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THE MOST TRUSTED COPYCAT RECIPES
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I'm Todd Wilbur, Chronic Food Hacker

For over 30 years I've been deconstructing America's most iconic brand-name
foods to make the best original copycat recipes for you to use at home. Welcome
to my lab.

Read more



THIS WEEK'S BIG SECRETS


THIS WEEK'S BIG SECRETS

 * Not rated yet
   
   MARIE CALLENDER'S FRESH STRAWBERRY PIE
   
   Every March through November, Marie Callender’s sells fresh strawberry pies
   made with the chain’s signature flakey crust piled high with whole
   strawberries tossed in a sweet glaze and finished with a crown of whipped
   cream.
   
   The pies are made-to-order to ensure the freshness of the berries, but the
   glaze that’s added to the beautiful berries tastes like the everyday goopy
   red stuff found in grocery store produce sections that’s usually made with
   corn syrup and other crud, and no natural fruit. For my Marie Callender’s
   Fresh Strawberry Pie copycat recipe, I set out to improve the glaze by making
   it with real strawberry puree, hoping to get a tastier finished product.
   Thankfully, it worked out. The new glaze was vibrant and fruity; it
   transformed into a nice gel and didn’t upstage the strawberries. This small
   change makes a strawberry pie that’s even better than the original.
   
   I designed the glaze to use frozen strawberries, so it’s quick and easy, and
   I’m also including scratch recipes here for the whipped cream and pie crust.
   You can buy each of these pre-made to speed up your build, but taking a
   little time to make the whipped cream and/or crust from scratch will
   absolutely be worth the extra effort. Also, I slightly tweaked my previous
   Marie Callender’s pastry formula to make it more closely match the current
   pie crust served at the chain.
   
   Try my Marie Callender's Fresh Strawberry Pie copycat recipe below, and find
   more of my Marie Callender's pie recipes here.
   
   Read more
 * Score: 5.00 (votes: 2)
   
   AMERICAN CONEY ISLAND CHILI DOGS (DETROIT CONEY ISLAND SAUCE)
   
   Over a century ago, Detroit, Michigan became the Coney Island chili dog
   capital of the world, even though Coney Island is nowhere near there. Greek
   immigrants who entered the U.S. through Ellis Island adapted a recipe for the
   hot dogs they ate while visiting Coney Island, New York, on their way to the
   Midwest. When they settled in southern Michigan, many opened restaurants to
   sell their clones of the food they ate when they first got to America,
   turning New York-style Coney Dogs into a Midwest phenomenon.
   
   Two of the most famous Coney Island restaurants in Detroit are Lafayette
   Coney Island and its next-door neighbor, American Coney Island. The two
   buildings were originally one building with a single restaurant inside, built
   by brothers Gus and Bill Keros in 1915. But somewhere along the way the
   brothers had a falling out and split the restaurant in half, right down the
   middle, and it stayed that way. Today, the two Coney Island restaurants are
   under different ownership, but they still remain next-door rivals.
   
   I decided the best Coney dog to hack is from American Coney Island, not only
   because of the restaurant’s deep history, but also because I was able to
   order the chili dogs shipped to my house in a kit. That’s always good news,
   since shipped foods must list ingredients, and I get to see exactly what’s in
   the chili. Built the traditional way, a typical Detroit Coney Island chili
   dog features a natural-casing hot dog in a soft white bun, smothered in chili
   sauce, drizzled with mustard, and topped with a pile of diced sweet onion.
   The kit came with everything I needed, including the tub of chili with
   clearly-labeled ingredients that I was counting on.
   
   With the help of that information, I was able to create my American Coney
   Island Chili sauce copycat recipe. A thick, flavorful chili sauce that you
   can use on your favorite hot dogs to build a clone of the famous Detroit
   chili dogs. Crushed soda crackers thicken the chili, and extra beef fat adds
   a smooth quality that mimics the famous 100-year-old American Coney Island
   chili recipe.
   
   The chili must simmer for four hours to properly tenderize the meat, so plan
   your Coney dog cloning adventure accordingly.
   
   Try making your other favorite condiments at home, like ketchup or mustard,
   with my copycat recipes here. 
   
   Read more
 * Score: 5.00 (votes: 1)
   
   DOMINO'S CHEESEBURGER PIZZA
   
   Domino’s new specialty pizza with seasoned ground beef, onions, tomatoes, and
   three kinds of cheese will shock your mouth. Even though this pie is more
   cheese than burger, the secret ketchup-mustard sauce hidden beneath it all
   makes each mouthful taste like you’re biting into a flat cheeseburger. The
   only thing missing is pickles.
   
   Before getting to work on the ketchup-mustard sauce, ground beef, and blend
   of cheeses, I slightly tweaked the Domino’s pizza dough hack from
   Step-by-Step. The dough here calls for high-gluten flour, which you can find
   online, to create the same chewiness in the dough as the real thing. But
   don’t worry if you can’t find high-gluten flour, just increase the bread
   flour to 25 ounces (4½ cups).
   
   The unusual combination of American, provolone, and Cheddar cheese is not
   what you’d expect on a pizza, but for this particular pie you won’t miss the
   mozzarella. You’ll need to dice the American and provolone since they usually
   come sliced and are too soft to shred. Stack everything on your custom dough,
   bake until the cheese browns, and it’s ready to devour. My Domino's
   Cheeseburger Pizza copycat recipe makes two large pizzas, so there should be
   more than enough for your crew.
   
