Reese Maraschino Syrup, 8 oz

This is the sweet red syrup that maraschino cherries sit in, bottled on its own. Reese is a US specialty grocery brand, and this is a small-format pantry item that solves one specific problem: getting cherry flavor into a glass or a dessert in situations where whole fruit would only get in the way.

Its natural home is the soda fountain. A spoonful in cola gives you a cherry Coke the way a lunch counter would have built one; the same spoonful turns seltzer and milk into a cherry egg cream, or plain lemonade into cherry limeade. Over ice cream it does what you would expect, and it soaks well into pound cake, cheesecake, and baked fruit.

Behind a bar it both sweetens and tints. A bar spoon in a whiskey drink or a shaken sour carries the cherry note, and those same recipes read fine built on soda water instead. The bottle is sized for a syrup you measure by the teaspoon rather than the ounce.