Homemade Watermelon Margarita Recipe

A margarita is one of my favorite drinks to enjoy with some delicious Mexican food. Or that was the case until I found out how many calories are in a typical margarita served at most big chain restaurants! Taking a quick glance at my book “Drink This, Not That” by David Zinczenko and Matt Goulding, I found that most margaritas served at restaurants range from 350 calories all the way up to 890 calories!!

That’s scary stuff! If I drank the margarita with 890 calories I would be consuming almost half of my daily allowance of calories in a drink! Keep in mind that this drink doesn’t provide me with any fiber, protein, vitamins, antioxidants, minerals that I would have gotten if I had eaten 890 calories worth of healthy food.  If I want to eat “bad calories,” I think I would rather have a few slices of light cheesecake or about 3 candy bars!

Using one of the pre-made margarita mixes that can be purchased at grocery stores to make margarita’s at home isn’t really a better option either. Scan the ingredients list of a few of the pre-made mixes at the grocery store and you will typically find a list of ingredients that goes like this: water, high fructose corn syrup, lots of preservatives, lots of additional kinds of artificial sugars, a few things I can’t pronounce, and different kinds of food coloring. That list of ingredients doesn’t add up to something I should be drinking because something seems to be missing from that list of ingredients: real fruit!

So what’s a girl to do if she doesn’t want to give up her drinking of an occasional margarita? Well this girl decided to start making her own margaritas at home from scratch. The recipe I found was very easy to make and contained real fruit which means I will be getting some vitamins and antioxidants with my drink! The watermelon margarita recipe is from Cooking Light magazine and each margarita is only 105 calories per serving!!! It’s a no guilt recipe and I won’t feel like I have to run 12 miles just to burn off the calories from one margarita.

Watermelon Margarita via Cooking Light magazine’s July issue

Ingredients:

• 2 teaspoons sugar
• 1 lime wedge
• 3 ½ cups cubed seeded watermelon
• ½ cup tequila
• 2 tablespoons sugar
• 3 tablespoons fresh lime juice
• 1 tablespoon Triple Sec (orange-flavored liqueur)
• Lime wedges or watermelon balls (optional)

Preparation:

1. Place 2 teaspoons sugar in a saucer. Rub the rims of 6 glasses with 1 lime wedge; spin rim of each glass in sugar to coat. Set prepared glasses aside.

2. Combine watermelon and next 4 ingredients (through Triple Sec) in a blender; process until smooth. Fill each prepared glass with 1/2 cup crushed ice. Add 1/2 cup margarita to each glass. Garnish with lime wedges or melon balls, if desired. Makes 6 servings so share with friends!

Depending on the size of the watermelon you purchased you may or may not have extra watermelon left over to eat or use in additional recipes. I did have some leftover watermelon that I used to make the watermelon ice cubes that were used to make the iced green tea drink I wrote about in a previous post. If you missed that post please take a quick glance at it to find another great drink recipe!