Natural form

Amaretto in a clear glass showing its characteristic deep amber color and transparency.

Shows the liqueur's defining visual property — amber color and clarity — so readers immediately recognize it by sight.

Beverages

Amaretto

Sweet almond liqueur for cocktails and baking

Sweet and marzipan-scented, amaretto warms an amaretto sour, laces a coffee, and flavors tiramisu and bakes. Its almond note is unmistakable. Keep it at room temperature.

Amaretto is a sweet Italian liqueur with the unmistakable flavor of marzipan — almond, marzipan, and warm vanilla — though traditionally it gets that note from apricot or peach kernels rather than almonds themselves. Disaronno is the famous brand. It's syrupy, amber, and gently bitter beneath the sweetness. In the kitchen amaretto is a baker's friend: it soaks sponge cakes, perfumes amaretti-based desserts, flavors creams and custards, and adds a nutty depth to fruit (especially cherries, peaches, and pears) and to chocolate.

Measured in: ml
Storage: Room Temperature

Find it in

Beverages

Types & varieties

Disaronno

Iconic apricot-kernel amaretto

Almond-based

Made with real almonds — drier, nuttier

How to use in cooking

Amaretto delivers concentrated marzipan flavor plus sweetness. Brush it over a sponge or pound cake, fold it into mascarpone cream or zabaglione, or use it to macerate peaches, pears, and cherries. It's lovely in chocolate desserts and in the soak for tiramisu variants. Because it's sweet, reduce other sugar accordingly, and add it late to keep the delicate almond aroma.

How to choose

Disaronno is the benchmark; cheaper amarettos can taste artificial. For cooking, a mid-range bottle is fine. If you want pure almond punch without sweetness, almond extract plus a little syrup is a workable, more controllable substitute.

Common uses

Soak sponge and pound cakesMacerate peaches, pears, and cherriesFlavor zabaglione and custardsLift chocolate dessertsFold into mascarpone creamSpike coffee or hot chocolateMake an amaretti tiramisu soak