The Italian town of Alba, where Pietro Ferrero built his pastry shop, was known for high yields of hazelnuts, a crucial ingredient in the creation of the first chocolate-hazelnut spread Pietro sold in 1951 under the name Supercrema. After Pietro passed away, his son Michele took over the company, and in 1963, Michele reformulated the hazelnut spread with more chocolate and changed the name to Nutella. Today, more than 25 percent of the world’s hazelnuts are used to make the famous spread.

A jar of Nutella chocolate hazelnut spread contains only seven ingredients, and every one of them is crucial for either flavor or form. The hazelnuts become hazelnut butter. The cocoa, milk, sugar, vanilla, and oil become milk chocolate syrup. And lecithin, a natural ingredient, is the emulsifier that holds it all together. Our home hack of Nutella looks and tastes like the real one, but thanks to Hershey, we can make our version with just six ingredients. Hershey’s ubiquitous chocolate syrup doesn’t have lecithin in it, but it does contain xanthan gum, an emulsifier made from sugar, that works great for our hack.

The big secret to a good batch of fake Nutella is getting the hazelnuts pureed into a smooth nut butter. Your homemade Nutella hack will only be as smooth as your hazelnuts are, and you’ll need a blender to do that. Once the hazelnuts become nut butter, mix them with the other ingredients in a bowl, and you’ll produce a little more knockoff Nutella than what comes in a 13-ounce jar.

Menu Description: "The one and only! The style we invented over 30 years ago; they're breaded by hand, tossed in your choice of wing sauce and served by your favorite Hooters girl."

When I first hacked this recipe back in 1997 for the book Top Secret Restaurant Recipes, Hooters wings looked different than they do today. The chain used to leave the pointy end of the wing attached to the middle piece, or “flat,” which, frankly, is unnecessary because there is very little meat on the tip segment. Today the chain serves wings like everyone else, with drumettes and flats completely separated, and delivered by waitresses in the same bright orange shorts as when the chain started in 1983.

One thing that wasn't available to me back then was the opportunity to examine the chain’s packaging for the lists of ingredients on signature items like sauces and breading. Today, since they sell these items as retail products, I can take advantage of labeling laws that require ingredients to be clearly listed and see what really goes into these recipes. Using that new information, I’ve made a few small tweaks to improve my Hooters Wings copycat recipe from over 20 years ago, including two versions of the kickass wing sauce—medium and hot—for your wing-devouring pleasure.

Find more of my Hooters copycat recipes here.

Amid the chicken sandwich wars of 2019-2021, Carl’s Jr. (Hardee’s) debuted a simple chicken and waffle sandwich that is remarkably good. Crispy chicken breast is doused with maple butter sauce and sandwiched between two Belgian waffle buns for a sweet-and-savory handful of fab.     

To clone the sandwich at home, the chicken gets brined for great flavor and juiciness like the real thing, and then it’s cooked until perfectly golden brown and crispy. The maple butter sauce is easy to hack with just three ingredients and a mixer.

The biggest secret I reveal is how to make Belgian waffles with one flat side just like the real sandwich using a standard waffle iron and a piece of folded aluminum foil. Those exclusive tricks are here plus plenty of helpful step photos so your Carl's Jr. chicken & waffle sandwich copycat recipe will come out perfect.

Find more of my copycat Carl's Jr. recipes here. 

Here's my hack of the popular side dish served with some of the entrées at the Cheesecake Factory. It's the perfect companion for my Cheesecake Factory Chicken Madiera copycat recipe, or as a side for just about any dish you're cooking tonight. Because the skin on the red potatoes is so thin, you save time by not having to peel them. I like that. Just quarter the potatoes, boil until tender, mash 'em up, add the remaining ingredients, and cook until hot.

Try my Cheesecake Factory Mashed Red Potatoes copycat recipe below, and find more of my Cheesecake Factory copycat recipes here.

Source: Top Secret Recipes Step-by Step by Todd Wilbur.

With cayenne and jalapeño peppers, these fried cheese balls bite back. They’re also the number one appetizer on the chain’s menu, so sleuthing out a kitchen copy was a mission I needed to accept. And I’m glad I did, because my Texas Roadhouse Rattlesnake Bites copycat recipe eventually worked out great. The dish is easy to duplicate at home, and, just like the real thing, yours will have just enough heat to wake up your mouth but not ravage it.