   You might also like my recipe for Domino's Crispy Bacon & Tomato Specialty
   Chicken.
   
   Read more
 * Score: 5.00 (votes: 1)
   
   KFC GEORGIA GOLD HONEY MUSTARD BBQ SAUCE
   
   After the early success of KFC’s Nashville Hot Chicken, R&D chefs explored
   other sauce variations that could be drizzled over the chain’s Extra Crispy
   Fried Chicken and breaded tenders and came up with this delicious sweet
   mustard basting sauce. 
   
   For my KFC Georgia Gold Sauce copycat recipe, I mixed dry ingredients into
   the mustard, then drizzled the oil into the mustard blend while whisking to
   form an emulsion, locking everything together into a flavorful paste. The
   process produced an overly thick sauce since mustard is such a great
   emulsifier. In the end, I added a little water to thin it out so that it
   coats just right when the sauce is drizzled over fried chicken or strips. 
   
   You can use my recipe for KFC Extra Crispy Tenders here or cook pre-breaded
   crispy frozen chicken pieces.
   
   Find more of my KFC copycat recipes here.
   
   Read more
 * Score: 5.00 (votes: 1)
   
   MANWICH ORIGINAL SLOPPY JOE SANDWICH
   
   Loose meat sandwiches were born in Iowa in 1926 when Maid-Rite started
   selling burgers made with ground beef that isn’t pressed into patties. These
   sandwiches quickly became a Midwest phenomenon, and they were often served
   with a spoon to scoop up the loose meat that would inevitably fall out. This
   dry and crumbly characteristic of the loose meat sandwich might be why, in
   1930, a chef named Joe, as legend has it, created a tomato-based sauce,
   possibly with ketchup, which he mixed into the loose ground beef. Joe’s new
   sandwich had more flavor than its drier cousin, and the loose meat stayed in
   the bun.
   
   Sloppy Joes became a common restaurant and diner menu choice for decades,
   with the sandwiches selling for as little as 10 cents. In 1969, Hunts brought
   Sloppy Joes home with the introduction of the first canned Sloppy Joe sauce
   that, when added to 1 pound of browned ground beef, made enough filling to
   feed a family of four. It was easy, and it was cheap.
   
   The original sauce lists corn syrup as the second ingredient, but for my
   Manwich Sloppy Joe Sauce copycat recipe, I chose to avoid corn syrup and even
   ketchup and instead built the sauce with ketchup ingredients, including
   tomato paste, sugar, vinegar, and spices. My version is also easy and cheap
   and tastes like the real thing, but because it’s fresher, it tastes a little
   bit better.
   
   Find more of my copycat recipes for iconic sandwiches here.
   
   Read more
 * Score: 5.00 (votes: 1)
   
   KFC EXTRA CRISPY FRIED CHICKEN (IMPROVED)
   
   To get their Extra Crispy Chicken so crispy, KFC breads the chicken two
   times. This double breading gives the chicken its ultra craggy exterior and
   extra crunch, which is a different texture than the less crispy original
   recipe fried chicken that’s breaded just once and pressure fried.
   
   As with my KFC Original Fried Chicken recipe, we must first brine the chicken
   to give it flavor and moisture all the way through, like the real thing, then
   the chicken is double breaded and deep-fried until golden brown. KFC uses
   small chickens which cook faster, but small chickens can be hard to find. If
   your chicken parts are on the large side, they may not cook all the way
   through in the 12 to 15 minutes of frying I’m specifying here. To be sure
   your chicken is cooked, start frying with the thickest pieces, like the
   breasts, then park them in a 300-degree oven while you finish with the
   smaller pieces. This will keep the chicken warm and crispy, and more
   importantly, ensure that they are cooked perfectly all the way through.
   
   On my CMT show Top Secret Recipe I chatted with Winston Shelton, a long-time
   friend of KFC founder Harland Sanders. Winston saw the Colonel's handwritten
   secret recipe for KFC Original Recipe chicken, and he told me one of the
   secret ingredients is Tellicherry black pepper. It's a more expensive,
   better-tasting black pepper that comes from the Malabar coast in India, and
   you should use it here if you can find it. Winston pulled me aside and
   whispered this secret to me when he thought we were off-camera, but our
   microphones and very alert cameramen caught the whole thing, and we aired it.
   
   I first published my KFC Extra Crispy Fried Chicken recipe in Even More Top
   Secret Recipes, but recently applied some newly acquired secrets and tips to
   make this much-improved recipe of one of the most familiar fried chicken
   recipes in the world. 
   
   My improved KFC Extra Crispy Fried Chicken copycat recipe below was our #2
   most popular in 2019. Check out the other four most unlocked recipes of the
   year: Texas Roadhouse Rolls (#1), Olive Garden Braised Beef Bolognese (#3),
   Pizzeria Uno Chicago Deep Dish Pizza (#4), Bush's Country Style Baked Beans
   (#5).
   
   Check out this list of our most popular recipes of all-time.
   
   Read more
 * Join our Recipe Club For Todd’s Best-Kept SecretsClick here
 * Not rated yet
   
   STARBUCKS PINK DRINK
   
   Many new food product ideas emerge from corporate test kitchens, but
   Starbucks’ Pink Drink was born on social media. That’s where customers
   learned to request coconut milk in their order of the chain’s strawberry-acai
   refreshers drink, and when they gave it a good shake it turned pink. That was
   in 2016. When high demand persisted for the “secret menu” item, Starbucks
   added the Pink Drink to its permanent menu one year later, in 2017.
   
