How to Make Virgin Mojitos at Home

Low-cost, Non-alcoholic Mojitos

With summer already underway, I thought I’d bring you something refreshing to beat the summer heat. Let me show you how with just a handful of regular ingredients, you’ll be able to make three incredibly refreshing summer drinks – 3 kinds of virgin mojitos. Virgin, meaning they’re non-alcoholic mojitos.

But what is a mojito? It’s a Cuban cocktail drink and classic mojitos are made with 5 ingredients: sour lime, mint leaves, sugar, white rum, and club soda. On the other hand, virgin mojitos, the ones we’re making today, are made with all of these except the rum. Let’s see how to make virgin mojitos – low-cost non-alcoholic mojitos. But with some Indian jugaad.

Bartenders use muddlers, a kind of wooden pestle to muddle sour lime, mint leaves, and sugar while making mojitos. But since in most homes, we don’t have any fancy equipment like muddlers, we’ll add a smart twist, some Indian jugaad to the recipe. Let’s see how.

And though in a regular virgin mojito, sour lime is the only fruit included, by throwing in other fruits (fruit pulp or juice like mango pulp, orange juice, strawberry crush, etc.), you could make a variety of fruit-flavoured virgin mojitos.

And also, do check out my recipes for two other refreshing home-made summer drinks – Goan SolKadi and Quick Jeera Soda.

Ingredients

Regular Virgin Mojito

Few wedges / pieces of sour lime

8-10 mint leaves

2 tbsp brown sugar

OR 1 ½ tbsp regular sugar, powdered

1 tbsp lime juice

Pinch of salt

3-4 mint leaves

Crushed ice

Club Soda

Water Melon Virgin Mojito

Few wedges / pieces of sour lime

8-10 mint leaves

1 tbsp regular sugar, powdered

1 tbsp lime juice

Approx. ½ cup crushed water melon

Pinch of salt

3-4 mint leaves

Crushed ice

Club Soda

Mixed Berries Virgin Mojito

Few wedges / pieces of sour lime

8-10 mint leaves

1 tbsp regular sugar, powdered

Approx. 2 tsp lime juice

3 tbsp mixed berry crush

Pinch of salt

3-4 mint leaves

Crushed ice

Club Soda

Procedure

1. Chop a few sour limes into pieces.
2. Indian jugaad! Instead of a muddler, we’ll use a wooden potato masher, and we’ll muddle the sour lime pieces, mint leaves, and sugar in a steel bowl first and then transfer the mixture to a glass.
3. For all the three kinds of virgin mojitos, begin by muddling the sour lime pieces, mint leaves, and sugar in the steel bowl. Transfer the mixture to a glass.
4. Add 1 tbsp of lime juice to the regular virgin mojito and the water melon mojito, and 2 tsp of it to the mixed berries mojito.
5. This step is only for the last two mojitos. To the water melon one, add around ½ cup of crushed water melon, and to the mixed berries one, add 3 tbsp of store-bought mixed berries crush. The crush I used had a mix of strawberries, blueberries, and mulberries.
6. Add a pinch of salt and crushed ice or ice cubes. Add 2-3 fresh mint leaves and then top up the glass with some chilled club soda.
7. Stir the drink and then add a sprig of mint on the top as a finishing touch.

Enjoy!