Orange Julius (Copycat) tastes just like the creamy mall food court drink. Made easily at home and perfect to enjoy on a hot day. Try it now!
This Orange Julius recipe is the perfect refreshing Drink to enjoy on a hot summer day. Similar to smoothies like Tropical Smoothie and Strawberry Banana Smoothie, this fruit beverage is sure to help keep you cool all summer!
Sabrina’s Orange Julius (Copycat) Recipe
For most people, this orange, creamy drink just takes you right back to when you were a kid hanging out at the mall. After a back-to-school shopping trip, there was nothing quite as good as mall food court favorites like a Gooey Cinnabon or a Chilled Orange Julius.
Recipe Card
Ingredients
- 1 1/2 cups whole milk
- 1/2 cup heavy cream
- 6 ounces frozen orange juice concentrate
- 2 tablespoons sugar
- 1/4 teaspoon vanilla extract
- 1 1/2 cups ice
- 4 slices orange
Instructions
- Add milk, orange juice concentrate, sugar and vanilla to a high speed blender and blend for 20 seconds.
- Add the ice and blend until smooth, another 30 seconds.
- Pour the drinks and garnish with one orange slice, then serve.
Nutrition
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Sabrina Tips
This homemade smoothie drink is perfect to enjoy as an afternoon pick-me-up or as a sweet treat after dinner. If you want enough to serve a larger group, simply double the ingredients to make enough for everyone. The recipe is so quick that you can easily blend a few batches if you need to.
Table of contents
About this Recipe
This copycat recipe is just as smooth and flavorful as the original frothy smoothie. Plus, you can make the refreshing treat in just a few minutes. Simply combine a few basic ingredients, such as milk, heavy cream, sugar, ice, and orange juice concentrate, in your blender. Then combine it into the simple copycat recipe. It’s delicious and way less work than going to the mall for your smoothie fix.
Ingredients
- Milk and Cream: For the base liquid ingredients in the Orange Julius Copycat, use whole milk and heavy cream. It’s important to use heavy cream along with the whole milk because its higher milkfat content makes a velvety, more creamy beverage.
- Orange Juice: To give the drink its iconic orange flavor, use frozen concentrate. The concentrate is better than using regular orange juice because it won’t make the mixture too runny. Plus, it’s the perfect secret ingredient to give it the right amount of fruity taste since the flavor is so condensed.
- Ice: To make the drink frosty cold, and to thicken it up, add in some ice. You can use small cubes, or crushed ice so that it can easily blend into the liquid ingredients. You want the finished mixture soft enough to drink through a straw.
Can this be made ahead of time?
While Orange Julius is best served made fresh due to the mix of refrigerated and frozen ingredients, you could make it ahead of time if you really needed to. One way to make sure your drink is cold and frothy the next day would be to mix all the ingredients together except the ice. Then store it in the refrigerator overnight. The next day, take it out of the fridge and add the ice, then blend it and serve it to your happy friends, family, or guests.
How to Store
- Serve: This recipe definitely tastes best served fresh. That way it’s still perfectly chilled and creamy.
- Store: If you have any leftovers, you can store the drink in an airtight container in the fridge for 1-2 days.
- Freeze: You can also freeze for up to 3 months. Let it thaw in the fridge, and then put the ingredients back in the blender to remix them before serving.
Frequent Questions
You will find the texture to be the main difference between an Orange Julius and a shake. Shakes use ice cream to make the drink nice and thick. An Orange Julius is not nearly as thick, but it is still a sweet and creamy drink that could serve as a refreshing snack or a sweet treat after a meal.
Orange Julius was created at an orange juice stand run by a man named Julius. Rumor has it that the drink got its name because the drink became very popular and customers would order at the counter, “Give me an Orange, Julius!” The name apparently stuck!
Variations
- Pineapple Orange Julius: One of the great things about this recipe is that you can add a variety of different fruit flavors to the original recipe. Instead of just using orange juice concentrate, you can use half orange juice and half pineapple juice concentrate. Then blend the Pineapple Orange Julius as usual to finish the recipe.
- Fruit: For more fruit options, you could also add frozen fruit to the blender. Try adding in frozen strawberries, blueberries, raspberries, or frozen bananas at the same time you add the ice cubes to the mix. Then blend until smooth.
- Thicker Drink: In order to thicken your drink to be more like a shake, you can add a couple scoops of ice cream to the drink. Other options would be to add frozen yogurt, or a frozen banana to thicken it and add some extra flavor.
- Healthy Orange Julius Copycat: When you make a copycat version of your favorite restaurant recipes, you can swap out any of the ingredients you want in order to meet your dietary restrictions or goals. To make a Healthy Orange Julius Copycat, you can exchange the heavy cream and whole milk with almond milk or coconut milk.
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Photos used in previous version of this post
When do you add the cream? It is listed in the ingredients, but not in the recipe!
The cream should go in during step 1 along with the milk. Thank you for catching it that it was missing from the recipe card. It has been updated.
the recipe for the Orange Julius says add chilled water in a couple places, but lists no amount or water of any kind except for ice on the actual recipe. how much water do you use?
Sorry for the confusion Nick. No water added, just ice added to the blender to thicken. I have this on the list to correct. Thanks for bringing it to my attention. Hope you try the recipe and enjoy your “chilled” Orange Julius!
Hi! The ingredient list says Heavy Cream but the instructions say ice water – could you please clarify? Thanks!
Sorry for the typo. There is no ice water, just ice added to the blender to thicken. I corrected the recipe card! Thank you Kathy for bringing this to our attention!