   You'll have no trouble creating my Starbucks Pink Drink copycat recipe as
   long as you procure a bottle of the strawberry acai flavor of Dr. Smoothie
   Refreshers. This lightly caffeinated concentrated drink mix can be found
   online in 46-ounce bottles and will be enough to make 11 (16-ounce) Pink
   Drink clones. You’ll also need coconut milk, preferably one that isn’t too
   thick or chunky (Goya brand is good), and freeze-dried strawberries.
   
   Finish the drink by shaking everything together in a shaker with ice, then
   pour the pink goodness into a 16-ounce glass and consume with glee.
   
   Find more of my Starbucks copycat recipes here. 
   
   Read more
 * Not rated yet
   
   THE OLD SPAGHETTI FACTORY RICH MEAT SAUCE
   
   Since 1969, The Portland, Oregon-based Old Spaghetti Factory has been filling
   bellies with a comfort food menu full of fabulous pasta choices, and this
   signature meat sauce has been the sauce of choice at the 43-unit chain for
   more than five decades.
   
   To reverse-engineer the sauce for my Old Spaghetti Factory Rich Meat Sauce
   copycat recipe, I started by rinsing the original sauce in a wire mesh
   strainer to see what secrets could be revealed. Once the solids were visible,
   I noted the size and ratios of ground beef, onion, celery, and garlic, and I
   also noticed that there were no bits of tomato left behind. This meant the
   tomato was puréed, but rather than using canned tomato purée, I opted for
   richer tomato paste. Lemon juice helped match the zing of the original, and I
   rounded out the flavor with just a bit of sugar.
   
   This recipe will make 3½ cups of meat sauce, which is enough for several huge
   plates of pasta. Use it on spaghetti as they do at the restaurant, or
   whatever pasta shape you prefer.
   
   Find more copycat recipes for famous sauces here.
   
   Read more
 * Not rated yet
   
   CALIFORNIA PIZZA KITCHEN (CPK) CARNE ASADA PIZZA
   
   Menu Description: Tender marinated steak, fire-roasted poblanos, cilantro
   pesto, yellow onions, Mozzarella, Monterey Jack and fresh cilantro. Served
   with housemade salsa verde.
   
   One of California Pizza Kitchen’s most popular “globally inspired” pizzas is
   this fabulous pie topped with strips of marinated flank steak, cilantro
   pesto, and fire-roasted poblano pepper. I broke it down and hacked all the
   parts for you—including the awesome salsa verde that goes on top—so that you
   can assemble two beautiful pizzas that look and taste like the real thing.
   
   Sometimes deliciousness requires patience, so be sure to plan for your
   copycat pizza one day in advance to allow your dough to properly proof and
   the steak to fully marinate. You can also prep the pesto, salsa verde, and
   roasted poblano a day in advance so that when it comes time to make pizzas
   the next day, you just need to cook the carne asada, build the pizzas, and
   bake.  
   
   Try my CPK Carne Asada Pizza copycat recipe below, and find more of my
   California Pizza Kitchen hacks here. 
   
   Read more
 * Not rated yet
   
   DICKEY'S BARBECUE PIT POTATO SALAD
   
   America’s largest barbecue chain is famous for its great smoked meats. But
   Dickey’s Barbecue Pit also deserves a major shout-out for tasty potato salad
   that even potato salad haters will like. It’s sweet, sour, creamy, and
   speckled with just a bit of bell pepper and celery to make it interesting.
   And it’s easy to make a perfect copy at home with this handy Top Secret
   Recipe.
   
   For my Dickey’s Potato Salad copycat recipe, you’ll start by mixing a simple
   dressing and stir it into diced potatoes that cook in just 10 minutes. Add
   some minced red and green bell pepper—both cook al dente in under 5
   minutes—plus a little minced celery, and your work is done. And you made it
   for much less than it would cost to buy the real thing.
   
   After it chills, give it a good stir, and your potato salad hack is ready for
   hungry mouths.
   
   Fans of Dickey's will also love my original BBQ sauce and coleslaw copycat
   recipes here.
   
   Read more
 * Not rated yet
   
   MCDONALD'S MAMBO SAUCE
   
   One of two new sauces McDonald’s debuted in late 2023 is inspired by the
   famous Washington D.C.-area sauce originally offered at chicken wing
   restaurants and Chinese takeout joints in the 1960s. The sweet, sour, and
   spicy mambo sauce—also called mumbo sauce—is used as a dip for all kinds of
   finger foods including fried chicken, chicken wings, chicken nuggets, French
   fries, and eggrolls.
   
   But McDonald’s only offered the sauce in small blister packs, which were
   available for about a month. So, if we want to bring back the great flavor of
   the limited-time-only sauce we'll need a handy home hack. Fortunately, I got
   my mitts on enough of the sauce before it went away to whip up this exclusive
   knockoff.
   
   My McDonald's Mambo Sauce copycat recipe is super easy, requires only common
   ingredients, and will make 1½ cups of the versatile stuff you can use for
   dipping anything that needs to be perked up.
   
