Bellini
The Bellini was born at Harry’s Bar in Venice, perfected through the 1940s by founder Giuseppe Cipriani and named in 1948 for the painter: the drink’s soft pink, Cipriani said, was the colour of a robe in a Giovanni Bellini altarpiece. White peach purée and prosecco, in a bar that also invented carpaccio and served everyone from Hemingway to Chaplin: Venice in a small, cold glass. The engineering is a single decision honoured absolutely: white peaches, not yellow, crushed and sieved to velvet, one part purée to two of prosecco, folded rather than stirred. The fruit’s floral delicacy is the drink, and every substitution, yellow fruit, bottled nectar, peach liqueur, produces something pleasant and wrong. It is the standard by which fruit-and-fizz drinks are judged and the reason most fail: the Bellini is not a recipe so much as an ingredient shown respect. In white peach season it is unbeatable; out of season, good frozen purée keeps it honest, exactly as Harry’s does.
Glassware: Champagne Flute
Garnish: None: the colour is the garnish
Ingredients
50ml
The drink itself: ripe white peaches sieved to velvet, floral and pale. Yellow peaches make a pleasant impostor, and the fruit must be ripe enough to give under a thumb.
100ml
The lift: Venetian by geography and by rights, brut and properly cold. Champagne makes it heavier, not better.
Instructions
Pour the cold peach purée into a chilled flute.
Add the prosecco slowly, in stages, folding gently with a bar spoon as it settles.
Serve immediately, while the drink is still the right shade of dawn.
Source: the IBA (Official IBA specification; method ours). Last checked 12 August 2026.
Expert Tip
Fold, never stir. Purée and prosecco separate if they are bullied, and the Bellini should pour and drink as one liquid rather than as fruit with wine sitting on top. Add the prosecco in stages, folding gently with a bar spoon between each addition. Everything must be cold before it meets anything else. Chilled flute, cold purée, cold prosecco. A room-temperature purée kills the mousse on contact and the drink arrives flat and slightly foamy, which is the most common way this goes wrong at home. One part purée to two of prosecco is the ratio, and it is worth measuring. Too much fruit and the drink turns into a smoothie with bubbles; too little and the peach disappears under the wine, which rather defeats the exercise.
Behind the Bellini
Flavour Profile
The Origin
Giuseppe Cipriani opened Harry’s Bar on a Venetian alley in 1931 and spent the next decades feeding and watering the century’s famous names. The peach drink he perfected got its name in 1948, during a Giovanni Bellini exhibition in the city: the pink of a painted robe, matched in a glass. It remains on the bar’s menu, made the same way, at prices that are part of the experience.
The White Peach
The specified fruit is the whole argument: white peaches are paler, more floral and gentler in acid than yellow, and the drink’s colour and character both depend on them. In season, sieve fresh fruit; out of season, good frozen white purée is the professional answer and Harry’s own practice.
Prosecco, Not Champagne
The Bellini is Venetian and its wine is too: prosecco’s soft fruit and gentle mousse flatter the peach where champagne’s autolytic weight competes with it. This is one of the few sparkling drinks where the cheaper wine is the correct one.
How to Serve It
Cold everything, folded gently, drunk promptly, ideally before noon has fully committed: the Bellini is breakfast aristocracy. For a party, batch the purée and pour to order; the drink itself refuses to be made ahead.
Making the Purée
Fresh white peaches, skinned, stoned and sieved. The sieving is the part people skip and it matters: a blender alone leaves fibre that catches the bubbles and turns the drink foamy, where a sieve gives the velvet texture the drink is named for.
Ripeness is not negotiable. A peach firm enough to slice neatly is not ripe enough to use; it should give under a thumb and smell of peach from arm's length. Underripe fruit is the second most common failure after the wrong colour of peach.
Out of season, good frozen white peach purée is the professional answer and Harry's own practice. It is not a compromise, and it is considerably better than a hard supermarket peach in February. A little lemon juice stirred through stops the purée browning if it has to stand for an hour, and it is invisible in the finished glass.
Why the Ratio Holds
One part purée to two of prosecco is a much higher proportion of fruit than most sparkling drinks carry, and it works because white peach purée is thin, delicate and low in acid rather than thick and sweet.
That is also why substitutions fail so completely. Bottled peach nectar is cooked, flat and considerably sweeter, so at this ratio it overwhelms the wine entirely. Peach liqueur is sugar and alcohol, which is a different drink with a different balance.
The Bellini is not really a recipe. It is one ingredient shown respect and given a supporting role that flatters it, which is why it is the standard by which fruit-and-fizz drinks are judged, and the reason most of them fail.
More to explore
Frequently Asked Questions
Why white peaches?
Prosecco or champagne?
Can I use peach nectar or liqueur?
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Where this one sits
Recipe by Jerry Can Spirits