Vodka

Vodka is an European clear distilled alcoholic drink that has been one of the most popular drinks across the world .

You'll find it to be the most popular spirit in drink making because of it's neutral taste and absence of flavour and colour.

Vodka often replaces Gin in many traditional cocktails

Vodka is known to be good for the heart, and if consumed in moderation, can prove to be good for cardiovascular health

Note that these days there are flavoured Vodka available in the market too, and some cocktails do make use of them.

Kahlua

Kahlua is a Coffee liqueur is a liqueur produced by steeping roasted coffee, sugar and other ingredients in neutral spirit. The most famous coffee liqueur brands are Kahlua and Tia Maria, Kahlua has been made in Mexico since 1936. Kahlua has a thick buttery taste

Typical ingredients of coffee liqueur include liquor, espresso coffee, roasted coffee bean (and powder), sugar, and vanilla syrup.

The characteristic flavor of coffee along with over a couple of hundreds compounds contribute to the taste of coffee liqueur. Caffeine is a major ingredient of coffee, and also might be a taste factor that influences the complex flavour profile that appeal to coffee liqueur drinkers' palate. Reference - International Journal of Engineering & Advanced Technology (IJEAT)

NOTE: In the absence of a Coffee Liqueur like Kahlua or Tia Maria, to make cocktails with Coffee Liqueur, Coffee Liqueur Syrup can be used as a substitute with the proportionate alcohol substituted with a triple distilled neutral Vodka.

Ice

Ice is so obvious in most drinks, be it a straight drink or a mixed drink, that we often forget it's importance or even reason behind using a crystal clear good quality ice in a glass of whisky, or crushed ice in a tall glass to enjoy a cocktail.

Ice tempers a hard liquor, and as is in the case of whisky for example, if you prefer the flavours of whisky reach your nose without the hard note of spirit lingering around, or want to avoid the mild sting of a neat whisky, a cube of ice mellows the strength down a little and as it melts slowly, the aroma and flavour is released from the whisky slowly and makes whisky progressively weak, lingering and palatable.

Ice in Vodka helps release the little flavour a Vodka has, slowly, instead of letting the Vodka hit your nose all at once,

In mixed drinks, ice plays an important role in creating the perfect temperature a certain drink requires and bartenders use ice in several different ways, crushed ice for long drinks that will allow the cocktail to slowly water down like a Mint Julep, Moscow Mule, Rum Swizzle, Sherry Cobbler and other Tiki drinks, a large block or cubes of ice for drinks that are spirit heavy, such as the Old Fashioned, Negroni, and Manhattan

Cherry

Although the name is Brandy, Cherry Brandy is not a Brandy since Brandy is produced by distillation of wine, pomace or fruit mash, where as Cherry Brandy is produced by macerating cherries in neutral spirit, Vodka to be specific in it's case, it is not even macerated in any Brandy, so technically it is not a Brandy and it doesn't contain Brandy either, although some brands might add some Brandy but that's not a legal requirement. Cherry Brandy is a liqueur, and thus it is also known as Cherry Brandy Liqueur.

Cherry Brandy Liqueur is usually flavoured using spices such as cinnamon and cloves. One distinctive speciality of distillation of the cherry infused spirit is that the pot still for distillation has to be copper instead of stainless steel, copper helps produce a smoother distillate and most importantly removes the cyanide produced when cherries are distilled

Cherry Liqueur is a sweetened liqueur made from different spirit bases of which Brandy is the most common base for macerating and infusing cherry and making the liqueur, and that is why cherry liqueur is often called Cherry Brandy.

Note that there's Kirsch or Kirschwasser, an unsweetened eau de vie distilled from cherries, and it is often called cherry brandy too. But you can't use Kirsch and Cherry Liqueur interchangeably since the liqueur is sweet and the other is not.

One of the most known Cherry Liqueur is Maraschino Cherry Liqueur, made from Marasca cherries.

Cherry Mix is a mix of different dried cherries like Bing Cherries and Tart Cherries, sweetened and if store bought, will have preservatives added for shelf life. In Europe, specially in Italy, specific cocktail cherry cultivars are in use, cherries like Morello and Montmorency are the traditional choices, and Marasca, a Morello variety grown in Italy is popular world over as the Maraschino Cherry Mix.

Maraschino Cherries are preserved, sweetened cherry, typically light coloured cherries like Royal Ann, Rainier and Gold varieties are used. Maraschino Cherries are used in many cocktails and Tequila Sunrise and Queen Mary are too bright examples.
The name Maraschino originates from the marasca cherry of the Dalmatian region, Maraschino Liqueur is made from it, and the marasca cherries that were macerated to create the pre-distillation liquor, were pickled and preserved for use, the steeping in spirit helped in the preservation, and since the production of these cherries and their alcohol pickle was scarce, the Maraschino Cherry, as they were known in Croatia because of it's origin in the Maraschino Liqueur making process, became a delicacy of the royalty and the wealthy across Europe.
Due to scarcity of the Marasca Cherry the Maraschino pickled cherry soon no more just Marasca cherries, other cherries were preserved in the same method and were sold as "Maraschino Cherry".
In USA, in 1912, the USDA defined Maraschino Cherries as Marasca cherries preserved in Maraschino Liqueur, but since Prohibition from 1920, alcohol preserved cherries fell out of preference and regulations prevented cherries from being pickled in alcohol too, and different brining methods were invented that produced pickled cherries that were far from the Maraschino Cherry that they claimed to be.
Most modern versions of Maraschino Cherries have little or no alcohol, and since post prohibition, under the pressure from the non-alcoholic preserved cherry industry, the FDA redefined Maraschino Cherries as "cherries which have been dyed red, impregnated with sugar, and packed in a sugar syrup flavored with oil of bitter almonds or a similar flavor" since 1940.

Cherry Juice is a fruit juice as obvious from the name, and it is marketed as a health supplement. It is produced by hot or cold pressing cherries, and then filtering and pasteurising it.
In alcoholic beverages, fermented cherry juice is used to distill cherry fruit brandy.
Cherry juice is often used in beer too. Belgian Kriek lambic is a distinctive beer, amde from the ferment of sweetened cherry juice.
In mixed drinks, cherry juice is best mixed with club soda, orange or apple juice. The tart flavour of cherry juice adds a nice twist to cocktails.

Cherry Heering is a Danish Cherry Liqueur created by Peter Heering in 1818. The Ruby Red liqueur is made by soaking lightly crushed Danish cherries and spices in neutral grain spirit. The mixture is then matured in casks for up to five years, sugar is added during the aging process.

Note: It is a good substitute for Maraschino Liqueur in cocktails, but Cherry Heering is sweeter with a more pronounced cherry flavour and unlike Maraschino Liqueur which is a clear spirit, Cherry Heering is a Ruby Red and will affect the colour of the cocktail.

Cherry Lambrini is a fruity perry or pear cider ( a perry is an alcoholic beverage made from fermented pears, similar to a cider ) manufactured in Liverpool by Halewood International. Lambrini is available in 6% ABV, Original and Luci ( 3.4% ABV) and Cherry, Peach and Strawberry Lambrini all at 5% ABV.