According to EU spirits legislation, brandy is a spirit drink produced from spirits with or without the addition of wine distillate distilled at less than 94.8% vol., provided that this distillate does not exceed 50% of the alcoholic strength by volume of the finished product. The term brandy was first used by the German brandy producer Hugo Johann Asbach (1868-1935) in 1896, who called his product Cognac-Weinbrand (from 1919, however, the use of the term Cognac was banned outside France). By definition, the term brandy is actually an exception, because otherwise only those distillate products are called brandy that were distilled from mash, such as grape brand y or fruit brandies (raspberry, cherry, apricot, etc.). Such a brandy, however, is not matured in oak barrels in the same way as wine brandy and, because of its light colour, is also called " Klarer aus Wein" (clear wine brandy).
![]()
For my many years of work as an editor with a wine and culinary focus, I always like to inform myself about special questions at Wine lexicon. Spontaneous reading and following links often leads to exciting discoveries in the wide world of wine.
Dr. Christa Hanten
Fachjournalistin, Lektorin und Verkosterin, Wien