One of top choices for your salad at this popular Mexican chain is this delicious, slightly spicy chipotle-flavored dressing. A clone for this one is made easily by combining several ingredients in small pan over medium heat and simmering for 5 minutes. The final step involves creating an emulsion to thicken the dressing and to keep the oil from separating. I suggest measuring the oil into a spouted measuring cup. This will make it easy to drizzle the oil in a thin stream into the dressing while you are rapidly whipping the mixture with a wire whisk. If you break a sweat, you’re doing it right.

You may notice that there is no jalapeño mentioned in this recipe. Chipotle is a smoke dried jalapeño. We'll use ground chipotle chili found near the spices in your market.

Source: Top Secret Restaurant Recipes 3 by Todd Wilbur.

Menu Description: "Fresh ripe bananas in our rich vanilla cream, topped with fresh whipped cream or fluffy meringue." 

Bakers get to work by 5 a.m. at Marie Callender's to begin baking over 30 varieties of pies. Huge pies. Pies that weigh nearly three pounds apiece. The fresh, creamy, flaky delicious pies that have made Marie Callender's famous in the food biz. On those mornings about 250 pies will be made at each of the 147 restaurants. Modest, I suppose, when compared with Thanksgiving Day when the stores can make up to 3,500 pies each.

For now though, we'll start with just one—banana cream pie with flaky crust, whipped cream, and slivered almonds on top. This recipe requires that you bake the crust unfilled, so you will have to use a pie weight or other oven-safe object to keep the crust from puffing up. Large pie weights are sold in many stores, or you can use small metal or ceramic weights (sold in packages). Or place dried beans on the crust which has first been lined with aluminum foil or parchment paper.

Source: Top Secret Restaurant Recipes by Todd Wilbur.

On a trip through Maine I saw an sign advertising a lobster sandwich at the world's most famous hamburger chain. Lobster at McDonalds? I just had to get a closer look. When I got inside a woman behind the counter told me that the sandwich is served only at select McDonald's locations, mostly in Maine, for a limited-time only during the summer months. So I ordered one and sat down in the dining room to examine it. When I opened up the wrapper I found chilled fresh lobster chunks tossed in mayonnaise and piled on a hoagie roll with a leaf of lettuce—it's McDonald's version of a lobster roll. I took a bite and it tasted pretty darn good. I ate the whole thing, ordered another one, and got back on the road. Driving off I thought about how strange it was to eat lobster at McDonald's.

Source: Top Secret Recipes Unlocked by Todd Wilbur.

For two years after the first Olive Garden restaurant opened in 1982, operators were still tweaking the restaurant's physical appearance and the food that was served. Even the tomato sauce was changed as many as 25 times. It's that sort of dedication that creates fabulous dishes like this popular soup. It blends the flavors of potatoes, kale, and Italian sausage in a slightly spicy chicken and cream broth. 

Source: Top Secret Restaurant Recipes by Todd Wilbur.

The menu describes the steakhouse chain's popular fruity drink as a "down under frozen wonder with peaches, DeKuyper Peachtree Schnapps, champagne, Smirnoff Vodka and secret mixers." You don't need to use the same brand-name booze as the chain does, but you will need to find a can of Kern's peach nectar. It's the perfect "secret mixer."

Source: Top Secret Recipes: Sodas, Smoothies, Spirits & Shakes by Todd Wilbur.

Menu Description: "Vanilla ice cream rolled in toasted coconut, covered in chocolate sauce and topped with whipped cream."

Here's an easy-to-make dessert that will give you a cool way to use the vanilla ice cream that's gathering ice crystals in the freezer. The key to this recipe is to plan ahead a bit by placing your serving plates into the freezer (give 'em at least 30 minutes). While the plates are chilling out, toast some coconut in the oven, then roll scoops of ice cream in it. Top your masterpiece with canned whipped cream or make your own from the simple recipe included here.

Source: Top Secret Restaurant Recipes 2 by Todd Wilbur.

It's the white, creamy broth in the original version of this delicious soup that adds unnecessary fat grams. By replacing the fat-filled dairy ingredients from the original with fat-free milk and chicken broth, and by using lean Italian turkey sausage, we can whack around fifteen grams of fat off the original version.

