St. Patrick's Day Cocktails - Updated for 2025

 

Ready or not, St. Patrick's Day is only 4 days away!

Yes, that's right!

But what does that mean?

Well, it means that you better get your cocktails in order.  STAT!

Over the years, I have made and created some pretty amazing cocktails, shooters, and more.  One of my favorite kinds of cocktails to make is a Holiday Cocktail!

They are so much fun to make!  I get to use different ingredients, colors, and decorations in my cocktails and photos, and I think it makes them taste better just knowing that they are a holiday cocktail.

For this round-up, I am going to share with you my St. Patrick's Day cocktails...now I only have a couple green cocktails in there, but if you REALLY wanted to have a green cocktail, I have a crap ton of other green "non St. Patrick's Day" cocktails on my blog that you can choose from.

Do you have traditions that your family does for St. Patrick's Day?  Now that our kids are grown, I no longer dump green food dye into the milk the night before for the kids to find in the morning....so besides eating corned beef, either putting a couple drops of green food coloring into our beers or making a yummy St. Patrick's Day cocktail....we really don't do much anymore.

OK, so onto the reason you are all here......My Collection of St. Patrick's Day Cocktails!

I wanted to start off with my Irish Delight, as the amazing people at Rent.com featured MY COCKTAIL, Irish Delight, in their 8 St. Patrick's Day Party Ideas Post!  It's been a while since I've posted and done much with my blog, so when I was contacted by them and told that they want to feature MY cocktail, I was excited!  Kinda ignited the small fire that was semi lit under my butt about jumping back onto the cocktail train!  

Also, a friend of mine has been sending me Instagram reels from a local guy who reviews and tries different recipes that people send him....and that's ALWAYS been something that I've wanted to do (among other ideas I have racing through my head)!  Him sending all of those reels was the initial fire being re-lit...you know.....under my butt (as I mentioned in the paragraph above, lol).

Anyways, I have a good variety of different kinds of cocktails and shooters for you to try on Monday, and here they are!

Irish Delight

Baby Guinness

Creamy Irish Balls

Irish Car Bomb

Creamy Nutty Paddy

Green Eyes

Irish Coffee

Leprechaun's Dream

Irish Coffee Balls

Nutty Irishman

Irish Cookie

Irish Headlock

There you have it, 12 St. Patrick's Day Cocktails that you can serve....or consume yourself (I'm not judging) on Monday!

I hope you all have a great day (or weekend) celebrating!  Stay tuned....b/c that fire is lit!  There will be more things coming in the future!  IF you're not following me on Instagram, please do!  I post more on there and would LOVE to connect with you!  You can go there now and follow me and see what I've been posting: Follow A Year Of Cocktails On Instagram

If you have any shots or cocktails that you would like me to try, message me on Instagram!  Maybe I'll feature your cocktail!

If you're on Facebook, you can follow me there as well at: Follow A Year Of Cocktails On Facebook


Until Next Time!

Blue Hawaiian Jello Shots

 Jello Shots!!

Jello Shots!!

Lately we've been on the BIGGEST Jello Shot kick!

I like to make mine more like I make my cocktails.  I mean anyone can mix some jello, water and vodka and call it a day, but I like mine to have a bit more flavor than just that.

Now let's talk a moment about this Jello Shot recipe I created.

First off it's called a Blue Hawaiian.  

No it's not BLUE.

I get that.

Now, if you do a Google search for Blue Hawaiian Jello Shots....well, they're mostly blue. 
 
Why?  

I'll tell you why.  They use Berry Blast Blue Jello to make them.

What's the problem with that?

There's no blue berry flavor in a Blue Hawaiian.  So why are we putting it in our Jello Shots?  Simply to make the shot blue.

Like I said, I make mine to taste like a cocktail and in this case I want it to taste like a Blue Hawaiian.

The green color is a pretty and what's even better? 

It's freaking delicious!

Seriously!  Delicious and OH so easy to make!  Here's how:

Pour the Jello mix into a bowl and set aside.  Boil the water.  

Pour the water into a bowl that has the Jello powder waiting.  Stir well for 2 whole minutes.

Add in the coconut rum.

The pineapple juice.

The blue curacao.

Stir everything together.

I usually lay my 2 ounce plastic containers out like this on a paper towel.  That way if anything drips it goes directly onto the paper towels and not my counters.

I use this pancake pourer to pour my jello shot liquid.  It minimizes my mess.

Fill up the containers.  I usually fill them about 3/4 way full.  When I do that I get "roughly" 17-19 Jello shots. 

For this batch I got 19.  When you are done, put the lids on top and stick them in the fridge overnight.  

The longer they sit in the fridge the better they taste.  I prefer to have mine sit for 2 days.

You can dress them up when you are ready to serve with a tiny pineapple slice if you'd like.  I serve mine as is, no extra fluff, just the jello shot.

Here's my recipe for these AMAZING Jello Shots!

