Low Carb Paloma: Keto Paloma Recipe With 4g Net Carbs

Low carb Paloma recipe made with real grapefruit, no soda. Mexico’s true tequila drink at 115 calories and 4g net carbs on a GLP-1 diet.

I love grapefruit. It’s one of those flavors people either love or hate, and I’m firmly in the first camp. Bitter, tart, a little sweet, and nothing else tastes like it.

The Paloma does the most with it. It’s a Mexican classic, and ask around in Mexico and you’ll hear that people order it over the margarita. Tequila, grapefruit, lime, a salted rim.

Then the sugar crept in, like it does with everything else. Most Palomas now start with grapefruit soda, usually Squirt. One 12 ounce can carries 38 grams of added sugar and 140 calories, along with the additives that come with it. Pour six ounces into a glass and you’ve added about 19 grams of sugar before the tequila shows up.

It’s okay to want a drink. You just need a low carb recipe that tastes like something you actually want to drink. My version goes back to the roots, with fresh grapefruit juice and a clean sparkling mineral water with no sugar in it. Four ingredients, five minutes, 4 grams of net carbs, and about 115 calories.

Why This Low Carb Paloma Works

• Written for people on a GLP-1. The carb count is the easy part.
• 4g net carbs, roughly 115 calories per drink. A soda-based Paloma runs about 165 calories and 19 grams of added sugar.
• Real grapefruit only. The sugar comes from the fruit, with the acid and bitterness of the whole thing attached.
• No soda, no agave syrup, no bottled mix. The three places a bar hides sugar in this drink, gone.
• No sweetener needed. A good ruby red balances the drink on its own.
• No seed oils, no hidden sugars, nothing you cannot pronounce. Same standard as every recipe on this site.

Where the Carbs in a Paloma Actually Come From

Same table as the margarita post, same point. These are typical figures per standard pour. Brands vary, so check your own bottles.

Component	Typical serving	Carbs
Blanco tequila, 100% agave	1.5 oz	0 g
Plain sparkling mineral water	4 to 5 oz	0 g
Fresh ruby red grapefruit juice	1.5 oz	about 4 g
Grapefruit soda (Squirt)	6 oz	about 19 g
Grapefruit juice cocktail or “juice drink”	1.5 oz	about 12 g
Agave syrup, the bar upgrade	1 tbsp	about 16 g

Same 1.5 ounce pour of tequila in every build. The only thing that changes is what goes in around it.

Paloma build	Calories	Sugar
This recipe, real grapefruit	about 115	about 4g, from the fruit
Built with 6 oz grapefruit soda	about 165	about 19g added
Bar version, soda plus agave syrup	250 to 350	25g or more

Real grapefruit juice does carry sugar. It’s roughly four grams in the pour used here. That’s a different thing metabolically than a corn syrup slug, and a much better thing in the glass. I wrote about why added sugar matters more than total sugar in what hidden sugars really mean.

The sugar is never in the thing you think you’re ordering. It’s in the mixer.

Pick the Right Tequila

A 1.5 ounce pour of any distilled tequila runs about 97 calories with zero carbs and zero sugar, the same as vodka, gin, or whiskey. Buy a blanco labeled 100% de Agave, with a NOM number, and check it against Tequila Matchmaker. I walk through the whole label routine in the low carb margarita post. Skip the bottle with no agave percentage on it.

Ingredients for a Low-Carb Paloma

• 1.5 oz tequila blanco
• 1.5 oz fresh grapefruit juice, about a third of a medium ruby red
• 4 to 5 oz plain sparkling mineral water
• Kosher salt for the rim
• Ice, plus a grapefruit wedge or slice of lime to garnish
• Optional: 2 dashes orange bitters, or a squeeze of lime

Ingredient Notes

Grapefruit. Buy ruby red. It’s sweeter and less bitter than white grapefruit, so the drink balances with no sweetener at all. A third of a fruit gives you the ounce and a half. Roll it hard on the counter first and you’ll get more juice.

Bottled juice works if you’re not squeezing. Read the label. You want 100% grapefruit juice with nothing added. Anything sold as a juice cocktail, juice beverage, or juice drink has sugar in it, and that puts you right back at the soda version.

