Theme parks capture the flavor of beloved films and books

ORLANDO — We were sitting at a rustic wooden table inside the Leaky Cauldron restaurant in the Wizarding World of Harry Potter-Diagon Alley at Universal Orlando Resort when Ric Florell, executive vice president of revenue operations, pulled three books out of a plastic bag. 

They were paperbacks so worn that they flattened when open, with hundreds of colored tabs marking pages riddled with notes. The books were Florell’s personal copies of the first three books in the “Harry Potter” series. 

Each color tab meant something — a mention of food, a beverage, a spell, an item of note. Florell and his team used those mentions to create what they call “authenticity to the fiction” when they were creating everything in the Wizarding World, right down to food and beverage options.

“We needed to know everything that we could possibly know about all the books,” Florell said. “About what we call ‘the fiction,’ and we had a mantra that we live by to this day: We want to be authentic to the fiction.”

The only way to do that was studying, hence the worn books. Florell estimated he’s read the series about three and a half times to help create the immersive Wizarding World, which has outposts in each of Universal’s parks in Florida, California and Japan.

The culinary options in the parks are among the best examples I’ve seen of using food and beverage to heighten the feeling of immersion in a theme park. Everything on the menu, from fish and chips to wild ice cream flavors at Florean Fortescue’s Ice-Cream Parlour to Butterbeer, was designed to seem as if it came right out of a Potter book or film. 

Mandy Bond, senior vice president of revenue operations, called it “storytelling through food and beverage.”

“There’s been such an evolution over the years from providing traditional theme park food to more immersive food,” Bond said. “And that’s what this is.”

Perhaps the best example in Wizarding World is the famous Butterbeer. Executive chef Steve Jayson said that when the team started formulating the recipe, it “was just words on a page. We took that and tried to bring it to life.”

The team wanted a drink everyone could enjoy, so that eliminated alcohol. But they also wanted it to look like beer, with an amber base and a foamy top. They settled on an amber-colored base soda with flavors reminiscent of shortbread and butterscotch, with a creamy, buttery foam on top. 

Buttery soda doesn’t sound too appealing, but the result was actually very tasty. It’s sweet, creamy and just plain fun to drink (and a Butterbeer mustache is guaranteed if you’re drinking it the right way, Florell said, which proved true for me).

Butterbeer is Jayson’s favorite item on the menu at the Wizarding World. He worked to create it, then flew the prototype to Edinburgh, Scotland, so Potter author J.K. Rowling could give it her personal stamp of approval.

Jayson recalled that Rowling “was very, very, very pleased and happy and said, ‘I don’t really know what I thought it would’ve tasted like, but I think this would be it.’”

The drink’s universal appeal can’t be denied. For proof, just search #butterbeer on Instagram. 

For another example, check out any #bluemilk or #greenmilk posts, which very likely originated down the road from Universal at Walt Disney World Resort or at Disneyland in California.

Disney brought to life the iconic blue milk and green milk from the “Star Wars” franchise at its Galaxy’s Edge lands, now open at Disneyland and Disney World’s Hollywood Studios. 

I tried both on a hot July day in Disneyland. I was initially put off by the idea of imbibing anything labeled “milk” on an 80-plus-degree day, but I was pleasantly surprised. Neither of the milks actually contain any dairy. Instead, they’re frozen concoctions made with coconut and rice milk that are lightly sweet and surprisingly refreshing.

Blue milk has a fruity taste, while green milk — more polarizing among those who have sampled both — has floral notes. I liked both, but I think I’d place myself firmly in the camp of the blue milk fans. My traveling companions agreed. I guess we’re traditionalists: Green milk didn’t appear until one of the most recent “Star Wars” films, while blue milk appeared in the first, 1977’s “A New Hope.”

Theme parks are in the midst of a shift to creating lands that immerse visitors in different worlds, and themed food and beverage just deepens that illusion. At both Wizarding World and Galaxy’s Edge, I often forgot I was in the middle of massive tourist meccas, and eating something other than typical “theme park food,” such as burgers and fries, only adds to that. That is, after all, exactly what the parks are going for.

“I think people have arrived in the fiction themselves,” Universal’s Florell told me, “and there’s not anything else that interferes with it until you leave.”