Citrus swirl co*cktail recipe inspired by Disney (2024)

April 12, 2021 by Becky 6 Comments

How I created my very own citrus swirl co*cktail recipe, inspired by Disney’s beloved frozen treat in Adventureland at Sunshine Tree Terrace!

If I could have any treat on my birthday it would be a citrus swirl. I have yet to actually spend my birthday in Disney World, but someday I will – and on that day you can be sure I will be at Sunshine Tree Terrace enjoying a citrus swirl. While that may not be the case on my birthday today I am finding other ways to enjoy my favorite Disney treat at home. And what better way to enjoy the flavors of a citrus swirl than by adding a little booze with this citrus swirl co*cktail recipe?

The citrus swirl is one item that Disney has not yet added alcohol, due to the fact that it’s only available in the Magic Kingdom and they only serve alcohol at sit-down restaurants there (for now). The dole whip has gotten a number of alcoholic versions, including adding coconut rum, spiced rum, or enjoying it as a dole whip mimosa. While the citrus swirl has been combined with other things in the past, including orange soda, an alcoholic version is one I had to tackle on my own!

My friend Kristin actually asked me if I’d come up with one yet a few months ago and it was quite literally on my list of things I wanted to do for the blog. So a few weeks ago I picked up a bunch of ingredients to experiment with and got to work.

And experiment I did – I probably created 5 different versions of a citrus swirl co*cktail before I decided this one was my favorite. I could definitely do a thicker version of this using ice cream but I wanted more of a liquid co*cktail than a frozen one. And then there was playing around with presenting it and making it look pretty!

I actually played around with trying to do a layered co*cktail so it would look more like a swirl. I’ve made layered co*cktails before and they can be quite beautiful but I wasn’t happy with any of the attempts I made here.

This was a lot of fun because I was really experimenting and coming up with a recipe from scratch rather than trying to recreate something from the parks. There were a few things I considered while making this co*cktail:

• Figuring out the best way to include both vanilla and orange flavor – I used vanilla vodka for the vanilla element and orange juice for the orange flavor, with a little Grand Marnier.
• If you’ve had a citrus swirl before you know the orange portion is much more of a tart orange than sweet, so I wanted to try and get some of that element in there. That’s where the frozen orange juice concentrate comes in. It has much more of the “sour” orange flavor to give it that little kick.
• I wasn’t sure if the heavy cream would blend well with the other ingredients but ultimately it wasn’t a problem, and it adds a little more creaminess to the drink to remind you of vanilla ice cream.
• The whipped cream is optional but since it’s a co*cktail based on a swirled ice cream I thought it added a fun visual element!

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• Margarita recipes from La Cava del Tequila!

• Moroccan sangria recipe from Epcot

Have you tried the citrus swirl ice cream in Disney World? Do you think you’d enjoy this citrus swirl co*cktail recipe?