DQ’s New ‘Swicy’ Menu Had Us Dipping Chicken Strips Into Soft Serve—And We Liked It

Have you ever dipped your chicken strips in vanilla ice cream?

Neither have I. In fact, it never occurred to me to violate what feels like an invisible boundary between my main course and dessert—but Dairy Queen is giving people like you and me permission to travel freely between the boundaries of sweet and spicy with its new “Swicy” selection.

The menu, which launched this spring, consists of a spicy chicken strip basket that includes fries (naturally) and a small cup-sized serving of vanilla soft serve for dipping.

The Flamethrower Chicken Strip Basket delivers a not-insubstantial degree of spice for a basket of four chicken strips. I took a few bites of the strips on their own before I ventured to take my first dip; the heat was immediate and lingering.

This surprising heat factor necessitated the dip option. And the vanilla soft serve itself did not disappoint. It was cold, not-too-sweet, and leagues more appealing to my palate than any one of the standard-fare packets of sweet sauces that usually act as a side dip for chicken strips.

Could the strips have been a little more tender and the coating a tad more crisp? Yes, on both counts. But do these kinds of considerations fall by the wayside when you plunge them into soft serve? Also, yes. I was not angry at this combo! (But while soft serve and chicken fingers go together surprisingly well, we draw the line at ketchup on poutine.)

Moving on to DQ’s two new “Swicy” drinks: the Pineapple Lemonade Cooler with Tajin and a sparkling variation, the Pineapple Lemonade Sparkler. Both drinks get "Swicy" billing for the addition of Tajin spice mix (a mix of chili, lime and salt).

The frozen pineapple lemonade is as thick as milkshake (it's a mix of soft-serve, lemonade, pineapple and slushie) and when paired with the spice mix, it’s pretty tasty. But while the Tajin topping is nice, the overall flavour of the drink leans more to sweet than spiced.

I’m not a fan of super-sweet drinks and preferred the Pineapple Lemonade Sparkler, which is more on the savoury side. After all that soft serve, I appreciated that this sparkler had some umami and a bit of punchy carbonation.

The whole shebang is just under $20—which is a pretty sweet price point, too.