Why trashy cocktails are having a serious comeback

Summer is not for serious drinks.

It’s for neon Aperol spritzes and well-iced rosé and slushies; it’s also for wonderfully trashy cocktails. London’s tip-top bartenders are taking the silly, fun, sugary drinks of hazy Nineties nights past and making them sophisticated. We’re talking Piña Coladas and Cosmopolitans, Sex on the Beach and Porn Star Martinis.

See Salvatore Calabrese at the Donovan Bar. Calabrese is the godfather of the serious Martini, head honcho at the legendary Martini bar Dukes for decades. But he’s also the creator of the Naughty Corner, a riff on the Porn Star, aka the sickly-sweet, vanilla and passion fruit concoction, served with a shot of champagne on the side, that is truly a desecration of the icy gin and vermouth original.

Calabrese’s version is rather more sophisticated and complex than the Porn Star. He blends white rum, white cacao liqueur, Galliano, pineapple juice and fresh passion fruit: a heady double hit of sweetness — the fudginess of white chocolate, the sharper fruitiness of pineapple and passion fruit — which is tempered by the alcohol burn of rum and champagne. More conversation-worthy is the garnish, which sees the rim dipped in cocoa butter and pink saffron syrup to add buttery complexity — and perfectly mimic lipstick. Rather than you leaving a lipstick stain on the glass, therefore, your Naughty Corner leaves you with coquettishly blushing lips. Ooh matron, indeed.