Sparkling water. San Pellegrino or Perrier. Both are plain carbonated mineral water and nothing else. Skip Topo Chico, which carries added preservatives. Skip anything flavored, since flavored seltzers are where sucralose tends to hide.

Lime. Most Paloma recipes add lime. This one doesn’t need it. A good ruby red carries enough acid, and leaving the lime out holds the drink at 4g net carbs. I add it in two cases. Winter grapefruit is often bitter, and a half ounce of lime pulls the drink back toward tart. If you’re eating low carb rather than strict keto, the extra gram isn’t worth thinking about. A half ounce brings the drink to about 5g net carbs and 119 calories.

Bitters. Two dashes of orange bitters is the best thing you can add to this drink. Bitters are botanical extracts in alcohol, so two dashes cost a couple of calories and effectively no carbs. They fill in the aromatic middle of the drink, the part grapefruit soda used to fake. Check the label first. Some brands use caramel color.

How to Make a Low-Carb Paloma

1. Rim the glass. Run a grapefruit wedge around the rim of a highball glass, then roll the rim in kosher salt on a small plate. Salt knocks back the bitterness, which is why the rim exists.
2. Fill the glass with ice. Do it now, so the glass is cold when the drink hits it.
3. Pour the tequila and grapefruit juice. Add 2 dashes of orange bitters here if you’re using them.
4. Top with sparkling mineral water. Pour slowly down the side of the glass to keep the fizz.
5. Stir once, gently. A Paloma is built, not shaken. Hard stirring kills the carbonation.
6. Garnish with a grapefruit wedge. Lime slices work also.

Two Variations Worth Making

Smoky Paloma. Swap half an ounce of the tequila for mezcal. The smoke and the grapefruit bitterness belong together, and it costs you nothing in carbs.

Reposado Paloma. Reposado brings vanilla and oak from the barrel, which reads as sweetness without adding any sugar. This is the version to make if you want the drink to taste richer.

Spicy Paloma. Two thin slices of jalapeño in the glass, muddled lightly. Zero carbs.

Pitcher for six. 9 oz tequila and 9 oz fresh grapefruit juice, stirred in a pitcher and refrigerated up to 24 hours. Add the sparkling water and ice per glass at serving time. Add it to the pitcher and the whole batch goes flat.

This drink is not sweetened, and with a good ruby red it does not need to be. If you end up with a bitter winter grapefruit, try the lime first. If it still needs help, two or three drops of pure liquid monk fruit or stevia extract will do it. Read that label too. Most sweetener packets are bulked out with dextrose or maltodextrin, both of which are sugar.

Does Grapefruit Interact With Ozempic, Wegovy, or Mounjaro?

This is the question that separates a Paloma from every other cocktail, and it is worth answering properly.

Grapefruit is famous for interfering with medications. It contains furanocoumarins that block CYP3A4, an intestinal enzyme that breaks down a large share of prescription drugs. Block the enzyme and more of the drug reaches your bloodstream than intended.

GLP-1 medications are not in that category. Semaglutide and tirzepatide are peptides. Your body takes them apart by cleaving the peptide backbone, not through the CYP enzyme system. Eli Lilly’s own medical information line states plainly that tirzepatide is not expected to interact with grapefruit. The same reasoning applies to semaglutide in Ozempic and Wegovy.

The real caution is everything else in your medicine cabinet. Grapefruit does interact with several statins, some blood pressure medications, certain anti-anxiety drugs, and others. Plenty of people on a GLP-1 are also on one of those. Check your specific list with your pharmacist before grapefruit becomes a regular thing, not because of the GLP-1, but because of what sits next to it.

More Low Carb Recipes and GLP-1 Reading

• Low carb margarita
• Diet myths about tequila
• Keto guacamole
• Air fryer chicken fajitas
• Baked BBQ chicken thighs

Low Carb Paloma FAQs

Final Thoughts

Grapefruit soda took over the Paloma because soda is cheap and keeps on a shelf. The sugar came along with it. Squeeze the fruit and you get a better drink at 115 calories, with the sugar load of a third of a grapefruit.

That’s the job here. I find where the sugar and the filler got in, take them out, and build the drink back with ingredients I can name. A GLP-1 shouldn’t cost you the drink in your hand on the patio while everybody else has theirs.