Metaxa substitute

Best substitute

Brandy or Cognac with a little honey or simple syrup

Use the same amount for the brandy, plus ½ teaspoon honey or simple syrup per 2 tablespoons as the metaxa you are replacing

Best for flambe dishes

Different taste

The base spirit Metaxa is built on, with the sweetness added back manually.

Other metaxa substitutes

Ranked, with the exact amount to use

2Brandy plus sweet muscat or moscato
Close match
Use 2 tablespoons brandy plus 2 teaspoons sweet muscat wine for every ¼ cup Metaxa
A close reconstruction of how Metaxa is actually made, since muscat wine is one of its defining components.
What changes
Best for
desserts, pan sauces, syrups, cakes, poached fruit
The most accurate swap on this list if you have a bottle of dessert muscat open. You get the grape-brandy backbone plus the floral raisin note that plain brandy cannot supply. It is slightly lower in alcohol overall, so it will still flame but a little less vigorously.
3Brandy de Jerez or Solera-aged Spanish brandy
Close match
Use the same amount
Spanish brandy aged in old sherry casks, which leaves it noticeably sweeter and more raisiny than French brandy.
What changes
Best for
desserts, flambe dishes, sipping, pan sauces, cocktails
The best single-bottle substitute. The sherry-cask ageing gives it dried fruit and toffee notes that overlap heavily with Metaxa, so no sweetener is needed. It is a shade drier and more oaky, and it lacks Metaxa's faint floral rose-and-herb top note, which most people would not identify anyway.
4Dark rum
Different taste
Use the same amount
Aged sugarcane spirit with plenty of built-in sweetness and molasses depth.
What changes
Best for
desserts, cakes, flambe dishes, coffee, poached fruit
It works in desserts and it flames well, but the sweetness is molasses rather than grape, so a Greek walnut cake made with rum tastes distinctly Caribbean instead of raisiny and floral. In a savoury pan sauce for shrimp it is a poor fit, since rum's sweetness reads as out of place.
5Sweet vermouth (cocktails only)
Taste and texture differ
About ¾ the amount
A fortified, herb-infused sweet wine, much lower in alcohol than Metaxa.
What changes
Best for
cocktails, mixed drinks, marinades
In a mixed drink it covers the sweetness and adds an appealing herbal bitterness, though the drink loses its backbone because vermouth is roughly a third of Metaxa's strength. Do not use it for flambe, since it will not light, and it will not reduce to a glaze in a pan the way a spirit does.
6Grape juice with vanilla and lemon (alcohol-free)
Taste and texture differ
Use 2 tablespoons unsweetened grape juice plus ¼ teaspoon vanilla extract and a squeeze of lemon for every 2 tablespoons Metaxa
The non-alcoholic option, aiming at the raisin-grape sweetness rather than the spirit.
What changes
Best for
alcohol-free desserts, cakes, syrups, poached fruit, marinades
It carries the fruity sweetness convincingly and the vanilla stands in for the oak. What it cannot do is any of the alcohol's work: no flame, no burn, no lifting of aroma, and no reduction to a sticky glaze. Simmer it a little to concentrate it, and expect a sweeter, softer, more juice-like result.

What is Metaxa?

Metaxa is Metaxa is a Greek spirit built from aged grape brandy blended with sweet aged muscat wine and a botanical infusion, which makes it smoother, sweeter and more raisiny and floral than a straight brandy.

Cooking tips

Metaxa is doing three things at once in a recipe: it contributes sweet grape and raisin aroma, it supplies alcohol that lifts flavour and deglazes the pan, and it adds a small amount of actual sugar. A plain brandy swap covers the first two and misses the third, which is why a half teaspoon of honey per two tablespoons closes the gap.
Because Metaxa contains sugar, it can catch and scorch in a very hot dry pan far more easily than dry brandy. Pull the pan off the heat, add the spirit, then return it to the burner.
For a flambe you need a spirit at roughly forty percent alcohol or above, so Metaxa, brandy, Cognac and dark rum all work while vermouth, wine and the alcohol-free options will not light. Measure the spirit into a jug first and never pour from the bottle over a lit pan.
The star number on a Metaxa bottle indicates how long the blend has been aged, so the 5-star is younger and more forward while the 12-star is smoother and rounder. For cooking, the youngest grade is the sensible buy, since long simmering flattens the subtleties you paid for.
In desserts, add Metaxa or its substitute off the heat at the end whenever you can. Its floral top notes are volatile and a long simmer leaves only sweetness and alcohol behind.
Metaxa is also excellent simply poured over ice with a strip of orange peel, so a bottle bought for one recipe will not sit unused.

Frequently asked questions

Is Metaxa just Greek brandy?

Not quite, which is why plain brandy undershoots. Metaxa starts as an aged brandy distillate but is blended with sweet aged muscat wine and a botanical infusion, so it is sweeter, rounder and more raisiny and floral than a straight brandy or Cognac.

Can I use brandy instead of Metaxa?

Yes, one for one, and it is the most common swap. Add half a teaspoon of honey or simple syrup per two tablespoons to replace Metaxa's sweetness, otherwise the dish will taste drier and sharper than intended. Spanish brandy de Jerez needs no adjustment at all.

What is a non-alcoholic substitute for Metaxa?

Two tablespoons of unsweetened grape juice with a quarter teaspoon of vanilla and a squeeze of lemon, per two tablespoons of Metaxa. It captures the grape-and-raisin sweetness. It will not flame, will not deglaze with the same force, and will not reduce to a glaze, so simmer it down a little first.

Can I leave Metaxa out of a recipe?

In a cake or a syrup, yes, replacing the volume with juice or water, and the result will simply be less aromatic. In a flambe dish the spirit is the technique, so leaving it out means cooking a different recipe. In a pan sauce, deglaze with a splash of white wine or stock instead.

Does Metaxa work in cocktails that call for brandy?

Yes, though it is sweeter, so pull back on any syrup in the recipe. In a sidecar or a brandy sour it makes a rounder, more honeyed drink. Going the other way, replacing Metaxa with brandy in a cocktail usually needs a quarter ounce of simple syrup to rebalance.

Related substitutes

More liquor substitutes

Metaxa substitute

Other metaxa substitutes

2Brandy plus sweet muscat or moscato

3Brandy de Jerez or Solera-aged Spanish brandy

4Dark rum

5Sweet vermouth (cocktails only)

6Grape juice with vanilla and lemon (alcohol-free)