Yield: 19

Author: Jennifer Penas

Blue Hawaiian Jello Shots

Ingredients

• 3 ounce box Island Pineapple Jello

• 1 cup water

• 4 ounces coconut rum

• 2 ounces blue curacao

• 2 ounces pineapple juice

• 2 ounce plastic containers with lids

Instructions

1. Boil water on stove.
2. Pour boiling water into a bowl and add the Jello package. 
3. Stir for 2 minutes.
4. Pour in the rest of the ingredients.
5. Stir.
6. Pour into 2 ounce plastic containers.
7. Snap lids on top.
8. Refrigerate over night.

Did you make this recipe?

Tag @ayearofcocktails on instagram and hashtag it #

Created using The Recipes Generator

Enjoy!

Paloma

 

This is THE cocktail that you will want to drink

THIS Cinco De Mayo!!

Happy Cinco De Mayo!!

What better way to celebrate such a wonderful day than with an ice cold Paloma!

Until a few months ago I had never heard of a Paloma.

<Gasp, I know>

But I hadn't!

I was asked to create a Paloma recipe for the magazine I write for, so I googled it and started creating a recipe to my likings.

Um......DELICIOUS!

This is my husband and mines new favorite cocktail!  When we're up at the lake house we seem to drink it ALL the time!

Speaking of the lake.....where we are in California we need rain to fill up our lakes.  

Like REALLY BAD!

We drive by another lake on our way up to our lake house and there are now islands and land where there used to be a LOT of feet of water.  

It's so sad.  This summer will not be a bit boating summer for sure unless we get A TON of rain.

Which I don't see happening.  Which is a bummer.  So extra pool time is how we will be spending our summer time up at the lake this year.  Fingers crossed that this winter brings all of the rain that we need!

OK, back to the cocktail!

In celebration of Cinco De Mayo, I decided to share my recipe with you all so that you too can enjoy the deliciousness that is, The Paloma!

This is such a simple cocktail to make.  First add your tequila.

Next add the grapefruit juice.

Add in the lime juice (I used frozen lime juice made from a neighbors lime tree, yum).

Onto the simple syrup.

And finally the grapefruit soda.

Give it a good stir to mix everything together well and enjoy!

Onto the recipe!!

Yield: 1

Paloma

This delicious cocktail is so satisfying as it mixes tequila with the refreshing taste of grapefruit juice and other ingredients to bring you a cocktail that you'll definitely want seconds of.

Ingredients

• 2 ounces clear tequila
• 2 ounces grapefruit juice
• 1 ounce grapefruit soda
• 1/2 ounce lime juice
• 1/2 ounce simple syrup

Instructions

1. Fill a cocktail glass with ice.

1. Pour in all of the ingredients above.

1. Stir cocktail well to mix all ingredients.

Created using The Recipes Generator

There you have it.  The Paloma.  I hope you enjoy this cocktail as much as my husband and I do!

Happy Cinco De Mayo!!

Cocktail Puzzles

What are you doing to help pass the time during Shelter In Place (SIP)?

We have been doing a LOT of puzzles!  

Which reminds me of one of my "Shelter In Place Drinking Games"........which really can be an "any day" drinking game.  Most of these are things we do or don't do regularly anyways!

So back to PUZZLES!  

We have had a couple in the house that we have never done.  Completed them in the first week.  

We then ordered another one.  Completed it.  

Then I went onto Amazon to order more..........yea I couldn't find any that were in stock.  If they were possibly in stock they weren't shipping for at least a month!

Insane!!

Then I got the idea to create my own!

I mean shoot I have 500+ cocktail photos from all of the cocktails that I have made over the past 8+ years!  Why not!

I submitted a couple of my photos.

Chose one I wanted to put together and ordered it.

I was excited and nervous to receive it.  I had NO CLUE what the quality would be.

Then the puzzle came in the mail.

HOLY CRAP the quality was good!  Like REALLY good!

The puzzle came in a box with it's photo on the outside.  

When I opened up the box all of the pieces were sealed in a bag, which I thought was awesome!

These puzzle pieces were thick.  They were super glossy which was AMAZING!  They all fit together perfectly, I have NO complaints!  I mean check out these pieces!!

My daughter and I worked on the puzzle together.

Boy was that fun!

Then we proudly displayed our finished product!

I have to say I am SUPER impressed with the quality of this puzzle.  I knew I would be critical because this is a puzzle of MY photo.  I didn't want a half ass puzzle. 

What I received was beyond my expectations.

If you want to put together a new puzzle, these are amazing!

You can order your puzzles and start having fun upon their arrival!

Also, if there is a cocktail photo of mine that you'd like to have made into a puzzle, let me know which one and I'll upload it!

I hope you are all doing well during this SIP!

I know how hard this time can be.

The fight to find some normalcy can be a challenge at times.

Just know that this will get better.  

This is not permanent.

We will get through this!

All My Love!!