Just around the corner, Universal will be debuting it’s ALL NEW event, Universal Fan Fest Nights. Making this the only other after hours event at the park, the other being Halloween Horror Nights. With this, comes a lot of excitement and anticipation. Guests are going to be stepping into the worlds of Star Trek, Back to the Future, Dungeons & Dragons, One Piece, and Jujutsu Kaisen as well as The Wizarding World of Harry Potter™ and SUPER NINTENDO WORLD™. Universal is calling this …”an event with the fandoms you love in one place, every event night.” Universal Fan Fest Nights are taking place Select Nights April 25th–May 18th, 2025!

CHECK OUT TICKET OPTIONS HERE!

In addition to the many immersive and one-of-a-kind experience, are themed food and merchandise! We were some of the lucky few to be invited out to Universal Studios Hollywood to try out some of the themed food, drinks and check out the exclusive merchandise.

THE FOOD

There are plenty of food items to choose from at Universal Fan Fest Nights. Each particular fandom has it’s own vast array of delicious treats. The spread was rather impressive and caught us off guard. I don’t think we’ve seen a spread of food this big at Universal Studios Hollywood for any other event. They are really going big on the themed food offerings.

Now we didn’t get to eat everything, but we tried A LOT of items. These are the scores for them and our thoughts.

KLINGON TARG LEGS 8/10 – Charsui honey pork wings served with kimchi fried rice

Honestly, I wasn’t sure what to expect with these. But I was pleasantly surprised by a slightly sweet and savory flavor. The meat was extremely tender and was falling off the bone. The rice wasn’t anything special, but it’s also not the star of the show.

VULCAN FRITTERS 6/10 – Fried mushroom fritters served with hummus and dusted with a Redspice Vulcan logo.

These were pretty tasty, although my only issue is that I couldn’t pinpoint what type of meat or non-meat they were at the time! Now finding out these were mushroom fritters is shocking, as I’m not a fan of mushrooms at all! But I ended up liking these ones. Then the hummus was next level in our opinion.

TRAVELER’S RATIONS 8/10

I know what you’re thinking, 8/10 for just charcuterie? We are big fans of a good charcuterie board and this was well above average in our eyes. A nice variety of cheeses, meats, and the honeycomb was a nice touch as well for sweetness.

FRANKY’S COLA BARBACOA 10/10 – Shredded beef tacos topped with pickled onion, jalapeno and cilantro served with a side of tortilla chips

These tacos were one of the stand out food items for us. Bursting with flavor, a slight kick from fresh jalapeños, sweetness from pineapple, and some tang from the pickled onions. This is 100% something we would get again!

LUFFY’S MEAT ON A BONE 9/10 – Braised ribs topped with mole, sesame seeds and cilantro

Another stand out item here. These ribs were extremely flavorful and really tender. We are massive fans of mole, so it’s not a shock that these were a winner for us. Although mole can be hit or miss for plenty of people.

DEVIL FRUIT CONCHA 6/10 – Sweet bread roll with ginger pineapple filling

We eat pan dulce quiet often in our home, so we had some high standards for this concha. And while it was good, it failed to live up to our expectations. It’s a fairly standard concha with some fruit filling, which we found pretty good. It just needed more of it. If you don’t eat pan dulce as much as we do, then you’ll probably love this one.

HOGWARTS CORNISH PASTY 8/10 – Potato and pea Cornish pasty with chutney

Another highlight here! Not only from taste, but also from variety. The pasty itself was filled with flavorful potato/pea filling and the crust was buttery and flaky. What I love about this food is that your side sauce is based on what Hogwarts House you choose! The flavor options are: Blueberry, Mango, Red Pepper, and Mint/Cilantro. Obviously, based on the colors, you can guess which sauce goes to which house!

TOAD IN A HOLE 10/10 – Vegan Yorkshire pudding with plant-based sausage, served with roasted vegetables, potato puree and onion gravy

Yet another standout food option and again within the Harry Potter foods too. This Toad in a Hole is a traditional British dish consisting of sausages in Yorkshire pudding batter, usually served with onion gravy and vegetables. This had my jaw on the floor! It was so damn good. Mine was so small at the tasting that I need to get the full sized one when we visit the event! And we didn’t realize till we were writing this article that the sausage was plant-based. We are even more impressed with this dish now, as we don’t often eat plant-based meats.

