Shots to Order at a Bar, Sorted by What the Table Actually Wants
Somebody at our table says “let’s do a round,” and then comes the pause we all know. Five people look at each other. One gets elected to walk to the bar. Nobody wants to come back with a tray of something awful.
So here is what we carry in our heads on that walk. Every shot below is one a normal bartender can make on a busy Friday without looking it up, and each comes with the words to use. A clear name at a loud bar beats a description every time. When one wins our table over, we look it up on Cocktail Builder and try it at home, where the pours are ours to get wrong.
Fruity shots to order at a bar
The safest answer for a mixed crowd is a lemon drop. Say “lemon drops, as shots” and you’ll get citrus vodka shaken with sour mix, plus a sugar-crusted lemon slice to bite afterward. We list that exact build as Lemon Drop #3. It’s the hard candy in liquid form, sugar first and then a bright little sting.
Now that the evenings are drawing in, we lean toward the Washington Apple Shot. Crown Royal, sour apple schnapps and cranberry juice go into the shaker in equal thirds, sometimes with a splash of 7-Up. You taste tart green apple first, then the whisky warming up underneath.
A Melon Ball is softer: Midori, vodka and orange juice in equal parts, a small taste of August. The Woo Woo belongs to the same family, with vodka, peach schnapps and cranberry. We pour it tall at home, so ask for a “woo woo, as a shot” and any bartender will cut it down.
The name Surfer on Acid puts people off, which is a pity. Pineapple and coconut rum somehow bury the Jägermeister, and it drinks like a beach holiday. We keep a longer list of fruity shots, but those few will get you through nearly any bar in the country.
Sweet shots for a dessert crowd
Coffee and cream carry most of this list, and we want them more once the nights turn cold. The Baby Guinness is Kahlúa with a little Baileys floated on top, so it looks exactly like a tiny pint with a creamy head. People laugh when it lands on the table, which is half of why we order it.
A B-52 adds Grand Marnier and layers all three, so you get coffee, cream and orange in turn. It needs a careful hand, so we save it for a quiet Tuesday. Nobody should ask for six on a packed Saturday.
Two more taste like the bakery next door. Shake cinnamon schnapps, butterscotch schnapps and Baileys and you have an Oatmeal Cookie, warm spice and all. The Chocolate Cake Shot contains no chocolate whatsoever. Frangelico and vanilla vodka go down first, you bite a sugared lemon straight after, and the flavors meet at the back of your mouth as something remarkably like cake. Ask for it by name, since most bars have the Frangelico and every bar has the lemon.
Simpler still is the Pineapple Upside-Down Cake, with vanilla vodka, pineapple juice and a drop of grenadine. It’s closer to a cold spoonful of canned fruit syrup than a shot of liquor. If your crowd stays in this mood all night, we’ve also written up sweet drinks to order at a bar for what comes after the shots.
Vodka shots at the bar
A group that wants vodka and doesn’t want to think should say “Kamikazes.” The Kamikaze is half vodka, a quarter triple sec and a quarter lime, and it’s sharp, cold and clean. Ask for it “nice and cold” so it gets a proper shake.
The small pleasure we’d miss most is the Cordless Screwdriver. You take a chilled ounce of vodka, then bite an orange wedge rolled in sugar. Few bartenders use that name now, so say “a shot of cold vodka with a sugared orange slice.” You’ll usually get a smile along with it. There are more in our run of vodka shots, though most of those are better made at home.
The popular ones bartenders reach for
Tell a bartender to pick and you’ll quite often get a Green Tea shot. There’s no tea in it. The usual build is Irish whiskey, peach schnapps and sour mix with a splash of lemon-lime soda, and it tastes like sweet peach iced tea. We don’t list it under that name, but the Water Moccasin is a close cousin, with Crown Royal for the Irish whiskey and a dash of triple sec.
Drop shots have outlived every trend we can remember. A Jäger Bomb is a shot of Jägermeister dropped into half a can of Red Bull, all black licorice and melted gummy candy. The Vegas Bomb as we list it sends Crown Royal and butterscotch schnapps into the Red Bull instead, though recipes for that one wander from bar to bar. Each costs more than a plain shot, since somebody has to pay for the can.
Strong shots
The strongest shots are the ones with nothing in them but liquor. A name with “bomb” or “eraser” in it tells you very little, and plenty of scary-sounding shooters are half juice.
- Three Wise Men: Johnnie Walker, Jim Beam and Jack Daniel’s in equal parts. Smoke, corn sweetness and char arrive in that order.
- Prairie Fire: tequila with a dash of Tabasco, which burns in two different ways.
- Tic Tac: ouzo and Rumple Minze, half an ounce of each. Picture icy licorice and peppermint, with the Rumple Minze at 100 proof.
Four Horsemen is worth a question before you order, because bars pour it several ways. The version we list runs to three full ounces of Jägermeister, Rumple Minze, Bacardi 151 and Cuervo, and since Bacardi stopped making the 151, any bar serving it today has swapped something in. We stop at one of these. It works as a toast, and the evening goes better if it stays one.
At the rail
Count heads before you get there and say the number first: “Five lemon drops, please.” If you like them very cold, ask for them shaken. Have your card ready too, because nobody behind a bar wants to split a round five ways.
Stuck? Ask what they’d pick for something fruity or something sweet. Good bartenders enjoy that question, as long as the line behind you is short.
Last modified on November 1, 2026