Spicy Fifty

A fiery vodka cocktail balancing vanilla sweetness with fresh chili heat, brightened by passion fruit and elderflower.

The Spicy Fifty was created by Salvatore Calabrese, the Italian-born London bartender known throughout the industry as The Maestro, who built his reputation over decades at some of London's most prestigious establishments including Dukes Hotel, the Library Bar at the Lanesborough, and Salvatore's at Playboy Club London. Calabrese is among the most decorated bartenders in the world, having received multiple awards from the International Bartenders Association and the United Kingdom Bartenders Guild, and he is the author of several definitive cocktail reference books. His Spicy Fifty was created as a precise exercise in flavor balance: vanilla vodka provides the sweet, aromatic base; elderflower liqueur — St-Germain, introduced in 2007 by the Cooper Spirits Company and produced from elderflower blossoms harvested annually in the Alps, was the defining elderflower liqueur of the era — contributes a delicate floral quality; fresh lime juice provides the acid structure; honey syrup adds a natural sweetness with more complexity than plain sugar; and fresh chili brings the heat. The name plays on the Fifty-Fifty Martini — a format using equal parts gin and dry vermouth that achieved prominence through the craft cocktail movement's reappraisal of lower-ABV cocktails — while signaling the addition of heat. The International Bartenders Association added the Spicy Fifty to its official cocktail list in 2020 as part of the New Era Drinks category, formally recognizing it as a contemporary classic.