After cracking the secret to flavoring the cheese, I worked out the best technique to produce fried cheeseballs that came out of the oil with a golden brown outside and completely melted cheese inside. The timing was crucial. Over-frying the cheese balls caused the cheese to ooze out and burn, while under-frying them prevented it from fully melting in the middle. To fry these bites perfectly, the magic happens at precisely two minutes.

For the best results, use Monterey Jack cheese shredded from a block rather than pre-shredded cheese. Pre-shredded cheese in bags tends to be drier, so it doesn’t melt as well as the cheese you shred by hand. You want the meltiest, creamiest bites possible.

Try my Texas Roadhouse Rolls copycat recipe here.

It’s not a regular menu item at Panda Express, so if the chain’s great chicken dish isn’t available at a restaurant near you, you can use my Panda Express SweetFire Chicken Breast recipe below to get your fix. 

I've worked up a simple hack here for the sweet-and-spicy sauce that gets poured over the crispy chicken chunks, and I’m also including a breading technique for perfect bite-size portions of crispy chicken. Add some onions, red bell pepper, and pineapple chunks, and you’ve just made a spot-on copy of the popular limited dish.

Find more of my Panda Express copycat recipes here. 

“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, I landed on this one. I believe it was number 92 out of 93 attempts.

Before we start, 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 to be too much 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 submerge the dough.

Try my Leonard's Bakery Malasadas copycat recipe below, and find more famous breads hacked here.

Source: "Top Secret Recipes Unleashed" by Todd Wilbur.

In 2024, Taco Bell brought back five iconic menu items as part of the chain’s new “Decades” menu: the Tostada from the 1960s, the Green Sauce Burrito from the 1970s, the Meximelt from the 1980s, the Gordita Supreme from the 1990s, and the Caramel Apple Empanada from the 2000s.

The Meximelt generated the most excitement in my circles, so I jumped at the chance to hop into a culinary time machine and recreate this long-lost classic. It’s a small flour tortilla filled with the chain’s seasoned beef, a melted combination of three cheeses, and fresh pico de gallo. If it weren’t called a Meximelt, you’d call it a soft taco. And you’d love it either way.

I tackled my Taco Bell Meximelt copycat recipe by first duping the mild pico de gallo with a simple combination of tomatoes, onion, cilantro, lime juice, and salt. And I made sure to dice the tomato and onion super small to match the real thing. Next, I copied the seasoned beef using my previously hacked recipe for the chain’s Chalupa Supreme and determined the ratios for a three-cheese blend of shredded cheddar, Jack, and mozzarella.

I piled everything on a warm 6-inch flour tortilla, took a big bite, and let my mouth take me on a tasty trip back to the era of MTV, yuppies, Blockbuster, and Rubik’s Cubes.

Find more of my Taco Bell copycat recipes here.

The Twinkie was invented in 1930 by the late James A. Dewar, then the Chicago-area regional manager of Continental Baking Company, the parent corporation behind the Hostess trademark. At the time, Continental made "Little Short Cake Fingers" only during the six-week strawberry season, and Dewar realized that the aluminum pans in which the cakes were baked sat idle the rest of the year. He came up with the idea of injecting the little cakes with a creamy filling to make them a year-round product and decided to charge a nickel for a package of two.

But Dewar couldn't come up with a catchy name for the snack cake—that is, until he set out on a business trip to St. Louis. Along the road he saw a sign for Twinkle Toe Shoes, and the name Twinkies evolved. Sales took off, and Dewar reportedly ate two Twinkies every day for much of his life. He died in 1985.

The spongy treat has evolved into an American phenomenon. Today the Twinkie is Continental's top Hostess-line seller, with the injection machines filling as many as 52,000 every hour.

You will need a spice bottle, approximately the size of a Twinkie, ten 12x14 -inch pieces of aluminum foil, a cake decorator or pastry bag, and a chopstick.

Watch Todd's video demonstration of this classic hack.

If you're a fan of Hostess powdered Donettes, or cupcakes, check out these recipes. 

Source: Top Secret Recipes by Todd Wilbur.

The menu describes this dish as "Parmesan-crusted chicken served over pasta with mushrooms, bell peppers, and onions in a spicy New Orleans sauce." Of the many great pastas on The Cheesecake Factory's menu, this one consistently ranks as a top choice, so a Top Secret Recipes hack was inevitable. 