CURRY CHICKEN 7/10 – Served with steamed rice, charred red onion and yogurt drizzle

Next up, we have the Curry Chicken! This was a pretty standard curry chicken in our eyes. We spoke to someone else that ate this and they found it incredibly spicy. We didn’t find it spicy at all honestly, but we eat spicy food every day and have a high tolerance. So if you’re spice tolerance is low, beware of this one.

BAJORAN HASPERAT 6/10 – Slow-cooked spicy pork, gochujang, pickled vegetables with sriracha mayonnaise

This one didn’t hit for us. There was too much tortilla and not enough filling. While the filling was tasty, it was hard to taste it over the sauce and tortilla.

HOGWARTS HOUSE CUP TRIFLE 5/10 – Pineapple, kiwi, strawberries and blueberries layered with a vanilla orange sponge cake and vanilla bean pastry cream

I think we aren’t massive fans of trifles, because every time we have one at ANY theme park, it ends up at the bottom of our list. But what I will say, is that I love the fresh fruit representing the different Hogwarts houses. Any dessert that incorporates fresh fruit is good in our minds. It offsets the sweetness of the cream with it’s tartness.

OUTTATIME COOKIE 3/10 – Chocolate malt cookie with crunchy pieces and chocolate pieces and garnished with edible flame colored icing

We loved the way this cookie looked, but we were so disappointed. We found the overly crunchy texture to be off putting and it lacked any particular flavor for us! This was one of the more highly anticipated items for us too, which might contribute to the lower score. But I do think people will clamor over this, simply from a dorky perspective.

KANAR 9/10

This was one of two drinks we had, it consists of a popular Cardassian liquor made with aged rum, pomegranate juice, black cherry syrup, lemon juice and soda water and garnished with a black cherry fruit gummy candy. There are a lot of sweeter things mixed into this drink. But surprisingly the tartness from the black cherry syrup and the strength of the alcohol really balanced this drink out for us. This was delicious.

TEA, EARL GRAY, COLD 6/10

Another Star Trek drink, this one is a twist on Captain Picard’s favorite available both cold and hot, features bourbon, Earl Grey tea, honey syrup and lemon juice and garnished with a dehydrated lemon slice. We found this one good, it just was too sweet for our pallets. We typically don’t like our drinks overly sweet and we thought this drink needed a bit more lemon to offset the sweetness.

The food for this event was pretty spectacular. We really enjoyed many of the items we had over the night. For many guests visiting after hours events, the food has to be stellar. As it’s a massive part of the experience. And if this food is any indication, Universal is clearing putting a lot of hard work into the offerings to make it stand out from the rest of the food at the park. And we think they are succeeding. We are very excited to see what people think of these unique offerings during the event.

THE MERCHANDISE

I think anyone who is remotely interested in the fandoms coming to Universal Fan Fest Nights is going to find something to take home. There are some really cute and fun choices for those looking to either wear their fandom or simply take home a mug.

The only thing we wished there was more of, was the official event merchandise. The shirt and hat are fairly basic and I was hoping for variations of the Universal Fan Fest Nights logo with some more adventurous designs. I feel like it was a missed opportunity to create event shirts based on the different fandoms that are coming to the park. Imagine a Delorean with a license plate that says “UNI FFN” or even in the iconic Back to the Future font. Maybe there’ll be more at the event, that weren’t ready for the preview!? We’ll hold out hope on this one.

Outside of the typical Universal event shirt and hat, you’ll find some fun options for the different fandoms. Some of our favorites were the “Save the Clock Tower Fund” mug, the Mimic monster plush, and the stunning Yoshi jacket!

Overall, I think the food and merchandise for Universal Fan Fest Nights are getting us even more excited for this all new event. Universal Studios Hollywood has needed an additional after hours event for so long. Now that we are on the cusp of having it come to life, it’s quickly becoming one of our more highly anticipated events of the year. To be honest, there is a lot of high expectations with this event. And this food and merch is setting fantastic groundwork for another fan favorite experience at the park.

Universal Fan Fest Nights Select Nights April 25th–May 18th, 2025. To learn more about the event or to purchase tickets, CLICK HERE