   You might also like my clones for McDonald's sweet and spicy jam, hot
   mustard, sweet and sour, honey mustard, and Szechuan dipping sauces. Find all
   my McDonald's copycat recipes here.
   
   Read more
 * Not rated yet
   
   APPLEBEE'S OREO COOKIE SHAKE
   
   This delicious made-to-order Oreo cookie milkshake was one of several items
   cut from the menu in 2020 when the pandemic brought the dine-in restaurant
   business to a crawl. But in June 2021 when the song “Fancy Like” from country
   singer Walker Hayes, which mentions the milkshake by name, went viral on
   TikTok, Applebee’s brought back the shake to satisfy the increased demand.
   
   Now you can make your own simple hack with my Applebee's Oreo Cookie
   Milkshake recipe without leaving home. It requires just a few ingredients and
   a blender. Start by getting the ice cream smooth in the blender with the milk
   before adding the Oreo pieces so that you don’t make the cookie crumbs too
   small. You want a few little bits in there for crunch, but they shouldn’t be
   big enough to clog the straw.
   
   Add some whipped cream on top with some more Oreo crumbs, and you’ve just
   made enough for two 12-ounce shakes.
   
   As the song goes, “We fancy like Applebee’s on a date night, got that Bourbon
   Street steak with the Oreo shake.” Now that you’ve got your Oreo shake, how
   about a Bourbon Street steak? 
   
   Read more
 * Join our Recipe Club For Todd’s Best-Kept SecretsClick here
 * Score: 5.00 (votes: 1)
   
   CRACKER BARREL BUTTERMILK PANCAKES
   
   A great buttermilk pancake recipe will produce fluffy, tangy, and slightly
   sweet pancakes—the same qualities as the popular pancakes served at Cracker
   Barrel restaurants nationwide. But Cracker Barrel’s flapjacks have a secret
   ingredient that sets the chain’s morning stack apart from other restaurants.
   And this Top Secret Recipe will reveal it.
   
   To create my Cracker Barrel Buttermilk Pancakes copycat recipe, I first
   purchased a box of the chain’s pancake mix at the restaurant’s store to
   examine the list of ingredients on the package. In the list were the
   ingredients you'd expect, like wheat flour, sugar, salt, and leavening. But
   there was also a surprise: yellow corn flour. When added to the mix in the
   right ratio, the yellow corn flour contributed great cornbread-like flavor
   and gave the pancakes a unique crumbly texture that many seem to love.
   
   Does this special ingredient produce buttermilk pancakes which are superior
   to a more traditional recipe? It's easy to find out. Once you have corn flour
   and just a handful of other common ingredients, it takes just minutes to
   produce enough pancakes for you and everyone else to get a taste and decide
   if these are indeed the best buttermilk pancakes in the biz.
   
   Try more of my Cracker Barrel copycat recipes here.
   
   Read more
 * Score: 5.00 (votes: 1)
   
   EL POLLO LOCO HOMEMADE TORTILLA SOUP
   
   Packed with tender chicken and vegetables, my El Pollo Loco Homemade Tortilla
   Soup copycat recipe is just like the original, which happens to be one of the
   most wholesome tortilla soups I’ve ever hacked.
   
   And the technique here is ultra-easy since you use chicken pulled from a
   supermarket rotisserie chicken, which is a good thing for a couple of
   reasons. You don’t have to cook the chicken, so you save time. And, since
   rotisserie chickens usually cost less than a whole uncooked chicken, you’re
   saving money, too. One 2-pound rotisserie chicken will give you around 1
   pound of white and dark chicken meat, which will be perfect for this recipe.
    
   
   Most of your time will be spent chopping the celery, carrot, and peppers,
   then it’s just a simple matter of sautéing the vegetables until soft and
   adding the remaining ingredients. Once the soup is hot, serve it topped with
   crispy tortilla strips, cotija cheese, and cilantro, and pass out the spoons.
   
   Find more famous El Pollo Loco recipes here.
   
   Read more
 * Score: 5.00 (votes: 1)
   
   KELLOGG'S POP-TARTS
   
   It took six months for Kellogg’s product developers to figure out how to mass
   produce a par-baked filled pastry that could be crisped up in a home toaster.
   In 1964, Pop-Tarts hit grocery store shelves in four flavors: strawberry,
   brown sugar cinnamon, blueberry, and apple currant, and went on to become
   Kellogg’s top-selling brand.
   
   I set out to make a taste-alike version of the popular snack that looks just
   like the original and could be cooked for a second time in a toaster. It was
   apparent that I would need a pastry dough that was flakey yet sturdy, and
   with a familiar flavor reminiscent of Pop-Tarts, and eventually, I came up
   with a recipe that worked.
   
   As I completed the dough for my Kellogg's Pop-Tarts copycat recipe, I worked
   on the filling, developing recipes for two of the most popular flavors:
   strawberry and brown sugar cinnamon. The strawberry filling here requires
   seedless strawberry jam and the cinnamon sugar filling is a simple
   combination of brown sugar, cinnamon, flour, and butter—like streusel. The
   filling is spread on the bottom layer of dough and then a top layer of dough
   is added, ventilated with a toothpick or wooden skewer, and baked just until
   light brown. 
   
   When cool, the brown sugar cinnamon tarts are frosted with cinnamon icing,
   and the strawberry tarts are frosted with white icing, and then topped with
   sprinkles. When the icing hardens your Pop-Tarts clones are ready to be
   finished in a toaster for eating at your convenience, just like the real
   ones.
   
