Maple Pear Bellini

Ripe pear purée, maple syrup, and Prosecco — a seasonal variation on Cipriani's 1948 Harry's Bar Bellini, maple's caramelized warmth giving it an autumnal identity.

The Maple Pear Bellini is a seasonal variation on Giuseppe Cipriani's celebrated 1948 creation at Harry's Bar in Venice, substituting ripe pear purée and a measure of maple syrup for the original's white peach purée. Cipriani opened Harry's Bar with Harry Pickering at Calle Vallaresso 1323 in Venice in 1931, and the Bellini — created in 1948 and named for the 15th-century Venetian painter Giovanni Bellini, whose paintings often featured a characteristic pinkish-white glow — became the bar's most internationally recognized creation alongside the Carpaccio dish. Pear Bellinis are among the most successful adaptations of the peach original, the ripe pear's similar stone-fruit adjacent sweetness and smooth texture producing a purée that blends with prosecco in a way that maintains the Bellini's essential character. Conference, Bosc, and Williams pears are most commonly used. The addition of maple syrup deepens the sweetener's contribution beyond plain sugar, the caramelized complexity of reduced maple sap adding a warm, autumnal register to the pear's fruity freshness that makes the Maple Pear Bellini specifically seasonal. The combination resonates particularly in North American markets where maple syrup's regional identity connects the Italian aperitivo tradition to local agricultural culture.