tobacco art is made, a cigar is an alkaloid nicotine, a powerful neurotransmitter that acts on the central nervous system as a stimulant. Nicotine in small doses provokes the release of adrenaline, which dilates blood vessels, stimulates the heartbeat. It also increases the amount of dopamine in the “pleasure center” – the brain, leading to mild relaxation and euphoria. By the way, nicotine also suppresses the feeling of hunger – this makes it ideal for completing the meal: even if you haven’t completely eaten after dinner, the cigar signals that everything is over – the movie is over!

These 3Cs do not let us fall asleep, they disturb and excite our brain, which wants to switch off for the stupid digestion of food. Here everything excites and maintains your attention – and the magical aroma of freshly ground and freshly brewed (preferably in a Turk, and not in vulgar coffee machines, and, God forbid, insoluble) coffee, a languid and exciting sensation of melting chocolate in your mouth, divine a cigar in your hand, whose smoke flows smoothly and melancholy into the sky, which plunges you into a state close to nirvana. This is psycho-emotional perception according to a stamp, already deeply sewn into the tracing paper of our sensations. At the same time, we don’t think at all that there is a banal physiological explanation for this: the synergy of nicotine, caffeine and theobromine. And, of course, cognac.

Cognac

Cognac, unlike the other three Cs, does not contain alkaloids. But ethyl alcohol, which makes up at least 40 volume fractions of your glass, is the same causative agent of the central nervous system as all of the above dishes. Ethanol acts as a vasodilator and thus, in particular, promotes blood flow to the stomach, helping it to digest our meal. It is not for nothing that in all countries of the world it is customary to drink a glass of a noble strong drink, like a digestif that helps digestion.

In addition, cognac contains many other substances and compounds that in one way or another affect our body. For example, tannins that cognac picks up from the barrel, and which actively affect our vascular system, and therefore our body as a whole. So, in physiological terms, this combination is quite reasonable: it allows us to maintain small talk after a hearty meal, and gives us the strength to show signs of attention to beautiful ladies – instead of stupidly snoring, as mother nature requires after a good dinner.

If you have a weak heart, tachycardia, arrhythmia, or other disorders, you should in no case be zealous with 4C: all members of this quartet have a powerful effect on both the central nervous system and the vascular system. In general, those who are under 50 should no longer get carried away with this divine combination. Unfortunately, our drinking traditions are largely vodka: drink in glasses and liters. And, meanwhile, there are so many tannins and tannins in XO age cognac that even one serving will give incorrect readings from a cardiologist. As they say, “The Ministry of Health warns”!

PS The work is entirely, but not completely built on the presentation of Mr. Erkin Tuzmukhamedov, may the force be with him.