   Try my Kellogg's Pop Tart copycat recipe below, and find more of your
   favorite breakfast copycat recipes here. 
   
   Read more

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MARIE CALLENDER'S FRESH STRAWBERRY PIE

Every March through November, Marie Callender’s sells fresh strawberry pies made
with the chain’s signature flakey crust piled high with whole strawberries
tossed in a sweet glaze and finished with a crown of whipped cream.

The pies are made-to-order to ensure the freshness of the berries, but the glaze
that’s added to the beautiful berries tastes like the everyday goopy red stuff
found in grocery store produce sections that’s usually made with corn syrup and
other crud, and no natural fruit. For my Marie Callender’s Fresh Strawberry Pie
copycat recipe, I set out to improve the glaze by making it with real strawberry
puree, hoping to get a tastier finished product. Thankfully, it worked out. The
new glaze was vibrant and fruity; it transformed into a nice gel and didn’t
upstage the strawberries. This small change makes a strawberry pie that’s even
better than the original.

I designed the glaze to use frozen strawberries, so it’s quick and easy, and I’m
also including scratch recipes here for the whipped cream and pie crust. You can
buy each of these pre-made to speed up your build, but taking a little time to
make the whipped cream and/or crust from scratch will absolutely be worth the
extra effort. Also, I slightly tweaked my previous Marie Callender’s pastry
formula to make it more closely match the current pie crust served at the chain.

Try my Marie Callender's Fresh Strawberry Pie copycat recipe below, and find
more of my Marie Callender's pie recipes here.

Read more
Not rated yet

THE OLD SPAGHETTI FACTORY RICH MEAT SAUCE

Since 1969, The Portland, Oregon-based Old Spaghetti Factory has been filling
bellies with a comfort food menu full of fabulous pasta choices, and this
signature meat sauce has been the sauce of choice at the 43-unit chain for more
than five decades.

To reverse-engineer the sauce for my Old Spaghetti Factory Rich Meat Sauce
copycat recipe, I started by rinsing the original sauce in a wire mesh strainer
to see what secrets could be revealed. Once the solids were visible, I noted the
size and ratios of ground beef, onion, celery, and garlic, and I also noticed
that there were no bits of tomato left behind. This meant the tomato was puréed,
but rather than using canned tomato purée, I opted for richer tomato paste.
Lemon juice helped match the zing of the original, and I rounded out the flavor
with just a bit of sugar.

This recipe will make 3½ cups of meat sauce, which is enough for several huge
plates of pasta. Use it on spaghetti as they do at the restaurant, or whatever
pasta shape you prefer.

Find more copycat recipes for famous sauces here.

Read more
Score: 5.00 (votes: 1)

MANWICH ORIGINAL SLOPPY JOE SANDWICH

Loose meat sandwiches were born in Iowa in 1926 when Maid-Rite started selling
burgers made with ground beef that isn’t pressed into patties. These sandwiches
quickly became a Midwest phenomenon, and they were often served with a spoon to
scoop up the loose meat that would inevitably fall out. This dry and crumbly
characteristic of the loose meat sandwich might be why, in 1930, a chef named
Joe, as legend has it, created a tomato-based sauce, possibly with ketchup,
which he mixed into the loose ground beef. Joe’s new sandwich had more flavor
than its drier cousin, and the loose meat stayed in the bun.

Sloppy Joes became a common restaurant and diner menu choice for decades, with
the sandwiches selling for as little as 10 cents. In 1969, Hunts brought Sloppy
Joes home with the introduction of the first canned Sloppy Joe sauce that, when
added to 1 pound of browned ground beef, made enough filling to feed a family of
four. It was easy, and it was cheap.

The original sauce lists corn syrup as the second ingredient, but for my Manwich
Sloppy Joe Sauce copycat recipe, I chose to avoid corn syrup and even ketchup
and instead built the sauce with ketchup ingredients, including tomato paste,
sugar, vinegar, and spices. My version is also easy and cheap and tastes like
the real thing, but because it’s fresher, it tastes a little bit better.

Find more of my copycat recipes for iconic sandwiches here.

Read more
Score: 5.00 (votes: 2)

TACO BELL AVOCADO VERDE SALSA

In March 2024, Taco Bell debuted the Cantina Chicken menu, featuring 2 types of
tacos, a burrito, a quesadilla, and a chicken bowl, each starring the chain’s
new slow-roasted chicken. The Mexican chain also introduced avocado salsa made
with peppers, tomatillos, lime, cilantro, and avocado as a companion to the
latest items. But unlike all the other hot sauces, extra packets of the new
sauce cost 20 cents each. And the 2½ teaspoons of salsa they hold doesn’t go
very far. But 3½ cups sure does.

For my Taco Bell Avocado Verde Salsa copycat recipe, I found there was no need
to go through the extra time-consuming step of roasting fresh tomatillos and
peppers when canned ingredients worked so great. The avocado, lime juice, and
cilantro will be fresh, and the dry ingredients, namely the onion and garlic,
will rehydrate nicely as the salsa rests.

The first ingredient in Taco Bell’s version is oil, but for our purposes, we can
reduce the ratio. Taco Bell chefs most likely add all that oil to their salsa to
prevent the avocado from oxidizing and turning brown, thereby extending its
shelf life. The oil has the same function in my version, but I call for ½ cup,
which is much less percentage-wise than the real thing. The oil will indeed
extend the life of your salsa, but feel free to reduce the amount substantially
if you plan to eat the salsa within a couple of days and prefer to avoid the
added fat.

