New Magic Kingdom Ice Cream & Snacks

Walt Disney World has released another wave of cool snacks and character-themed ice cream at Magic Kingdom, further stepping up the park’s game in terms of fun treats and good uses of Disney Dining Plan snack credits. In this post, we’ll take a look at the new items, plus where they rank in the landscape of desserts and snacks at Magic Kingdom.

Think of this post as a ‘sequel’ to our Best Magic Kingdom Snacks & Desserts post from last fall. All of those items are still around, and that should really be where you start when formulating a plan of attack to “conquer” the best savory treats and decadent desserts in Magic Kingdom. Once you’ve “done” all of the classic Magic Kingdom desserts, consider the brand new items in this post.

As we’ve said previously, snack options at Magic Kingdom can be short-lived. If these items don’t sell well or are too time-consuming to prepare, don’t be surprised if they’re gone before your visit. While some Magic Kingdom menu items have been around for a decade-plus, other things come and go within a span of months. If you’re planning a Walt Disney World trip for the 50th Anniversary, it’s way too early to budgeting your Disney Dining Plan snack credits. Some menus will change a ton between now and then.

In terms of new food items in Magic Kingdom, we’ll begin with a trio of character-themed ice cream cones that are literally brand new, having debuted yesterday.

Of all the new novelty ice cream, I was most excited for the Hei Hei Cone. Not because I expected it to be anything good, but because I was envious of Disneyland Paris, which got this little gem earlier this year:

It should go without saying that this cookie, which is Yoda in case you can’t tell, is an unmitigated disaster–a kindergarten art project gone horribly wrong. It also brings me immense joy, and a bigger smile to my face than just about anything Disney has done this year.

It takes some doing to fail this hard. Also worth pointing out is that the above is a stock photo, which means this is as good as it gets in terms of how this cookie will ever look. However, since it’s not something substantive like a ride or hotel, it’s terribleness is no big deal.

Suffice to say, my expectations were equally high (low?) for the Hei Hei Cone.

Available at Aloha Isle, the Hei Hei Cone features a blue sugar cone topped with raspberry soft-serve, pineapple Dole Whip, sugar eyes, and sour candy.

It doesn’t look good, and that eye staring into my soul while I ate the ice cream will forever haunt me. Nevertheless, it falls short of the high (low?) bar of the infamous Yoda cookie as there’s nothing really endearing or humorous about this. In part, I think this is because the actual Hei Hei character looks goofy, whereas Yoda is a solemn character with gravitas. Either way, this cone is fun. Plus, I’m sure if you waited for Hei Hei to melt a bit, you could get some gloriously grotesque photos.

Taste-wise, the Hei Hei Cone works. There’s a mild contrast between the sweet and sour of the flavors, but you’re mostly consuming them separately. The sugar eyes and candy add literally nothing to the mix, so order this based upon your thoughts about the ice cream flavors.

Next, we cross Magic Kingdom to Tomorrowland and Auntie Gravity’s Galactic Goodies. The “Adventure is Out There” Cone is available there (for some reason), and is a blue sugar cone topped with mango soft-serve and a candy balloon piece.

The mango soft serve is excellent, and instantly becomes my second favorite Dole Whip style treat in Magic Kingdom. The candy balloon piece adds exactly nothing to the ice cream, and if you wait too long to remove it, the white chocolate balloon will float its way to the ground as the ice cream melts. I hope a future version of this cone is available ice cream-only.

Finally, we head to Storybook Treats in Fantasyland for the Lost Princess Cone. This is a relatively straightforward purple cone topped with lemon soft-serve and edible flowers.

Classy and photogenic, this is exactly what you’d expect. It was Sarah’s favorite of the trio, and I also liked it–but with the Peter Pan Float also available here, I have a tough time recommending this if you’re only choosing one of the two.

Ultimately, these cones serve two purposes: pretty props for the hordes of Instagrammers who roam from wall to wall in Magic Kingdom, and an expansion in the range of Dole Whip-esque soft serve flavors available in the park.

I’m not sure how well any of these ice cream cones succeed from the first perspective, and I don’t really care. From the latter perspective, they’re great. The tropical flavors of each are refreshing and don’t taste overly artificial, which is a big win.

The pineapple Dole Whip has been a venerable staple of Magic Kingdom snacking for years, and it’s nice to see that success expanded upon with other flavors of equal quality.

For me, the Peter Pan Float still reigns supreme, but that’s largely a matter of flavor preference. In any case, variety is the spice of life.

Moving on from ice cream to other stuff, we head to Liberty Square Market to try the Frog Prince Whoopie Pie. This is apparently a limited time only thing, but we’ll see if it sticks around.

This is a cinnamon whoopie pie, graham cracker icing, sprinkles, and a chocolate frog. I was expecting a glorified Little Debbie Oatmeal Creme Pie here, but it’s actually quite good. The graham cracker flavor is fantastic, and not overpowered by the cinnamon.

Continuing in Liberty Square, we make a stop at Sleepy Hollow for a couple of items.

First up is the Foot-Long Corn Dog, which is probably not a snack for most people…but it’s also not a foot-long. On the plus side, this tasted freshly-battered and was the best corn dog I’ve had at Magic Kingdom. We’re talking quality approaching Little Red Wagon (Disneyland) quality here.

Finally, the Vanilla Ice Cream Churro Sandwich, which was also fantastic. The churro was warm and fresh, the pinnacle of what a churro should be. The ice cream was standard issue, but softened perfectly with the warm churro. (This is something you’ll want to eat fast.)

This is a pretty glowing endorsement of both items at Sleepy Hollow, but with it I want to offer a hard caveat: I think we might’ve gotten lucky. Over the past year or so, our ‘results’ at Sleepy Hollow have been very hit or miss. Sometimes, things are fresh and perfect. Other times, it tastes like what we’ve ordered was prepared a few days ago and has been sitting around since.

I don’t know what’s going on with Sleepy Hollow, but this is a problem we’ve had more generally with Walt Disney World churros, as well. Combine Sleepy Hollow and churros, and this ice cream sandwich is something I could see being very inconsistent. We loved the one we had this time, but I wouldn’t expect it to be consistently fresh.

Overall, we continue to be pleased with Magic Kingdom’s efforts to up its snack game. While this very well might be driven by Instagram crazes, we’re thankful that the end result is a flurry of desserts that taste as good as they look. Now, Walt Disney World just needs to work on the counter service menus here, as recent improvements at Disney’s Hollywood Studios have caused Magic Kingdom to slip into fourth place on that front…

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YOUR THOUGHTS

What are your favorite snacks in Magic Kingdom? Do the new character-themed ice cream cones appeal to you, or do you think they’re a lame gimmick? Any questions we can help you answer? Hearing your feedback–even when you disagree with us–is both interesting to us and helpful to other readers, so please share your thoughts below in the comments!