Hard Rock Cafe

Hard Rock Café Twisted Mac & Cheese Menu Description: "Twisted cavatappi pasta, tossed in a lightly spiced 3-cheese sauce with roasted red peppers and topped with Parmesan parsley breadcrumbs."

The rock-and-roll theme chain peps up old-school macaroni and cheese with roasted red bell pepper, a breadcrumb topping, and a delicious sauce made from three cheeses. For a home clone of this hip appetizer, I found that it's best to shred your own Cheddar and Monterey Jack cheeses, since the pre-shredded type sold in bags doesn't melt as well, and you'll likely end up with a grainy sauce. Grainy is not good for a sauce. You can use bottled roasted red bell pepper for convenience, or you can roast your own pepper with the tips provided in the Tidbits below. And don't worry about tracking down the hard-to-find cavatappi pasta twisted tubes. Any pasta shape will do here, including the ubiquitous mac & cheese standard: elbow macaroni.

Try my Hard Rock Cafe Twisted Mac & Cheese copycat recipe below, and find more of your favorite Hard Rock Cafe dishes here.
 
Source: Top Secret Restaurant Recipes 3 by Todd Wilbur.

Smashing a guitar and hanging it on the wall will not give you the true Hard Rock Cafe experience unless you then eat a sandwich with this coleslaw served on the side. You have to be patient though, since it's not something you can enjoy right away. Good coleslaw needs a little time to chill in the cool box—24 hours at least. The cabbage needs a chance to get it together with the other ingredients before rocking out at the gig inside your mouth. If you're patient, you'll find that my Hard Rock Cafe coleslaw recipe tastes just like the real thing. 

Now, how about a killer pulled pork sandwich or bar-b-que beans? I've got more Hard Rock Cafe hacks for you here. 

Source: Top Secret Restaurant Recipes 2 by Todd Wilbur.

Menu Description: "Select pork, hickory-smoked then hand-pulled, so it's tender and juicy. 'An old Southern delicacy' with our famous vinegar-based bar-b-que sauce. Served with fries, ranch beans and homemade coleslaw."

Take a big honkin' bite out of one of this, and you'll soon know why it's the Hard Rock Café's most popular sandwich. The pork is hickory smoked for 10 hours, but since we're impatient hungry people here, we'll use the techniques laid out in my Hard Rock Café pulled pork sandwich recipe below, and cut that cooking time to under 4 hours using a covered grill and carefully arranged charcoal; or by packaging your wood chips in foil to use on a gas grill. If you've got an actual smoker, you can certainly use it and go the full 10 hours. 

You should try to make your cabbage a day ahead of time, so it has time to marinate.

Serve with Hard Rock cole slaw and baked beans on the side.

Source: Top Secret Restaurant Recipes 2 by Todd Wilbur.

If you like baked beans you'll want to try my clone recipe from the world's first theme restaurant chain. Combine ingredients in a covered casserole dish, and bake for an hour and a half. This makes the dish handy if transporting to another location for a party or potluck, since you can fill the dish, cover it, then pop it into the oven once you arrive. For the pulled pork, you can either use the recipe here Hard Rock Cafe Pig Sandwich clone, or you can add some pre-made pulled pork found in most stores. Or just leave that ingredient out. Either way, my Hard Rock Café BBQ Beans copycat recipe will make a tasty side dish or solo snack.

Source: Top Secret Restaurant Recipes 2 by Todd Wilbur.

Menu Description: "Filet mignon grilled to perfection, sliced thin, with shredded lettuce, tomato and spicy mustard. Served on a sourdough French roll with fries and a salad."

When the first Hard Rock Cafe opened in 1971 on Old Park Lane in London, England, not one guitar or gold record decorated the walls. The burger joint was the inspiration of two Americans, Peter Morton and Isaac Tigrett, who couldn't find a decent American style hamburger anywhere in London and decided to do something about it. The restaurant soon became famous only for its food, until along came Eric Clapton, who donated his guitar as a joke. Up on the wall it went. Not wanting to be outdone, Pete Townsend of The Who soon offered up a guitar of his own to be hung on the wall next to Clapton's with a note: "Mine's as good as his." That started a wave of donations from rock and rollers through the decades, and thus was born the world's first theme restaurant. Soon more Hard Rock Cafes were opening around the world, with the first one in America opening in Los Angeles in 1982. After that came New York City, San Francisco, Chicago, Houston, New Orleans, Maui, Las Vegas, Aspen, Newport Beach, and many more. The success of the Hard Rock Cafe spawned a trend which now includes other restaurants built around themes ranging from movies to fashion to motorcycles to blues.