Your homemade Cheesecake Factory Louisiana Chicken Pasta copycat starts with the delicious yet straightforward New Orleans sauce, made like Alfredo sauce, with paprika for color and cayenne pepper for zing. The chicken is breaded with a combination of panko breadcrumbs and Parmesan cheese and pan-fried to a golden brown. 

In true Cheesecake Factory style, this recipe makes four very large servings, but you can also serve this dish on one big platter for a nice family-style feast.

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

Source: Top Secret Recipes Step-by-Step by Todd Wilbur.

Panera sells other cookies, but the star in the chain’s cookie display is this 6-ounce beauty packed with two kinds of chocolate, salty pretzels, and plenty of chewy caramel bits. This cookie lives up to its name, delivering a unique experience with every bite—almost like enjoying several different cookies simultaneously.

For my Panera Bread Kitchen Sink Cookie copycat recipe, I needed a cookie base that baked to a light brown around the edges while staying chewy in the middle. After accomplishing that mission, I experimented with the ratio of fillings. I sliced my cookies through the middle and compared their cross-section to the original to determine which ingredients needed adjustment. Then, I kept baking batches until my cookies matched Panera's.

To create the best clone, I found it best to measure the eggs. Since all large eggs are not the same size, I discovered that beating the eggs and measuring 1/3 cup for the recipe yielded more reliable results. Also, it's best to line your baking sheet with parchment paper rather than a silicone baking mat. Since these cookies are so big, they'll spread too much on the slippery surface of silicone mats and will come out thinner than you’d like. Parchment paper grips more, creating cookies that best resemble the Panera version.

Panera Bread has amazing soups too! See if I hacked your favorite here. 

Spinach dips are a great finger food appetizer and just about every chain has its own version, but Cheddar's has one of the best in the business with a unique, slightly spicy southwestern twist. Just like the original, four different kinds of cheese are used in my Cheddar's Santa Fe Spinach dip recipe: three are blended into the spinach, then mozzarella is melted over the top just before serving.

And for speed, we’ll use a microwave oven to quickly defrost the box of frozen spinach so that you’ll have a delish copycat Cheddar's Santa Fe spinach dip on the table in just 20 minutes.

This way to more cool copycats from Cheddar's.

This West Coast chain's take on an ahi poke appetizer features beautiful ahi tuna marinated in a sweet-and-sour poke sauce, presented over wasabi guacamole and drizzled with creamy sriracha aioli sauce. It may be the best version of the dish I've had at any casual chain, so a home clone was inevitable.

For my BJ's Ahi Poke copycat recipe, each part requires just four to five ingredients: the creamy sriracha aioli, wasabi guacamole, and poke sauce. The crispy wontons served on the side are easily made with half circles cut from eggroll wrappers, fried, and sprinkled with Japanese rice seasoning (nori komi furikake).

If you're looking for an easy and delicious way to use an ahi tuna filet, this popular appetizer hack is the bomb. 

Find more of your favorite copycat recipes from BJ's Brewhouse here.
 

Croatian immigrant Joseph Vlasic moved to America in 1912 and built a creamery in Detroit, Michigan, to make cheese. His business grew, and during World War II, Vlasic began producing pickles, which were a huge success. He created Vlasic Foods in 1957 and passed it down to his son Bob in 1960, who then sold it to the Campbell Soup Company in 1978 for $33 million.

One of Vlasic’s most popular pickles in grocery stores across America is the sweet-and-sour slices, often eaten straight out of the jar or used on sandwiches and burgers. For my Vlasic Bread & Butter Chips copycat recipe, I used Persian cucumbers, which have thin skin and a mild taste that works perfectly here. You’ll need eight of them.

The Vlasic pickles are sweetened with corn syrup, but I opted for organic agave syrup and the recipe worked great. The rest of the brine is a simple combination of white wine vinegar, mustard seeds, celery seeds, onion, and garlic. Just a touch of turmeric adds the perfect light yellow tint.

The real thing contains calcium chloride to keep the pickles crispy, so I included it in this recipe if you’d like to add it. You can find this ingredient online—one brand is Pickle Crisp—and you’ll need 1/8 teaspoon per 16-ounce jar.

Try my Vlasic Bread & Butter pickle chips copycat recipe below as a snack or on one of my copycat sandwich recipes here.

