The 10 Best Passion Fruit Cocktails

Porn Star Martini cocktail in coupe glass garnished with half a passion fruit, yellow background with purple passion fruit illustrations — Liquor.com / Illustration: Sabrina Tan, Photo: Tim Nusog

Passion fruit has a distinct tanginess and tropical flavor that, thanks to store-bought products like purees and syrups, is accessible for many cocktails.

This versatile tropical fruit is native to an area of South America extending from southern Brazil to northern Argentina, where it grows on passion flowers (genus passiflora). The flower likely received its evocative name from 1500s-era Spanish missionaries, who called it Flor de las cinco lagas (flower of the five wounds) for its resemblance to the crucifixion of Jesus Christ.

Since the 19th century, passion fruit has been cultivated in tropical areas around the world, including Australia, New Zealand, California, Florida, and Hawaii, where it is called lilikoi. Today, cultivated varieties include the purple passion fruit, which is sweeter and most typically consumed fresh, and the tarter yellow passion fruit, which is often processed for its juice. Both varieties have a high citric acid content, but yellow passion fruit is more acidic.

How to Use Passion Fruit in Cocktails

Passion fruit is most often used in cocktails in one of two forms: puree or syrup, both of which can be found online or at many grocery stores.

Keep in mind that passion fruit puree is different from the pulp, which includes the entirety of the blended fruit, whereas the puree is strained to remove the seeds and any solids. Most passion fruit puree comes frozen; make sure to thaw before use, ideally overnight. Purchase unsweetened puree, if possible, as added sugar will affect the balance of cocktail recipes that call for puree.

Common passion fruit syrup brands include BG Reynolds, Monin, and Torani. Because the syrup is sweetened, it’s often used as a substitute for simple syrup or sugar. Passion fruit juice is also sometimes used in cocktails. Look for juice without added sugar. If using fresh passion fruit as a garnish, seek a purple-brown color and moderately wrinkled skin, which indicates a ripe passion fruit.

Here are 10 of the best ways to use passion fruit in cocktails.

Porn Star Martini

Liquor.com / Tim Nusog

Passion fruit is paired with vanilla in this maximalist modern classic from bartender Doug Ankrah, who says he was inspired by baking recipes to create the drink for London’s Townhouse Bar in 2002.

The Porn Star Martini combines vanilla-flavored vodka with passion fruit puree, lime juice, and vanilla syrup, strained into a cocktail glass and served up with a fresh passion fruit garnish—all served with a shot of sparkling wine as a sidecar.

Get the recipe.
Saturn

Liquor.com / Tim Nusog

Tropical drinks are often associated with rum, but this citrusy mid-century classic flips the script with a base of gin. The spirit lends its botanical notes to the blended combination of lemon juice, passion fruit syrup, falernum, and orgeat, which was created by California bartender J. “Popo” Galsini in 1967 when he won the International Bartender’s Association World Championship.

Get the recipe.
Hurricane

Liquor.com / Tim Nusog

How many drinks have become so iconic, they have a glass named after them? Invented in the 1940s at the legendary New Orleans bar Pat O’Brien’s, this boozy and fruity concoction is just as over-the-top as the glass it inspired, combining light and dark rums, lime and orange juices, passion fruit puree, simple syrup, and grenadine.

Get the recipe.
Mezcal Mule

Liquor.com / Tim Nusog

This agave-fueled twist on the Moscow Mule goes beyond swapping vodka for mezcal in the lime-ginger beer combination. Legendary bartender Jim Meehan also adds muddled cucumber and passion fruit puree to the shaker for a tangy, fruity element that makes the combination even more refreshing.

Get the recipe.

Continue to 5 of 10 below.
Beachbum’s Own

Liquor.com / Tim Nusog

This complex tropical drink comes from Jeff “Beachbum” Berry, a Tiki historian and the proprietor of Latitude 29 in New Orleans. The Spanish liqueur Licor 43 has vanilla, citrus, and baking-spice notes that make a natural match for two rums alongside passion fruit puree and a trio of fruit juices (pineapple, orange, and lemon).

Get the recipe.
Soda Jerk

Liquor.com / Tim Nusog

This bittersweet and slightly earthy Fizz variation from San Francisco bartending pro Kevin Diedrich combines blanco tequila, Campari, lime juice, passion fruit puree, vanilla bean-infused agave syrup, and an egg white, topped with cream soda.

Here, the tartness of the passion fruit balances the sweetness of the other ingredients, says Diedrich. “You’ll see the classic pairing of Campari and passion fruit going together very, very well,” he says.

Get the recipe.
Batida

Liquor.com / Tim Nusog

“Batida,” which roughly translates to “shaken” in Portuguese, encompasses a wide range of shaken or blended drinks that combine the Brazilian spirit cachaça with sugar and either fruit juice or coconut milk. This variation includes both coconut and fruity elements, adding fruit in the form of passion fruit syrup, which goes for a whirl in the blender along with cachaça, coconut milk, lime juice, and ice.

Get the recipe.
Maracuya Mistress

Liquor.com / Tim Nusog

The unofficial drink of the French Caribbean islands of Guadeloupe and Martinique, the Ti’ Punch (“small punch”) calls for three ingredients—lime, sugar cane syrup, and rhum agricole, which is made from fresh sugar cane juice. This fruity, gently floral riff adds passion fruit juice and swaps the sugar cane syrup for a homemade hibiscus syrup.

Get the recipe.

Continue to 9 of 10 below.
Smuggler’s Cove Hurricane

Liquor.com / Tim Nusog

Black rum is a particularly robust example of the spirit, with its viscous texture and strong molasses flavor. Its richness is tempered by lemon juice and passion fruit syrup in this take on the classic Hurricane from famed San Francisco Tiki bar Smuggler’s Cove.

Get the recipe.
Gangster’s Paradise

Spare Room

For this complex Piña Colada riff, Los Angeles bartender Yael Vengroff combines a blended rum, a spiced rum, pineapple and passion fruit juices, heavy cream, and cinnamon syrup. A drop of turmeric oil adds an earthy, savory note to the combination.

Get the recipe.