Skittles Vodka: How to Infuse It, Filter the Film, and What to Pour It In

Skittles vodka is a solution, in the chemical sense, of almost everything a Skittle is made of, plus a thin layer of the one thing a Skittle is made of that vodka cannot dissolve. Sugar, citric acid, flavoring and dye all go into a 40 percent alcohol solution within hours, because roughly 60 percent of that bottle is water and sugar and food dyes are water-soluble. The candy also contains a vegetable fat and a coating of carnauba wax, however, and neither of those dissolves in a water-ethanol mix at room temperature, which is why a finished bottle tends to carry a cloudy film on top unless it is filtered.

The ratio and the sort

The working ratio is about one standard bag (the 2.17-ounce size, roughly 60 pieces) per 750 ml of vodka. That gives a clear, distinct fruit flavor and a noticeable but not syrupy sweetness; doubling the candy produces something closer to a liqueur, which some people prefer as a shot and most people find tiring in a mixed drink.

Sorting by color is worth the five minutes it takes, because a mixed bag dissolves into a brownish purple that tastes vaguely of fruit punch, whereas single colors keep their own flavors and make a far better-looking row of bottles. The usual approach is five small jars or flasks, each with around 150 ml of vodka and its own color’s pieces, which adds up to the same one-bag-per-750 ratio.

Cheap vodka is perfectly adequate here, and our Skittle Vodka entry says so directly by calling for the cheapest available, since the candy covers whatever character the spirit had. Sixty grams of dissolved candy adds around 40 ml of volume to a 750 ml bottle, which lowers an 80-proof vodka to about 38 percent, a change too small to notice in a shot.

Infusing, step by step

1. Sort the candy into clean glass jars, one color per jar.
2. Pour the vodka over each and seal tightly.
3. Shake every hour or so. Agitation strips the dissolved sugar away from the surface of each piece and exposes fresh candy to the solvent, so it roughly halves the time compared with leaving the jars still.
4. After four to eight hours at room temperature, the pieces should be gone except for a pale, slightly slimy residue.
5. Put the jars in the freezer for 30 minutes. Cold firms up the fat and wax so they clump instead of staying suspended.
6. Strain through a paper coffee filter set in a funnel. It runs slowly, and a second filter may be needed when the first one clogs; a fine sieve alone lets most of the film through.
7. Bottle, label, and refrigerate or freeze.

The Skittka is the same infusion under a different name, which suggests how many bars and dorm rooms arrived at it independently.

Why the dishwasher trick is a bad idea

A widely shared shortcut puts the sealed bottle of vodka and candy through a hot dishwasher cycle, on the theory that heat speeds dissolving. It does speed dissolving, which is true of nearly every solid in nearly every liquid, but the method combines a sealed glass bottle with hot water and alcohol vapor, and ethanol boils almost 40 degrees Fahrenheit below water. As the contents warm, vapor pressure inside the bottle rises, so a tight cap can force a leak or a crack, and an escaping stream of alcohol vapor inside a closed appliance with a heating element is not a reasonable risk to take for a few hours of convenience. Shaking the jar on the counter gets to the same place by the end of an afternoon.

Jolly Rancher vodka, a different candy

Jolly Ranchers behave differently because they are hard candy, essentially sugar and corn syrup boiled down to a glass, with no wax shell and only a trace of oil. They leave little or no film, so filtering is mostly unnecessary; however, the dense, glassy pieces dissolve only from the surface inward, which takes a day or more instead of a few hours. Smashing them in a sealed bag first, to multiply the surface area, brings that down considerably. A couple of dozen pieces per 375 ml, separated by flavor, gives a bright, sharply sour result, especially with the green apple and watermelon colors.

The Jolly Joker is simply vodka infused with original-flavor Jolly Ranchers, while the Jolly Rancher #5 stretches that vodka into a longer drink with 7-Up. The Jolly Rancher Rita skips the infusion entirely and blends the candy straight into prepared margarita mix over ice. Hard candy of other kinds follows the same rules, and the Fisherman’s Friend dissolves crushed menthol lozenges in 100-proof vodka, a sharp, cold shot best known in Finland.

What to do with the bottles

As a chilled shot, a single-color infusion needs nothing added. Mixed, it behaves like a flavored vodka with extra sugar, so it pairs best with something sour or dry to balance it. Red or purple Skittles vodka shaken with lemon juice gives a fair version of a candy lemon drop, the same structure as the Pucker Up #2, which builds on lemon vodka, lemon juice, sugar and a candy garnish. Green apple Jolly Rancher vodka slots into the Heads Up 7 Up, whose sour apple schnapps and lemon-lime soda already point in that direction. The Gummies shot, built on vodka with watermelon, peach and blackberry schnapps and a gummy worm, has room for a splash of red Skittles vodka, which pushes it further toward the gummy aisle.

Candy vodkas also set well in gelatin, provided they make up no more than half of the cold liquid, because the sugar they carry does not interfere with the set the way extra alcohol would; our jello shots guide gives the full ratio. For shots that rely on liqueurs rather than infusions to reach the same flavors, the candy shots list covers the gummy bear and Jolly Rancher recipes built from schnapps.

When the freezer fills up with five colors of vodka and not enough ideas, see what else the shelf supports on CocktailBuilder.

Last modified on October 11, 2026