Jello Shot Alcohol Substitutes: Delicious and Unique Ideas (2024)

FAQs

Jello Shot Alcohol Substitutes: Delicious and Unique Ideas? ›

For a refreshing and healthy twist on jello shots, try using fruit juice instead of alcohol. Choose your favorite flavor of juice — orange, pineapple, grapefruit, or any other — and mix it with your jello powder according to the instructions.

Colorful and delicious, boozy Jell-O shots are always a sure hit at any party. Sometimes called "jelly" shots, these popular shooters can be made in any gelatin flavor and spiked with your favorite liquor. Vodka and rum are the most popular options, but you can use just about anything.

All you'll need to do is pour the mixture into a glass dish or baking pan, allow it to set, cut the Jell-O into individual mini squares, and let guests help themselves.

Add cold water or equivalent amount of ice, fruit juice, and then liquor. Definitely use ice instead of the cold water if you are having the party in less than 4 hours because it will solidify faster. Taste to ensure there is enough liquor and consider adding more.

If you are in a hurry, you can set your jello faster by having your liquids as cold as possible when starting to make your shots. You can have your alcohol in the freezer to get it cold, and/or you can add some ice cubes in with your cold water and remove the ice that's left after 2-3 minutes.

Some fresh fruits prevent Jell-O and other types of gelatin from gelling. These are fruits that contain high levels of proteases. Proteases are enzymes that break chemical bonds in proteins, such as collagen in gelatin. Pineapple, kiwi, papaya, mango, and guava are examples of fruits that cause a problem.

Jello Shots, like life, are all about balance. That said, if you want a strong one, it is possible if you leave it in the fridge long enough. In a Supercall experiment, we found that the strongest Jello Shot that will set is three-to-one ratio of 80-proof alcohol to water, and it took a full day to become mostly solid.

To do it, simply pour your liquid Jell-O shot into the cups, add the lid, and then flip each one before refrigerating. The result is a shot that sticks to the lid rather than the edges of the cup, allowing you easy access to that Jell-O goodness and making it so much easier to slurp down.

Jello shots won't set properly if you add too much alcohol.

Do jello shots get you drunk? ›

The sugar in these mixes helps to mask the taste of alcohol, and when you tie alcohol up in solid form, it doesn't dissolve as much on your tongue, which means you can't taste the alcohol as much. That means that you can easily get a little too drunk without realizing it.

The ones that do not have cuts in the bottom don't work very well for Jello shots. If you use these the Jello will come apart when you try to get the shot out and the paper will unfold so you will have a soggy piece of paper and sticky fingers. Just terrible. I recommend the little plastic medicine cups.

The enzymes in bromelain are inactivated once they have been heated to about 158° F (70° Celsius), so while fresh pineapple prevents Jell-O from gelling, gelatin made using canned pineapple (which was heated during the canning process) won't ruin the dessert.

Putting them in the foil cupcake liners did help keep them contained, and added a festive flair as well. Just keep this mechanical issue in mind if you're bringing them to a party, or maybe add the swirl before the jello is completely set (and let me know if that works if you try them out).

Jello shots taste best fresh, so make them the day of your event or up to 2 days before. Technically, you can make them more in advance, but they tend to shrivel and shrink after a week in the fridge. Don't serve them if they are more than a week old.

If you add the alcohol to the boiling hot Jello and water mixture, all the alcohol will just evaporate because alcohol has a lower boiling point than water. Be sure to allow the Jello/Knox/water mixture to cool to about room temperature before adding the alcohol.

Alcohol can interfere with the setting properties of gelatin, so don't increase the proportion of alcohol to non-alcoholic liquid past this.

For stronger Jello shots, try using 100 proof vodka (for 33 proof shots) or Bacardi 151 (for 50 proof shots). You could even use 190-proof Everclear (grain alcohol). The only catch here is that using more potent alcohol makes the gelatin less likely to set.

To help jello shots to set more quickly, make sure you mix VERY COLD ingredients into your mixture. That means put your alcohol in the freezer and have some ice cubes ready to go.