Thanks again to Leigh Caldwell of Theme Park Mom for this great review of the new beverage bar at Orlando’s Downtown Disney Pollo Campero.

The beverage bar can be accessed from both outside and inside the restaurant

A new bar has opened at Downtown Disney as part of the renovations at the former McDonald’s on the edge of the Marketplace area.

It offers beverage menus from both Pollo Campero, a chicken restaurant with Latin flair, and Fresh A-peel, which brings some new healthy counter service choices to Downtown Disney.

Beverage Bar Menus -- click for larger image

The beverage bar concept confused me when I initially walked into Pollo Campero. I had heard that there were Latin soft drinks available, and I guess I expected to find Latin sodas over at the drink dispensers where you would get a Coke, but there was only the usual Coke, Diet Coke, Sprite, etc., there. I didn’t notice the bar until after we had bought our regular soft drinks, but I quickly resolved that we would check it out after eating our food.

Beverage Bar Drink Dispensers

The bar has counters both inside and outside of the restaurant. There’s a nice outdoor seating area around the bar, too. There are beverage bar menus for both Pollo Campero and Fresh A-peel.

Pollo Campero offers bottled beer, coffee and three Latin soft drinks:
Horchata – a cinnamon flavored drink made with rice
Jamaica – a red hibiscus drink
Mango – made with mango, of course

The Fresh A-peel beverage bar menu includes “zero-calorie” sweet tea, lemonade or an “Arnold Palmer” mixture of the two; fruit smoothies; vanilla frozen yogurt; and watermelon sangria.

We tried the Horchata and the Jamaica. I love horchata, and this was a good version of it – creamy with plenty of cinnamon flavor, like drinking rice pudding. The Jamaica was crisp and refreshing in the heat. It’s bright red, but it’s not a sweet fruit punch, which the guests at the table next to me were expecting.

Horchata and Jamaica

The watermelon sangria sounded very interesting. I was driving on this visit, so I couldn’t try it, but believe me, watermelon sangria, I am coming back for you soon.