There is a surprising variety of vermouth. As I understand it: White (sometimes called Bianco): Off-dry or slightly sweet white-wine based vermouth with herbs and botanicals, often with citrus notes. M&R "Bianco" and Dolin "Blanc" are brands I think of. To me, this really is a white vermouth -- light, sweet, clean. You might want to class Lillet Blonde here. Dry (sometimes called French): Dry white wine based vermouth with herbs and botanicals. M&R dry, Vya dry, N-P dry, etc, are all common brands. This is the martini vermouth -- herbaceous, sometimes with some quinine, drying and savory on the palate. I think of it as 'green' vermouth, actually, because of how it tastes, and its generally greenish tinge. Sweet (Italian): Wine based (mostly red), with herbs, spices and other botanicals. Has a very earthy quality, like the Italian amaros, but is quite sweet as well. Carpano Antica Formula is the oldest, and probably the best, but I also love Vya, and even use M&R sometimes. Cinzano sweet is another well known brand. I think of this more as a brown vermouth than red -- both from the earthiness as well as the ruddy brownish red color that it usually has. Rouge/Red:Red wine based, but, like a Blanc vermouth, it is sweet, light, and herbal, lacking the earthy notes of a Sweet vermouth. Often similar to Lillet Rouge in its level of winey-ness. M&R Rouge and Boling Rouge are brands I can think of -- what I consider a red vermouth. Now, some other firms make other variants also -- M&R makes a rose vermouth, and N-P makes the ambre. Neither of those really fit in the above categories, nor, to be honest, in my understanding of their use in cocktails. As for the Bols -- hm, now I am unsure because it says both "liqueur" and "brandy" -- these terms are, to me, mutually exclusive. I consider cherry brandy to be a cherry flavored brandy -- that is, aged grape spirit that has been flavored with cherries and aged some more. It gets a cherry flavor, but it also has that wood-aged brandy notes. It also is not particularly sweet, and has roughly 40% alcohol. Cherry liqueur, to me, is a cherry-flavored neutral spirit which has not been aged in wood barrels, is fairly sweet and lower in alcohol -- basically a cleaner cherry flavor, and none of the brandy's earthiness. Cherry Heering is a Dutch cherry brandy, that may be closer to a liqueur than a brandy, but it really is its own product. Hope that is interesting! ~H