Followed as written, this recipe makes 3 1/2 cups of salsa or the equivalent of
67 Taco Bell blister packs. 

Try more of my Taco Bell copycat recipes here.

Read more
Score: 5.00 (votes: 1)

CRACKER BARREL BUTTERMILK PANCAKES

A great buttermilk pancake recipe will produce fluffy, tangy, and slightly sweet
pancakes—the same qualities as the popular pancakes served at Cracker Barrel
restaurants nationwide. But Cracker Barrel’s flapjacks have a secret ingredient
that sets the chain’s morning stack apart from other restaurants. And this Top
Secret Recipe will reveal it.

To create my Cracker Barrel Buttermilk Pancakes copycat recipe, I first
purchased a box of the chain’s pancake mix at the restaurant’s store to examine
the list of ingredients on the package. In the list were the ingredients you'd
expect, like wheat flour, sugar, salt, and leavening. But there was also a
surprise: yellow corn flour. When added to the mix in the right ratio, the
yellow corn flour contributed great cornbread-like flavor and gave the pancakes
a unique crumbly texture that many seem to love.

Does this special ingredient produce buttermilk pancakes which are superior to a
more traditional recipe? It's easy to find out. Once you have corn flour and
just a handful of other common ingredients, it takes just minutes to produce
enough pancakes for you and everyone else to get a taste and decide if these are
indeed the best buttermilk pancakes in the biz.

Try more of my Cracker Barrel copycat recipes here.

Read more
Not rated yet

CHARMS BLOW POP

The fruity lollipop with gum inside is Charms' bestselling product, but the cool
combo candy was the brainchild of a different candy company. Thomas T. Tidwell
of Triple T Co. invented and patented his method for encasing gum inside candy
in the 1960s, and sold his new lollipop, Triple Treat, for a short time. In
1973, Tidwell sold the product idea to the Charms Candy Company who renamed it
Blow Pop, and for over 50 years the famous pop has been enjoyed by millions of
happy mouths.

I’m not privy to the details of Tidwell’s method, but I can see by the vertical
seam on a real Blow Pop that it's probably made by sealing two halves of the pop
together, one half with gum and one half without. I tried various silicone
lollipop molds for my Charms Blow Pop copycat recipe with little success and
decided instead to create a technique using half of a slightly altered cake pop
mold. I first poured half of the pop into the molds, added the gum on a stick,
and when it hardened I removed it, poured the other half of the candy into the
mold, and added the hardened first half on top. When all was set, I had
perfectly spherical pops with seams just like the original. And it didn’t seem
to bother anyone that my pops were more than twice as big as the real thing.

I designed my recipe to call for 1 dram of LorAnn Oils which you can find
online. The original Blow Pops come in five flavors, and I’ve got four of them
for you here: cherry, grape, watermelon, and sour apple. I also made a batch of
cinnamon pops just for fun and added those instructions to the Tidbits below.
Real Blow Pops don’t come in cinnamon flavor, but after tasting these, you might
wish they did.

Click here to make more famous candy at home. 

Read more
Not rated yet

STARBUCKS PINK DRINK

Many new food product ideas emerge from corporate test kitchens, but Starbucks’
Pink Drink was born on social media. That’s where customers learned to request
coconut milk in their order of the chain’s strawberry-acai refreshers drink, and
when they gave it a good shake it turned pink. That was in 2016. When high
demand persisted for the “secret menu” item, Starbucks added the Pink Drink to
its permanent menu one year later, in 2017.

You'll have no trouble creating my Starbucks Pink Drink copycat recipe as long
as you procure a bottle of the strawberry acai flavor of Dr. Smoothie
Refreshers. This lightly caffeinated concentrated drink mix can be found online
in 46-ounce bottles and will be enough to make 11 (16-ounce) Pink Drink clones.
You’ll also need coconut milk, preferably one that isn’t too thick or chunky
(Goya brand is good), and freeze-dried strawberries.

Finish the drink by shaking everything together in a shaker with ice, then pour
the pink goodness into a 16-ounce glass and consume with glee.

Find more of my Starbucks copycat recipes here. 

Read more
Score: 5.00 (votes: 1)

MARIE CALLENDER'S COCONUT CREAM PIE

For a delicious slice of your favorite iconic American pie, Marie Callender’s is
the place to go. The chain serves tasty breakfast, lunch, and dinner entrees,
but it's mostly famous for great homestyle pies, and the classic coconut cream
pie is no exception. Like many other pies I’ve hacked from Marie Callender's
(Pumpkin Pie, Double Cream Blueberry Pie, Chocolate Satin Pie), the Coconut
Cream Pie is sold in your store’s freezer section. But none of these frozen pies
are as good as a fresh one you make from scratch. 

The filling for my Marie Callender's Coconut Cream Pie copycat recipe takes just
10 minutes to make, and if you use a premade pie crust, this becomes a very
low-impact recipe. I recommend you make the whipped cream topping from scratch
using the recipe here that will produce much better whipped cream than anything
from a can, and it's also quick. The most time-consuming step is making the
dollops of whipped cream that cover the top of the pie, but even that’s pretty
fun.