Nutrition Facts
Serving size–1 1/2 cups
Total servings–3
Calories per serving–196 (Original–275)
Fat per serving–4.5g (Original–19g)

Source: Low-Fat Top Secret Recipes by Todd Wilbur.

This Outback margarita will quench and soothe—just what the doctor ordered. A mildly fruity on-the-rocks margarita is powerful ammunition in any home bartender's arsenal of party cocktails. I like tequila. Tequila is my friend. But watch yourself. If you get to the bottom of too many of these tasty pink drinks you might feel like a used pinata in the morning.

Source: Top Secret Recipes: Sodas, Smoothies, Spirits & Shakes by Todd Wilbur.

Menu Description: “An extra generous pecan brownie is crowned with rich vanilla ice cream, drizzled with our classic warm chocolate sauce and finished with chocolate shavings and whipped cream. A chocolate lover’s dream.”

The gluten-free brownie under the ice cream and homemade whipped cream is a flourless chocolate pecan cake cut into squares. Once the brownie is baked, it is chilled and sliced, then each serving is nuked for about 45 seconds until gooey hot. The fun really starts when you load a huge scoop of vanilla ice cream on top of the hot brownie and then drizzle some warm fudge sauce over the top. Outback cooks make the sauce from scratch each day, but it tastes similar to Hershey’s Hot Fudge Topping that you can get in just about any market. The homemade whipped cream formula here is easy and better than anything that comes out of a can. 

Source: Top Secret Restaurant Recipes 3 by Todd Wilbur.

The salad dressings are made fresh in each Outback Steakhouse kitchen using authentic ingredients, including olive oil from Italy's Tuscany region and Parmesan cheese that comes from eighty-pound wheels rolled in from Parma, Italy.

Salad dressings are usually one of the most fat-contributing components in your meal, but with a few tweaks, we can clone Outback's delicious salad dressing with only two grams of fat per serving.

Nutrition Facts
Serving size–1/4 cup
Total servings–6
Calories per serving–51 (Original–331)
Fat per serving–2g (Original–35g)

Source: Low-Fat Top Secret Recipes by Todd Wilbur.

Menu Description: "Six colossal shrimp dipped in beer batter, rolled in coconut, deep-fried to a golden brown and served with marmalade sauce."

The three founders of Outback Steakhouse are an experienced lot of restaurateurs. Tim Gannon, Chris Sullivan, and Bob Basham had each worked for the Steak & Ale chain of restaurants at one time or another, as well as other large casual dining chains. When the three got together to open a few restaurants in the Tampa, Florida area, they had modest ambitions.

Basham told Food & Beverage magazine, "We figured if we divided up the profits with what we thought we could make out of five or six restaurants, we could have a very nice lifestyle and play a lot of golf." The first six restaurants opened within 13 months. Eight years later the chain had grown to over 300 restaurants, and the three men now have a very, nice lifestyle.

Coconut Shrimp is a sweet and crispy fried appetizer not found on most other menus, especially with the delicious marmalade sauce. Outback servers claim it's a top seller.

At the restaurant chain, you get six of these shrimp to serve two as an appetizer, but since we're taking the time to make the batter and use all of that oil, I thought I'd up the yield to a dozen shrimp to serve four as an appetizer. If you don't want to make that many, you can use the same recipe with fewer shrimp and save the leftover batter to make more later or just pitch it.

Source: Top Secret Restaurant Recipes 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 disapoint 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 taste of Olive Garden's famous Pasta e Fagioli at home, this may be the only recipe that will live up to a side-by-side taste test. Beware of imitation imitations!

Source: Top Secret Restaurant Recipes 2 by Todd Wilbur.

Menu Description: "Parmesan, Romano and mozzarella cheese, clams and herb breadcrumbs baked in mushroom caps."

Breadcrumbs, clams and three types of cheese are baked into white mushroom caps in this clone of a top pick from Olive Garden's appetizer menu. Mix all the stuffing ingredients together in a bowl, fill the mushroom caps, sprinkle on some minced red bell pepper, cover the mushrooms with a blanket of mozzarella cheese slices, and bake. After 15 minutes you'll have a great appetizer or hors doeuvre for 4 to 6 people—that's twice the serving size of the dish from the restaurant.

