Most people don’t look to add a banana liqueur to their bar unless they either love bananas, or are planning on using it for something really specific. If you happen to be looking for a high quality banana liqueur, Giffard Banane du Bresil might be just the ticket. Made from slow macerated bananas mostly from Brazil, this banana liqueur is heavy on the banana notes and finished with just a touch of cognac. So does this hold up to the high standards of Giffard’s other products?
Giffard Banane du Bresil
Sight: A moderate gold with hints of copper.
Smell: The smell is sweet and initially stands out as a banana candy note. The smell is more dynamic though, giving way to overly ripe, mashed banana notes and a slight caramelization.
Sip: The sip starts sweet and has a correspondingly thick texture. The flavors of overripened mashed bananas bump up against candied banana notes. A subtle caramelized sugar flavor leans toward bananas foster. A range of other banana flavors flit in and out.
Savor: The candied banana carries over to the finish and has a subtle dried banana chip flavor.
Giffard Banane du Bresil is banana forward and does a good job of balancing real banana flavors and candied notes. The flavors here are obviously sweet, which is to be expected, but there’s complexity that underlies the liqueur. The different sugar notes bring depth and dimensions. The net effect is rather sweet to sip on its own, but it has enough character if you were to try to drink it straight that you wouldn’t feel overwhelmed with one note.
In Cocktails
There aren’t really standard classic cocktails that call for a banana flavor, but the Educated Barfly’s reader Chase Hoffman from Denver, was nice enough to contribute the Banana Farmer to the world. This riff on Planter’s Punch and Zombie ends up using almost an ounce of Giffard Banane du Bresil to make an amazing rum forward drink that does a slam dunk of caramelized banana flavor with underlying bruleed sugar. The falernum adds a beautiful spicing, and the lime comes to brighten the whole thing up. While not listed in the written recipe, you’ll find two dashes of angostura bitters in the video presentation of it. I recommend that you try it both ways to find your preference for spice level.
If perhaps a Banana forward Zombie cousin isn’t your jam, we’ll talk about how this works in cocktails in general. To start with, we’ve found that the sweetness is strong enough to replace most one to one simple syrups, but with a strong caramelized banana flavor. This means you can use it in relatively small proportions to add a good amount of banana flavor, like by substituting it in an old fashioned. Doing so gives a subtle caramelized banana note that compliments Jim Beam’s peanut note.
In Review – Giffard Banane du Bresil
Giffard Banane du Bresil is a deliciously flavored with lots of different banana flavors and a good mix of sugars. It has depth, sweetness, and complexity that align well with it’s mid $20 price tag. Despite this, it’s definitely an expansion bottle or one that you target specific drinks you want to make with it. True banana fans should also consider trying a bottle, and spicing up their favorite cocktail with hint of banana.