Here is an easy-to-make sandwich that features tender slices of filet mignon. It's a clone of one of the Hard Rock's more popular recent additions to the menu. This recipe suggests another way you can serve the filet mignons you've been saving in the freezer.

Try my other Hard Rock Cafe clone recipes here.

Source: Top Secret Restaurant Recipes by Todd Wilbur.

Menu Description: "Texas style ribs basted in our special watermelon B.B.Q. sauce, grilled and served with fries and a green salad."

The collection of rock and roll memorabilia is different in each Hard Rock Cafe. You may find artifacts that come from recording stars of the fifties, like Elvis Presley and Fats Domino, to more contemporary artists such as Prince, Pearl Jam, and Nirvana. Usually there are several gold and platinum records donated from artists, sequined stage costumes, and famous guitars, some even left in a smashed condition as they were donated straight from a performance. The Hard Rock also collects movie memorabilia, such as Tom Cruise's pilot helmet from the movie Top Gun and the Indiana Jones jacket from Raiders of the Lost Ark.

In 1995, Hard Rock co-founder Peter Morton opened the world's first rock-and-roll hotel, The Hard Rock Hotel and Casino, in Las Vegas. Peter now operates the hotel and his swank restaurant Morton's in Hollywood, California—the famous location of many a celebrity power meal over the years.

I thought these ribs with a barbecue sauce made from watermelon rind had a unique and memorable flavor begging to be duplicated for your next power meal. The sauce is sweet and slightly tangy, and the ribs are so tender they melt in your mouth. It's the slow-cooking process that makes them that way. Throwing them on the grill at the last minute is not meant to cook them so much as it is to add the smoky flavor and slight charring that good ribs require. If possible, make the watermelon barbecue sauce a day ahead so the ribs can marinate in it overnight. If you don't have time for that, at least marinate the ribs for a couple of hours.

Try my Hard Rock Cafe watermelon ribs copycat recipe below, and find my Hard Rock Cafe coleslaw and BBQ beans recipes here.

Source: Top Secret Restaurant Recipes by Todd Wilbur.

Give this simple soup clone a shot and you'll never again want to eat chicken soup from a can. I designed this recipe to be easy, requiring chicken fillets rather than a whole chicken, and you won't need to create a stock from scratch. 

Source: Top Secret Restaurant Recipes 2 by Todd Wilbur.

The world's most famous theme restaurant pays tribute to the birthplace of Elvis Presley with this chicken finger appetizer dish, and two great mustard-based dipping sauces. I was a fan of the original version of this appetizer served around ten years ago before they changed the name to Tupelo Chicken Tenders and replaced the apricot dipping sauce with hickory barbecue sauce. With this recipe you can now re-create the classic original version.

Source: Top Secret Restaurant Recipes 3 by Todd Wilbur.

Menu Description: "Grilled eggplant, zucchini, summer squash, and roasted red peppers. Served on a sourdough French roll with your choice of fries or watermelon."

If you don't eat meat—or even if you do—you'll find this grilled vegetable sandwich makes a great meal in itself for lunch or dinner. I'm not usually one to go for vegetarian sandwiches, but when I tried this one I was surprised at how good it was. Now I veg out with this sandwich regularly. Maybe you will too.

Source: Top Secret Restaurant Recipes by Todd Wilbur.

Here's a quick recipe for the dessert drink served at Hard Rock Cafes all over the world. With only a few ingredients, you can make my Hard Rock Cafe Orange Freeze recipe quickly in the blender. Great on a hot day. And it's easy to double or quadruple to serve more.

Find more of my famous drink recipes here.

Source: Top Secret Restaurant Recipes by Todd Wilbur.