Margarita Mix
The best Margarita Mix will give you the best margaritas. Learn how to make your own margarita mix in a few minutes with a handful of simple ingredients. You can make it ahead of time and store it in the fridge until cocktail time.
When you’re ready, a delicious Margarita will be only 5 minutes away. Try our Sweet and Sour Mix with other cocktails.
Table of Contents
Beautiful weather outside always makes me want to invite my girls over for margaritas and brunch. Nothing beats girls day in with cocktails and the way to make it perfect is to have the best tasting cocktails. 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 have a few favorite cocktails to serve but margaritas go so well with just about any occasion.
Truly, once you’ve made margaritas with homemade mix, you will never go back to the bottled mix. Flavor difference is remarkable and after trying the homemade mix made with fresh citrus juices, 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.
For the best tasting Margaritas, I highly recommend using homemade margarita mix. It’s really easy to make and there are only a 5 simple ingredients. The 5th ingredient is not something that other margarita mixes have and that’s orange juice. I like to add a little freshly squeezed orange juice to add a touch of natural sweetness and compliment the orange liqueur.
Ingredient Notes
Fresh citrus juice – the most important ingredient in the best margaritas is fresh juice from limes. Lime is the main component in a margarita besides tequila, so it will be the biggest portion. I also like to add some fresh lemon juice and a touch of fresh orange juice.
Sugar – white granulated sugar is the easiest to melt in hot water but you can also use raw sugar or turbinado. Just note that it will take much longer to melt and you will need to make sure to use hot boiling water.
Water – make sure to use really hot water. The best way is to bring the water to boil and turn it off. Then, mix the hot water with sugar until it’s melted.
PRO TIP: Fresh is always 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 Make It
Okay, you can treat this process like a workout and use a manual lemon squeezer or you can take a much easier way with the juicer. (A simple citrus juicer is about $20 on Amazon and it’s so worth it.)
1. 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.
2. 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.
3. 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.
Recipe FAQs
Homemade margarita mix is most definitely gluten free. There is nothing is this recipe but lime juice, lemon juice, orange juice, sugar, and water. When it comes to margarita, tequila is made with blue agave and it’s naturally gluten free. Triple Sec and most other orange liqueurs are also gluten free but make sure to check the labels.
To mix is up a little, you can venture away from the classic margarita and try a strawberry one. I love to add some of my strawberry sauce to the mix. A couple of tablespoons per cocktail will be plenty and you can make the sauce ahead of time, just like the margarita mix.
Nope, a margarita mix is just juice, sugar, and water. It is not a pre-mixes margarita, but rather a juice mix.
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.
You will want to make sure to pick ripe lemons, limes and orange. 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.
More Cocktail Recipes To Try
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
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.
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!