A portmanteau of the spanish words "gomita" (the generic name for jelly-based treats) and "Chela" (vernacular, jargon for "Cerveza", Beer)

A Gomichela is a sweet beer-based cocktail. Its name comes from the fact that it's sweetened and drunk with jelly treats such as Gummy bears, and fruit. But, just like the other mexican food writeups I've done, there's no single authoritative recipe for it.

But that shouldn't stop you from doing it! It's actually quite simple to prepare. In its most general form, you need:

  • Beer (low-tier or mid-tier only; don't use good stuff here)
  • Chamoy or lemon juice
  • Miguelito chamoy powder (Amazon). This can be substituted with a salt/sugar mixture, but it won't be as awesome.
  • More lemon juice
  • Tomato/clam juice (Clamato)
  • Worcestershire sauce
  • Soy sauce
  • Tabasco sauce
  • Fresh mango/strawberry pulp
  • Tamarind candy sticks/balls (more Amazon)
  • Gummy bears/worms/treats

General procedure

  • Rim the glass (usually 1 liter) with the Chamoy/Lemon juice and the Miguelito powder
  • Inside the glass, Mix the liquid ingredients to your taste, except for the tomato/clam juice. Ideally, you should use all these ingredients to make a concentrated cocktail of sorts to your liking. It should be acidic and a bit salty
  • Add the fruit pulp and some gummy bears. Ideally, you should crush them so they can suspend in the cocktail and give it some sweet flavor
  • Add the tomato/clam juice. Depending on your taste and alcohol tolerance, this should make up for 25-50% of your glass
  • Fill it up with an inexpensive ale
  • Put a tamarind stick or more gummy bears inside the glass to eat while you drink
  • Drink to your heart's content.

Variations

  • You can substitute the tomato/clam juice with orange soda or other soft, carbonated drink
  • It's common in some areas to add more seafood flavor with a tiny bit of shrimp and/or oysters. Urban legend says that this avoids a hangover. I have yet to test this piece of wisdom.
  • "Dunking" tamarind candy sticks on the beer cocktail isn't exclusive to this beer cocktail. If you are ever presented with this, be mindful that it imparts a slight spicy taste to the beer which, according to my experience, can be too much for those not used to eating spicy food.
  • Just like Ponche, this is a sweet alcoholic drink. When prepared correctly, the taste of alcohol is almost completely gone, so be careful not to drink too much
  • The taste of beer is also completely lost in this cocktail, so please don't waste your good stuff in this.
  • As a matter of fact, I advice you to drink one of these and then proceed to get some real beer. Gomichelas are, in my opinion, good for pre-game drinking, not as session cocktail

 


 

Post script

DonJaime says: Sounded like a waste of good beer until you said use bad beer. But then I'd have to buy bad beer? Heaven forfend!

I must state that my experience with gomichelas is limited. Maybe there's a way to prepare one that doesn't completely mask that sweet, sweet beer flavor but I haven't found one. I just want to add a bit of cultural context on this drink:

  • Preparing (and selling) gomichelas is an easy and inexpensive way of upping the markup on beer. For reference, one bar near my house sells 500ml of gomichela at $35 MXN and 1000ml of regular beer at $45 MXN. By my recipe and several observations, I can safely say that maybe half of that 500ml glass is beer, so you do do the math.
  • My observation is that gomichelas are sold mostly at low-class bars (you know, the kind that your mother warned you about with low lights, loud music, little space and underage drinkers) because they can be shotgunned rather easily. My hypothesis is that they weren't created to be enjoyed, rather to get people drunk easily (which would explain why this drink is quite popular with the young 'uns and in certain tourist destinations)

So yes, if you want to try this my first advice would be to never buy bad beer and instead go to your local watering hole to get one. I guess this drink isn't popular or even known outside of Mexico, so my second advice would be to buy one and only one low-tier ale and prepare it yourself and then proceed to wash it down with something better.