A really fun addition to any theme park day is pairing up your visit during a festival. Along with normal theme park fun, festivals usually feature concerts and decorations but they all include tasty and unique food and drinks. Epcot has some heavy-hitters when it comes to festivals, and they’re the most well-known, but SeaWorld Orlando shouldn’t be overlooked.

The SeaWorld Orlando Craft Beer Festival is one of our favorite SeaWorld festivals because it promotes local Florida-based breweries along with the rest of the offerings. The Craft Beer Festival at Seaworld Orlando runs Fridays through Sundays during August and September, is a really fun, low-key festival that’s perfect for beer lovers.

The Lanyard

The easiest way to navigate the Craft Beer Festival is by pre-purchasing a sampling lanyard. You can buy the food and drinks a la carte, but because the lanyards come in different numbers of punches you’ll end up saving money regardless of which sampling lanyard you choose. 

Not only do lanyards end up saving you a lot of money, but it makes the booth interaction easier too. You don’t have to rustle through your bag to find your wallet to pay, you simply scan your lanyard’s barcode and the Ambassador punches the lanyard so you can keep track of how many tastings you have left. This also helps to limit the points of contact as well.

Tip for 2020 – Grabbed a lanyard for the 2020 Seven Seas Food Festival? Because the event was sadly cut short due to Covid-19, you’re able to use any unused punches at the 2020 Craft Beer Festival. 

Craft Beer

We love supporting local, so it’s great to see SeaWorld Orlando bringing in Florida-based breweries into the more than 100+ craft brew offerings next to the big hitters. The nice part about the sample sizes is you can try out new beers without the pressure of hoping you like the beer enough to drink an entire cup.

And while craft beer is the star of the show, if you aren’t a huge beer drinker you don’t have to worry — there’s still plenty of options available. Each booth has several beer options, but every booth also offers wine and a specialty mixed drink you can get with or without alcohol.

Food

While the festival may be centered around brews, the food shouldn’t be overlooked. There are nine booths with food ranging from chicken wings and sliders to tacos and dessert.

Here are our top three food items in no particular order:

Mojo Roasted Heritage Pork Waffle Potato Nachos

Waffle fries as the base for nachos was the first indicator this was going to be a great dish. The pork was cooked well, but the toppings were awesome. The avocado creme and cojita cheese and pickled onions were so good. You get a pretty generous portion, so this is a great one to share.

Yuengling Golden Pilsner Cured Chicken Wings

This was one of Tyler’s favorites from the Craft Beer Festival. The serving comes with three wings – ours were all flats. The sauce the wings are bathed in is delicious and, of course, beer-infused. They were peppery, but not overly hot, and had a fantastic flavor to them. It may be strange to recommend something as basic as chicken wings, but these aren’t to be missed.

Hot Chicken Slider

We are big lovers of Nashville Hot Chicken (hello, Eat Chicken Fire – if you don’t know about them, look them up!). This slider packs a punch with the heat, but it’s not too overwhelming. It was also topped with some really great fruit salsa that brought down the heat level a bit.

The Verdict on SeaWorld Orlando’s Craft Beer Festival

This festival sometimes gets overlooked but makes for a really nice addition to your visit to SeaWorld Orlando. It’s a smaller festival than its counterparts at Disney and doesn’t feature the concerts or fireworks of some of SeaWorld’s other festivals, but don’t let that fool you. There are some really great food offerings as well as plenty of unique and flavorful drinks. Plus, the lanyard system is a really great way to manage what you’re eating and drinking while saving time and money.