Tart and fruity, bright and boozy, these tequila, lime, & watermelon popsicles are the perfect late-summer treat!
Freeze a taste of summer that can be enjoyed all year round. You only need 4 ingredients to make these boozy frozen treats, talk about easy peasy!
Sometimes, you find yourself with way too much watermelon.
Seriously. We’re just two people. Do you really expect us to eat an entire watermelon all by ourselves?
We’ve been able to pick and choose the cantaloupe-sized melons from our CSA most of the summer, which, although they always made fun of us and our mini melons, were really the perfect size for two.
And then… the little melons turned into bigger melons and then even bigger melons the week after that. And, well, I wasn’t NOT going to take a watermelon just because it was a little on the big side.
We ended up with two big melons, just sitting there, taunting us.
Time for action.
I cut and seeded and blended and strained; boiled and gelled and canned and froze.
And what do you know, I managed to eat/use/preserve every last bit of those melons.
Go me.
These popsicles used up the last of it. It was an “oh crap I made too much watermelon juice” kind of thing. Tossed with some sugar syrup and lime juice and, oh yea, some tequila (for good measure, you know), into the freezer they went.
Watermelon juice is especially prone to separating, so if you want to avoid distinct layers in your popsicles, gently stir the pops every 30 minutes or so as they slowly freeze. Once they get to a slushy-like consistency, stir once more then position the sticks in the middles before they freeze completely solid.
Pro tip: be sure to set a timer for yourself, no matter how good you think your memory is! Because it’s far too easy to forget you have semi-frozen pops; once they’re frozen solid you will not be able to add the sticks.
This is the popsicle mold I used. I love the geometric shape of it, however go ahead and throw away the metal top. It’s stupid, because if you don’t get your sticks perfectly straight up and down, the lid is almost impossible to get off with sticks pointing every which way. Instead, I just wait until the pops are slushy-like and just frozen enough to hold a stick in place, no lid required.
You can also make these pops in the plastic ice pop pouches (same as I used for my Mai Tai ice pops). These are nice because instead of stirring, you just need to invert the pouches and squish them a bit every 30 minutes or so to keep them from separating.
You can make this recipe sans tequila with no other adjustments to the recipe.
You could also swap in smoky mezcal or any other liquor of your choosing.
I do not recommend increasing the alcohol from what is listed, as the popsicles will not freeze fully and you won’t be able to get them out of the molds in one piece. If you must have it extra boozy, use the plastic ice pop pouches instead of a standard popsicle mold. These are a bit more forgiving with boozy popsicles since you don’t have to worry about the pops coming out in one piece, rather enjoy the slushy consistency!
This is a recipe I originally posted back in 2011 and am updating. Because it’s a great recipe, but the photos (rather, photo, singular, since there’s only one) in the old post leave… a lot of be desired.
For proof that I’ve come a long way in 11 years… here’s a before and after:
When life gives you melons… just add tequila. Apparently.
(Also, if you like this recipe you’ll love the Tequila Watermelon Jelly recipe in my That’s My Jam ebook [Summer edition]. Seriously, so good!)
This recipe was originally published on September 30, 2011, it has been updated and rephotographed here. The main difference is the updated process to reduce separation, though I have scaled the recipe up to fit my 10-count popsicle mold. There’s also a little extra lime juice and no lime zest.