Bazooka Joe Shot

Banana liqueur, blue curaçao, and Irish cream — recreating Bazooka bubblegum (Topps, Brooklyn, 1947), Bazooka Joe added to the wrapper comics in 1953.

The Bazooka Joe shot takes its name from Bazooka Joe, the comic book character who has appeared on Bazooka bubblegum wrappers since 1953. The original Bazooka bubblegum was introduced by the Topps Company in Brooklyn, New York, in 1947, using the post-World War II bazooka rocket launcher as its brand identity. Bazooka Joe and his eyepatch-wearing friends were added to the wrapper comics in 1953 as a way to encourage children to collect the series of illustrated strips. The bubblegum itself was famous for a specific flavor profile — a sweet, slightly floral, artificially fruity pink note that became one of the most widely recognized candy flavors in mid-20th century American culture. The cocktail shot attempts to recreate that exact flavor through a combination of banana liqueur, blue curaçao, and Irish cream — a combination that on its surface appears to have nothing to do with bubblegum, but whose interaction produces a genuinely bubblegum-adjacent sweetness. The banana liqueur provides the artificial-fruit base; the blue curaçao adds an orange-citrus brightness alongside the blue coloring; and the Irish cream rounds and softens the profile. When the blue and yellow of the two liqueurs combine with the cream's pale color the result tends toward pink — a visual cue that reinforces the bubblegum association before the first sip.