Margarita Mix Recipe
My friends and family are always happy to come over because they know two thing: I always have food and I always have cocktails. I also make killer margaritas after years of making them as a bartender and at home. (I may have learned a few awesome tricks through the years from senior bartenders and very happy customers.)
Once you’ve made margaritas with my homemade mix, you will never go back to the bottled mix.. Flavor difference is remarkable because homemade is made with fresh citrus juices and after that, store-bought mix suddenly tastes fake. Bright and beautiful flavors of freshly squeezed lime, lemon, and orange juice just can’t be replicated for mass production.
Steps and Tips To Make Homemade Margarita Mix
Okay, you can treat this process like a workout and use a manual lemon squeezer or you can take a much easier way with an electric juicer. (A simple citrus juicer is about $20 on Amazon and it’s so worth it.)
- Start by making simple syrup first. You need equal parts of hot water and sugar, but make sure that water is boiling hot to melt the sugar. Next, mix sugar and hot water until sugar is fully dissolved and pour it into the jar.
- Use a citrus juicer to juice limes, lemon, and orange. After the juice is ready, I like to run it through a fine mesh strainer because there will always be a little pulp that snuck in. If you don’t mind the pulp, then you don’t have to run it through a strainer.
- Finally, mix the juices with simple syrup in the jar, cover it with a lid or plastic wrap, and refrigerate until ready to make some awesome margaritas.
How to Pick Out the Best Citrus for Juicing?
- THIS IS IMPORTANT! You will want to make sure to pick ripe lemons, limes, and orange to get the most and best tasting juice out of them!
- Pick up the lime and give it a gentle squeeze, if it feels too hard, it is not ripe enough and will not give you much juice. If it feels too squishy, it is probably starting to rot. A good, juicy citrus will have some give when you squeeze but still feel firm.
- There is also a smell test. Smell the lime and if it have a distinct lime scent, it is ripe. Unripe limes have no to barely any scent and over-ripe lime will start to give off strong and funky smell.
- The skin of the ripe limes and lemons will also be shinier and smoother than the skin of un-ripe ones.
- Lastly, feel the weight. Unripe limes (lemons, and oranges) weigh less and almost feel hollow. These limes will not give you much juice at all. Ripe citrus weight more than unripe.
Storing Instructions
Make sure to store your homemade margarita mix in the refrigerator and use a a glass jar with an air-tight lid. Properly stored, it should last 5-7 days.
If you’ve tried the margarita mix using my recipe and found a lot of good information here, PLEASE leave a 🌟 star rating! Let me know how you liked it by leaving the 📝 comment below as well.
Margarita Mix
Ingredients
- 16 oz lime juice about 8 large limes
- 8 oz lemon juice about 4 large lemons
- 4 oz orange juice about 1 large orange
- 1- 1.5 cup white granulated sugar depending on personal sweetness preference
- 1 cup hot water
Instructions
- TIP: make sure to choose ripe fruit that are soft (but not too soft). If fruit is not ripe enough, it will not yield much juice.
- Heat up a cup of water and stir in sugar until dissolved to get simple syrup.
- Squeeze juice from lemons, limes, and oranges. (If you use a juicer, you will get more juice out of each fruit.)
- Optional: run freshly squeezed juices through a fine mesh strainer to get excess pulp out.
- Combine citrus juices and simple syrup in a large glass jar and stir to mix.
- Close the jar with a lid and refrigerate until ready to use.
Video
Notes
- Storing: Make sure to store your homemade margarita mix in the refrigerator and use a a glass jar with an air-tight lid. Properly stored, it should last 5-7 days.
- Use Freshly Squeezed Fruit Juice! Fresh will truly taste the best. Although, it might be way easier and tempting to get a bottle of lime juice from the store, I strongly advise against it. The taste will not be the same as freshly squeezed citrus juice.
- How To Pick Ripe Citrus: Pick up the lime and give it a gentle squeeze, if it feels too hard, it is not ripe enough and will not give you much juice. If it feels too squishy, it is probably starting to rot. A good, juicy citrus will have some give when you squeeze but still feel firm.
Smell the lime and if it have a distinct lime scent, it is ripe. Unripe limes have no to barely any scent and over-ripe lime will start to give off strong and funky smell.
The skin of the ripe limes and lemons will also be shinier and smoother than the skin of un-ripe ones.
Lastly, feel the weight. Unripe limes (lemons, and oranges) weigh less and almost feel hollow. These limes will not give you much juice at all. Ripe citrus weight more than unripe. - To make a margarita, you will need 3-4 oz of margarita mix, 2 oz of your favorite tequila, and 1 oz of orange liqueur like Triple Sec of Cointreau. You can add a little more or a little less margarita mix depending on how strong you want the tase to be.
Nutrition
More Cocktail Recipes To Try
All images and text ©Lyubov Brooke for ©Will Cook For Smiles. Please do not use my images without prior permission. If using my posts in collections and features, please link back to this post for the recipe.
Disclaimer: Nutrition information shown is not guaranteed to be 100% accurate as most ingredients and brands have variations.
My first time making the margarita base from all natural fruit and ingredients. This was very good and I will definitely make it again. Thanks for sharing!
It does taste a lot better, right? lol I am so glad you liked it! 🙂
How much tequila do we add for one drink
Hi Marianne, here is the link to my margarita recipe where I list all the measurements. https://www.willcookforsmiles.com/margarita-recipe/
how much ice would you put in blender to make it a frozen one without watering it down. love frozen margaritas. also, where did you purchase the bottle? thank you in advance for replying.
Hi Caroline,
I bought that bottle from Home Goods awhile ago… maybe they would have something simular still. I do have a few recipes for frozen margaritas I will post the links here so you can go over the recipes, you would just use the same amount of mix and ice that the recipe calls for.
https://www.willcookforsmiles.com/sunset-margarita-mango-pineapple-margarita/
https://www.willcookforsmiles.com/watermelon-lime-frozen-margaritas/
By far my favorite margarita recipe! Sooo much better then the mixes you can buy!
Hi Cora,
I am glad you liked them! And your right it is better then the mix!
Fantastic margarita!
Loved it! Thanks!
Glad you liked them! Thanks for letting me know!
This mix was so good! Not to sour or to sweet!
Thank you, Lisa!