If you’d like to make your pie crust from scratch, I’m including a recipe from
my previous Marie Callender’s pie hacks. It’ll add time to your build, but the
extra effort will be worth it.

Try more of my Marie Callender's copycat recipes here.

Read more
Score: 5.00 (votes: 1)

CHEESECAKE FACTORY SHRIMP SCAMPI

This top entrée pick from Cheesecake Factory is a classic dish, but its
preparation is far from traditional, and perhaps that's why it's so popular.

The creamy scampi sauce is flavored with a handful of whole roasted garlic
cloves, plus shallot, basil, and tomato. The shrimp are lightly battered and
fried until golden, then arranged upright around the plate to keep their
crunching coats from sogging.

In addition to all the secrets you’ll need to assemble two servings of my
Cheesecake Factory Shrimp Scampi copycat recipe, I’ve also included a cool
technique for easily roasting the garlic cloves in just 15 to 20 minutes, and
you won’t even need to peel the cloves. After your garlic cools, the skins will
slip right off.

Now, how about dessert? Find my copycat recipes for Cheesecake Factory's
signature cheesecakes here.

Read more
Score: 5.00 (votes: 3)

CHEESECAKE FACTORY STEAK DIANE

Fans of Cheesecake Factory’s Steak Diane don’t seem to care that the dish isn’t
a traditional take on the classic dish. The restaurant chain’s version is indeed
served with mushrooms and medallions of beef tenderloin just like the old-school
recipe, but you won’t find any Dijon mustard, Worcestershire sauce, cognac, or
cream that one would expect in a true Steak Diane. Instead, the chain douses
steak with the same Madeira sauce served with its Chicken Madeira entrée, and
it's delicious.

I hacked the chain’s Chicken Madeira many years ago in Top Secret Restaurant
Recipes 2 but was happy for the chance to go back and improve the great sauce.
After some fiddling, I came up with an improved formula that calls for less wine
and uses a more thorough reduction to intensify the flavors. When shopping for
ingredients for my Cheesecake Factory Steak Diane copycat recipe, it's okay to
pick the least expensive Madeira wine on the shelf. Just know that Madeira wines
have different characteristics, so your final flavor may slightly vary from the
restaurant version.

For your tenderloins, start with thick steaks, since you’ll be slicing the
portions in half through the middle, making them thinner. You’ll need 7 to 8
small steak portions to be sliced in half for 14 to 16 medallions. 

Now, how about dessert? Find my copycat recipes for Cheesecake Factory's
signature cheesecakes here.

Read more
Not rated yet

MCDONALD'S MAMBO SAUCE

One of two new sauces McDonald’s debuted in late 2023 is inspired by the famous
Washington D.C.-area sauce originally offered at chicken wing restaurants and
Chinese takeout joints in the 1960s. The sweet, sour, and spicy mambo sauce—also
called mumbo sauce—is used as a dip for all kinds of finger foods including
fried chicken, chicken wings, chicken nuggets, French fries, and eggrolls.

But McDonald’s only offered the sauce in small blister packs, which were
available for about a month. So, if we want to bring back the great flavor of
the limited-time-only sauce we'll need a handy home hack. Fortunately, I got my
mitts on enough of the sauce before it went away to whip up this exclusive
knockoff.

My McDonald's Mambo Sauce copycat recipe is super easy, requires only common
ingredients, and will make 1½ cups of the versatile stuff you can use for
dipping anything that needs to be perked up.

You might also like my clones for McDonald's sweet and spicy jam, hot mustard,
sweet and sour, honey mustard, and Szechuan dipping sauces. Find all my
McDonald's copycat recipes here.

Read more
Not rated yet

RAISING CANE'S SAUCE

This chicken finger chain makes a big deal out of its "secret" dipping sauce
recipe, even requiring employees to sign a confidentiality agreement to protect
any details about the recipe. As far as I can tell, it's a very simply recipe
made with just a handful of pretty obvious ingredients. All you do is mix
everything together and let it sit for a bit in the fridge. This may not be the
exact recipe the chain uses, but it tastes the same, and that's all that
matters. 

Get the full recipe in my book "Top Secret Recipes Step-by-Step".

You might also like my bottled Chicken Tender Sauce, inspired by the sauce at
Zaxby's and Raising Cane's.

Read more
Not rated yet

NOTHING BUNDT CAKES WHITE CHOCOLATE RASPBERRY CAKE

While sharing a Bundt cake one day in 1997, amateur bakers and close friends
Dena Tripp and Debbie Shwetz realized they could do better. After much
experimentation, the duo discovered a batter that produced a moist, delicious
cake, which was a huge improvement over the dense, dry cake usually associated
with Bundts. But they weren’t done yet.

The next step was to decide how to best frost their new Bundt cake.
Traditionally, Bundt cakes are glazed by drizzling warm icing over the top,
which drips down the sides and dries there. But the pair didn’t want to use
glaze. They had a cream cheese icing they thought tasted better than any glaze,
but it took some time to figure out how to apply it. They eventually settled on
frosting their Bundts with large piped vertical ropes, so the icing looks like
it’s dripping down the outside of the cake.

