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The above definition broadly aligns with the US legal definition of Fruit Brandy, though that includes grape spirits. In the European Union, however, such products must be labelled as "fruit spirits".
Subcategories and designations
Many of these European fruit spirits are registered under their own PDO (Protected Designation of Origin). These may simply specify the fruit used. Some fruit spirits are labelled with alternate names, such as kirsch (cherry brandy), slivovitz (damson plum brandy) or applejack.
There are a number of products which feature the name of the region of origin. Examples include Schwarzwälder Kirschwasser, or Framboise (Raspeberry) d'Alsace.
Calvados is an apple spirit from Normandy. Cognac and Armagnac can be considered fruit spirits also, though we group them under the Brandy category. (See Oak Maturation below.)
Applejack
Until the 1960s applejack was more or less synonymous with apple brandy in the USA. It is now defined in law as a blend of at least 20 percent apple distillate with neutral grain spirit. This must be aged for at least two years in oak. Straight applejack has been reintroduced in recent years.
Blended applejack tends, not surprisingly, to have a mellower apple taste than straight applejack and other brandies distilled entirely from apples.
Fruit brandy vs pomace brandy and eau-de-vie
The French term eau-de-vie is often used for fruit spirits. These should be made by fermentation and double-distillation. The suffix "de fruit" denotes non-grape brandies, in contrast to eau-de-vie de vin.
Wine-Searcher includes eaux-de-vie in this category. However it should be noted that some of those products might more acurately belong to our Pomace Brandy category. Something like Eau-de-Vie de Marc de Bourgogne is an example of this complexity.
Eau-de-Vie translates as "water of life". This is the same for akvavit (not typically a fruit spirit) and whisky (from the Gaelic uisce beatha).
Marc is the French term for pomace; grappa is the Italian equivalent. Pomace brandies are those made from the solid remains of grapes used for winemaking, and sometimes other fruits. Based on the American and European legal definitions, these are not a subset of the fruit brandy/spirit category.
The use of barrel ageing is often (but not always) used as the differentiating factor between brandy and eau-de-vie, with the former (though more widely used) therefore a subset of the latter. In this way Cognac and Armagnac are usually described as brandies, not eaux-de-vie.
To add to the complexity of categorization, some grappa is barrel aged and amber in color, while many are unaged and clear. Therefore these products might collectively straddle two or three generic terms, however all are collated on our Grappa page. See also Grappa di Amarone, Grappa di Barolo, Grappa di Brunello and Grappa di Toscana for specific appellations.
Fruit brandy vs fruit liqueur
In English-speaking countries the term "fruit brandy" is often appled to liqueurs, where fruits, juice or flavorings are macerated in a distillate (not fermented and distilled themselves). Where we can identify such products, they are classified as fruit liqueurs.