Menu Description: "A delicious combination of ham and turkey, plus Swiss and American cheeses on wheat bread. Lightly battered and fried until golden. Dusted with powdered sugar and served with red raspberry preserves for dipping."

It sounds crazy, but it tastes great: a triple-decker ham, turkey, and cheese sandwich is dipped in a tempura-style batter; fried to a golden brown; then served with a dusting of powdered sugar and a side of raspberry preserves. For over ten years, tons of cloning requests for this one have stacked up at TSR Central, so it was time for a road trip. There are no Bennigan's in Las Vegas, and since the Bennigan's chain made this sandwich famous, I headed out to the nearest Bennigan's in San Diego.

Back home, with an ice chest full of the original Bennigan's Monte Cristo sandwiches well-preserved and ready to work with, I was able to come up with this simple clone for a delicious sandwich that is crispy on the outside, and hot, but not greasy, on the inside (the batter prevents the shortening from penetrating). My Bennigan's Monte Cristo recipe makes one sandwich, which may be enough for two. If you want to make more, you'll most likely have to make more batter so that any additional sandwiches get a real good dunking.

Recently, Bennigan's restaurants across the country have been closing, but with this secret formula you can still experience the taste of the chain's signature sandwich. 

Try more of my copycat recipes for famous sandwiches here.

Source: Top Secret Restaurant Recipes 2 by Todd Wilbur.

Ingredients you don’t find in other popular tortilla soups are probably why this has been my most requested menu item to hack from the chain. I’m thrilled to have finally cracked it since this is now the go-to tortilla soup recipe at my house.

You’ll notice some standout ingredients, like zucchini, fresh corn kernels, diced Roma tomato, rice, and a garnish of Monterey Jack cheese and avocado, but the ingredient that brings it all together is the significant portion of perfectly seasoned chicken tinga. The shredded chicken tenderizes nicely in the soup and all the components that make it such a tasty tinga contribute great flavor and color to the pot.

For my On the Border Chicken Tortilla Soup recipe, I spent the first day fabricating the best chicken tinga formula I could make. I started with uncooked white and dark chicken fillets but found that a supermarket rotisserie chicken worked even better and saved oodles of time. After removing the skin and bones, I used two forks to shred the chicken and was stoked to get precisely four cups of shredded chicken. I created a tinga sauce with chipotle, tomato, onion, garlic and spices, and combined it with the shredded chicken, then I built the rest of the soup around the tinga.

When your soup is done, you’ll have enough for ten bowls, each garnished with Jack cheese, tortilla strips or chips, cilantro, and a fresh wedge of avocado. The tasty chicken tinga recipe here also makes an excellent filling for tacos, burritos, and enchiladas.

Find more of your favorite On the Border copycat recipes here.

The secret to the signature flavor of the most popular grilled dishes at Carrabba's, including the Pollo Rosa Maria, is a top secret grill baste applied to the food as it cooks. According to servers at the chain, the base formula contains butter, oil, vinegar, and seasoning, and it flames when applied to the grilling chicken, giving the dish a fantastic smoky flavor.

The chain's famous lemon butter sauce and mushrooms top the Fontina cheese and prosciutto-stuffed chicken breasts for an impressive signature entree you can perfectly duplicate with my easy Carrabba's Pollo Rosa Maria copycat recipe below.

Click here for more of your favorite dishes from Carrabba's.

Source: "Top Secret Recipes: Step-by-Step" by Todd Wilbur.

Menu Description: "White and red beans, ground beef, tomatoes and pasta in a savory broth."

It's amazing how many lousy clone recipes for this delicious chili-like soup are floating around. Cooking message boards, and questionable sites that claim to have "actual restaurant recipes" have for years passed off numerous versions that disappoint home chefs. Other formulas leave out major ingredients that you can clearly see in the real thing, like the carrots, or ground beef, or two kinds of beans. Others don't even get the pasta right—it's clearly ditalini pasta, which are short little tubes. If you want the same taste of the original at home, try my Olive Garden Pasta e Fagioli copycat recipe below. It may be the only one that will live up to a side-by-side taste test. Beware of imitation imitations!

Find more of my Olive Garden copycat recipes here.

Update 3/14/25: For a better clone, reduce the amount of pasta to 1/4 pound (1/4 package).

Source: Top Secret Restaurant Recipes 2 by Todd Wilbur.