Fruit on Fire

Pairing a fruit with its corresponding liqueur heightens and deepens the flavor of the fruit itself. Serve the fruit over ice cream after flambeing or marinating it in the liqueur. Bananas Foster uses banana-flavored liqueur, rum and brown sugar as a topping for sauteed bananas. For sauteed pineapple, use a pineapple-flavored liqueur, creme d'ananas. And for crepes Suzette, use butter and an orange liqueur for a flambe sauce.

Soaking Up the Flavor

Dried fruit soaked in a liqueur adds both flavor and color to muffins, cakes and cookies. Heat the liqueur on the stove top or in a microwave, add dried cherries, raisins, dates, apples, prunes or cranberries and let the fruit sit for at least 20 minutes before using it. Possible liqueurs to use include Calvados, an apple-flavored brandy liqueur, Frangelico, a hazelnut-and-berry-flavored liqueur or creme de rose, a liqueur made with rose petals, vanilla and spices.

Glazes Galore

A small splash of liqueur balances the sugar in a glaze and adds an interesting flavor contrast to savory grilled or roasted pork chops, chicken breasts or beef steaks. For pork chops or poultry, add orange-flavored triple sec to a glaze made with maple sugar, Dijon mustard and cranberry sauce, or use a dash of eau-de-vie, in plum or raspberry flavors, also called framboise and mirabelle, in your barbecue sauce for ribs or steak.

Spirited Sauces

A few tablespoons of liqueur give chicken, meat or poultry sauce a complex flavor when you add them during the final minutes of cooking. Galliano, an Italian liqueur, works well in a mushroom sauce for chicken, adding hints of anise, vanilla and 30 other herbs and spices. Pernod, a French liqueur with a licorice and fennel flavor, is traditionally added to fish soups and stews. Calvados, an apple-flavored liqueur, works well with apples for a sauce poured over pork.