Sour Apple Pucker Drinks: Mixed Drinks, Shots and the Appletini

The bottle was always sticky. Every bar I worked had one, green as antifreeze and wedged between the peach schnapps and the blue curaçao. Nobody ever admitted to ordering from it, and I still went through a case a month.

DeKuyper Sour Apple Pucker is a schnapps at about 15% ABV, which is 30 proof. That puts it closer to a strong wine than to vodka. It tastes like a green apple candy that went to the gym: sweet first, then a sharp sour snap at the back. Some people call it green apple pucker. It’s the same bottle.

Low proof matters. You can pour a lot of it and the drink still won’t get you very drunk. That’s why it shows up beside vodka or whiskey so often. Pucker brings the flavor and something else brings the booze.

The appletini is the reason it exists

Fine, not literally. But the apple martini is what made this bottle famous: vodka and Pucker, shaken cold and served up. The house Appletini runs 1 oz vodka to 1/2 oz Pucker or apple schnapps. That ratio is right. Most bars flipped it and served green syrup.

I like the Apple Martini #3 better. It’s equal parts apple juice, Sour Apple Pucker and apple vodka. The juice drags it back toward real fruit. Shake it hard and strain it into a chilled glass. We broke down every version of the drink in our appletini recipe post, so I won’t repeat it here.

Sour apple Pucker with vodka

Vodka is the obvious partner. It adds proof and no flavor, so Pucker does all the talking.

Granny Smith

Granny Smith: 1 1/2 oz vodka, 1 1/2 oz Sour Apple Pucker, 3 to 4 oz tonic over ice. The quinine bitterness fights the sugar. It’s the one drink here I’d order sober. Big lime wedge if you have one.

Green Booger

Ugly name, decent drink. The Green Booger is 1 1/2 oz vodka, 3 oz Pucker and 6 oz lemonade, stirred over ice. It’s tart on tart, with kids’ party colors and adult strength. Batch it in a pitcher and nobody will ask what it’s called.

Sour apple Pucker with Sprite

This is the easiest mixed drink on the shelf. Pucker plus lemon-lime soda and you’re done.

The Green Meanie is literally a shot of Sour Apple Pucker in a highball, topped with a can of lemon-lime soda. Sprite, 7-Up or the store brand all work the same. I poured hundreds of these for people who said they “don’t like the taste of alcohol.” At 15% ABV diluted with a can of soda, they mostly couldn’t taste it. Pour them with that in mind.

Want it stronger? Add an ounce of vodka and you’ve made a lazy version of the Apple Jolly Rancher.

Jolly Rancher shots

Green apple Jolly Rancher is the flavor this bottle gets compared to more than any other, and the comparison is fair.

1. Apple Jolly Rancher: 1 oz vodka, 1 oz Sour Apple Pucker, sweet and sour mix and a squirt of 7-Up. Shake it cold. Serve it in a rocks glass or split it into shots.
2. Lisa’s Jolly Rancher: cranberry, Sour Apple Pucker and watermelon Pucker. It’s shaken and strained, pinkish-red, and it tastes like the whole bag of mixed candy instead of only the green one.
3. Jolly Rancher Jello Shots: one cup boiling water, one package green apple Jell-O, one cup chilled Pucker. That makes about 20. Because Pucker is so low proof, you can use a full cup and they still set firm. Try that with 151 and see what happens.

Washington Apple, and its cousins

The Washington Apple is Crown Royal, Sour Apple Pucker and cranberry. Use two ounces of each, over ice in a highball. Canadian whisky is soft enough that the apple doesn’t fight it. The cranberry dries the whole thing out. Our full Washington Apple cocktail write-up covers the shot version too.

Shrink it and add a splash of 7-Up and you get the McIntosh Apple. Crown, Pucker, cranberry, 7-Up, shaken and poured as a shooter. Same family, a little fizzier.

Tennessee whiskey fan? The Washington Apple Shot #2 is just Jack Daniel’s and Pucker, half an ounce each. I think it’s worse. Jack’s caramel and the green apple don’t agree, so use Crown.

Two-ingredient shots that actually work

Pucker plays well with other sweet liqueurs. Here’s the short list:

• Caramel Apple: butterscotch schnapps and Sour Apple Pucker, shaken cold. It tastes like the county fair and it’s the best one on this page in October.
• Apple Ashley: Pucker and Malibu, equal parts. Coconut and green apple sounds weird on paper but is fine in practice.

More in our apple shots roundup, including the cinnamon ones.

How I’d actually use the bottle

Treat it as a modifier, not a base. Half an ounce wakes up a vodka soda. An ounce is a flavor and three ounces is a dessert. The biggest mistake I saw behind the bar was people building the drink on Pucker and topping it with more sugar. Cut it with something sharp or bitter: tonic, lemon, cranberry, fresh lime.

Got Pucker and not much else? Type what’s in your cabinet into CocktailBuilder and it’ll list the green drinks you can pour tonight.

It’s low proof and heavy on sugar, so it doesn’t last forever once opened. Cap it tight and keep it out of the sun. If the green has gone brownish and it smells flat, that bottle has done its time.

Last modified on October 4, 2026