To make a Bundt cake that matches the moistness and crumb of the real Nothing
Bundt Cake, it’s important to start with the right flour. The cake has more bite
to it than one made with only cake flour, but it isn’t as tough as one made with
all-purpose flour. That’s why I settled on pastry flour, like the one from Bob’s
Red Mill. Pastry flour contains more protein than cake flour, but not as much as
all-purpose flour, so it works perfectly here. If you can’t find pastry flour,
no need to worry. I’ve got a way for you to hack it by combining cake flour with
all-purpose flour in a 2-to-1 ratio.

The raspberry puree is made from scratch using frozen raspberries and it’s
swirled into the batter before the cake goes into the oven. While the cake cools
you can make the cream cheese buttercream icing. Get a 1A tip, which is a wide,
circular tip for a pastry bag or gun, to make ropes of icing over the top and
down the sides of the cake all the way around, just like the original.

Get this recipe in my book "Top Secret Recipes Unleashed" only on Amazon here.

Read more
Not rated yet

LEONARD'S BAKERY MALASADAS

“Biting into a cloud” is how many describe the lightly crisp browned shell and
fluffy, custard-like middle of Leonard’s malasadas. Hawaii has become known for
the best malasadas in North America, but the hole-less doughnuts aren’t
originally from Hawaii. Malasadas were brought to the islands in the late 1800s
by Portuguese immigrants who worked on the sugarcane plantations, and today
malasadas are sold in bakeries all over Hawaii. But for the best malasadas,
everyone knows you must brave the long lines that always go out the door at
Leonard’s Bakery in Honolulu. And that’s okay because it’s always worth the
wait.

Leonard’s has been making malasadas since 1952 using a well-protected secret
recipe that many have unsuccessfully tried to duplicate. The chain will ship
malasadas from Hawaii to your house on the mainland for a pretty hefty fee
(nearly $100), but even after following strict reheating instructions, eating a
two-day-old malasada is not the same heavenly experience as consuming a fresh
one. A fluffy, fresh malasada turns into a tough and chewy malasada in just a
few hours. That’s the nature of fried dough. It quickly became clear that if I
were ever to properly clone these, I would have to experience them fresh, from
the source. So, I hopped on a plane to Hawaii.

I visited two Leonard’s locations in Honolulu: the original brick-and-mortar
bakery and a Leonard’s Bakery food truck parked in a shopping mall lot. I
watched them make malasadas in big vats of oil, lowering dozens of doughnuts at
once into the oil with a metal screen pressing down on them so that they were
fully submerged in the hot fat. I observed the process, noted the temperature,
watched the malasadas come out of the oil and get sugared, and timed everything.

Back home I made malasadas for weeks, using intel gathered in Hawaii. Dozens and
dozens of versions later, after altering variables such as proofing methods,
mixing methods, flour types, fat types, sweetness, saltiness, and many others,
until I landed on this one. I believe it was number 92 out of 93 attempts.

Before you begin making my Leonard's Malasada recipe, let me offer a few tips
about equipment you’ll need. It’s best to have a stand mixer. The dough starts
loose but it eventually gets too tough for a handheld granny mixer. I’m sure
it’s possible to mix and knead the dough by hand when it gets too tough for the
little mixer, but a big mixer is much better.

Also, a deep fryer is helpful. You can fry these in a pot of oil with a
thermometer if you want, but it’s so much easier to regulate temperature with a
deep fryer. And you must devise a way to keep the malasadas submerged so that
you won’t have to flip them, and they won’t get a white line around the middle
where the dough isn’t in the oil. Deep fryers typically have a basket that you
can use to put on top of the malasadas to hold them down. Rather than placing
the dough in the basket when frying, carefully lower the dough into the fryer
without the basket and use the basket on top of the dough to hold it under the
oil. If you are frying on your stovetop, you can use a spider or strainer to
hold the dough under the oil.

Get this recipe in my book "Top Secret Recipes Unleashed" only on Amazon here.

Read more
Not rated yet

NABISCO FIG NEWTONS

In 1891, a baker named Charles Rosen invented a machine that inserted fig paste
into seamless pastry dough and was soon mass-producing one of the first
commercially baked products in America. Rosen named his creation after the
nearby town of Newton, Massachusetts, and eventually sold the recipe to the
Kennedy Biscuit Company, which later became Nabisco. Today Nabisco sells over 1
billion Fig Newtons each year.

It has long been my wish to create a satisfying clone of such an iconic snack,
but I was never quite sure how to go about it. The fig filling needs to be sweet
with a sour aftertaste, and thick like jam. The thin pastry would need to be
tender, not tough, and should smoothly wrap around the figs without cracking.
After a week or so of pureeing dry figs and testing pastry doughs, I finally
created a Fig Newton recipe that tasted great and looked just like the original.

Since you likely don’t have a fig bar extruder in your kitchen like Charles
Rosen did, we’ll use a dough folding technique to make nicely shaped bars with
smooth sides, no cracks, and no visible seam. The trick is to roll out the dough
on wax paper, then wrap the dough around the fig filling by lifting the wax
paper up and over the filling. You can cleanly manipulate very thin dough this
way, and when you flip the bar over, the seam will be hidden.

Re-hydrating the dried figs will help make them easier to puree, and the dry
pectin in the mix will thicken the figs to a jammy consistency and give the
filling additional tartness (citric acid is in pectin to help activate it). My
Fig Newton recipe will make 48 cookies, or more than twice what you get in two
10-ounce packages of the real thing.

Get the recipe in my book "Top Secret Recipes Unleashed" only on Amazon here.

Read more
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