Sunday, March 25, 2012


Orlando, FL - Three Broomsticks, Wizarding World of Harry Potter; The four stars may be inflated due to the excitement of it being Harry Potter'ish and being able to sit in the Three Broomsticks to eat and drink butterbeer.  The full breakdown is:

Decor: 5 stars
Amusement Park Food: 3 stars
English Pub Food: 2 stars
Butterbeer: 5 stars

The decor fits perfectly the setting for a large English pub and certainly for Harry Potter's Three Broomsticks.  Walking up, you can tell the building looks slightly angled and crooked, almost magical. Inside resembles a traditional English pub, but much larger. They have to accommodate thousands of people each day, so you can imagine inside it's like an extremely large dining hall.  However, with the wooden look and pub colors inside, you still feel like you're in a pub. Making it more exciting is the magical, Harry Potter, experiences you'll find inside. Occasionally, you'll see something on a bookshelf move or see an owl's shadow fly by. When you're inside, make sure you keep looking around and your imagination ready.

If it were an English pub not involved with Harry Potter, I would probably give it 2 stars, but it being compared to amusement park food, it improves to 3. They have menu items typically not at amusement parks include shepherds pie and turkey drumsticks. My turkey drumstick was extremely salty. I really couldn't eat the whole thing. The fish and chips were ok, but nothing really good compared to a good English pub. Now take it in comparison to other amusement park food, the stars go up. You'll rarely find shepherds pie at the amusement park and since you can't compare it to others, it would be decent.  However, I heard the actual English couple sitting next to me make a comment, "Is this suppose to be Shepherds Pie?"  Not knowing who they are, but from their English accents, I found it comical they made the comment, giving me a little insight.

Oh my goodness, the butterbeer! It really is worth getting multiple glasses of it. When you walk out, you'll want to turn around and walk back in for another glass. They offer two types, frozen and regular. I tried both and found the regular to be more flavorful.  The frozen is good, but it doesn't have the complete rich flavor and some of it is lost in the ice crystals. Either which way you go, you can't go wrong. They serve it both inside Three Broomsticks and outside on the street. It's a cream soda style drink with butterscotch flavoring in the soda and topped with butterscotch cream. DON'T DRINK IT IMMEDIATELY, LET IT STAND FOR A MINUTE OR TWO. It becomes a magical drink. If you let it sit the carbonation forces the butterscotch cream to begin boiling up and becomes alive. It's really neat to watch. Now that you've watched it, tear into it, drink up. It's so delicious. After having two, frozen and regular, went walking around, then came back for more, that good.  FYI...It's non alcoholic for those that are wondering.

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