Source: Top Secret Restaurant Recipes 2 by Todd Wilbur.

You don't need rum to make a great mojito—just check out this variation on one of the most popular cocktails of the new millennium. Where white rum is usually found in this drink, America's largest casual Mexican food chain mixes in silver tequila and Cointreau orange liqueur. Add to that a little sweet-and-sour mix and a squirt of agave syrup and you have a tasty mash-up of margarita and mojito. Agave syrup is used as a sugar substitute, and it can be found in many markets now, or in specialty and health food stores. The same brand of agave syrup On the Border uses in this drink (Wholesome) can be found at Whole Foods.

Source: Top Secret Restaurant Recipes 3 by Todd Wilbur.

This flavor variation from the Orange Julius company may be called Banana Julius, but they also add a little orange juice to the mix. Make sure your bananas are ripe for this clone, so you get a nice sweet drink with the perfect thickness.

Source: Top Secret Recipes Unlocked by Todd Wilbur.

Coffeehouses have replaced many of the old Orange Julius stands, but there's still a nostalgic group of us who long for the frothy juice drinks invented decades ago by Julius Freed. Today Orange Julius has tailored its business to meet the changing demands of its customers by including several varieties of fruit drinks and updated smoothies on its menu. But it's the foamy fruit juice creation developed in the late twenties that made the company famous, and that's what I've cloned here in an improved version that's found in the book Top Secret Recipes: Sodas, Smoothies, Spirits, & Shakes. The flavor and consistency is better now, plus we use the blender to dissolve the sugar before adding the ice. Use pasteurized egg whites found packaged in your local supermarket or just use egg substitute, which is also made from pasteurized egg whites.

Source: Top Secret Recipes: Sodas, Smoothies, Spirits & Shakes by Todd Wilbur.

Menu Description: "Made fresh to order, with ripe avocados and choice of tomatoes, jalapenos, cilantro, red onions and fresh lime juice. Enough to share."

This 160-unit casual Mexican chain makes a nice tableside guacamole that you can easily duplicate for your amigos. This is the basic formula, but you can freely adjust it to suit the tastes of your crew. It's also easy to double it (or more) for a bigger fiesta, if that's the plan. You may want to put the avocados into the fridge for an hour or two before you open them up. This guac is much better when slightly chilled.

Source: Top Secret Restaurant Recipes 3 by Todd Wilbur.

In the first book, Top Secret Recipes, I included a recipe for homemade Orange Julius that was often requested for demonstrations on TV talk shows. Just about every time I did those demos I was asked how to make other Julius flavors. So here they are: strawberry and pineapple. Each one is made like the orange version but has chunks of real fruit thrown in, just like the real thing.

Source: More Top Secret Recipes by Todd Wilbur.

As the trend for fruit smoothies surged in the 1990s, the Orange Julius company didn't want to be left out. Orange Julius popularized the fruit smoothie with the original Orange Julius blended drink back in 1926. But as thicker smoothie drinks of more complex blends became popular, Orange Julius put a twist on fruity beverages with a secret ingredient that is dumped into the blender along with the fruit. They also add a scoop of the original powdery compound added to the "Julius" drinks. This new powder, called coconut-almond compound, includes a frothing and thickening agent, plus a hint of coconut and almond flavorings. Now you can clone your own version of the most popular variety of the chain's Classic Smoothie using coconut syrup and almond extract as part of your own homemade secret recipe.

Source: Top Secret Recipes Unlocked by Todd Wilbur.

Who is Otis Spunkmeyer? Actually, he does not exist. The character who flies around in the plane pictured on the product labels, searching the world for premium ingredients, is just a catchy name dreamed up by founder Ken Rawling's 12-year-old daughter.

The company offers low-fat versions of many of its 11 varieties of muffins, but they are more difficult to track down than the original versions. 

This reduced-fat conversion clone recipe of the famous Texas-size muffins has 4 grams of fat per serving, or 8 grams total—quite a reduction compared to the original muffins, which have a total of 22 grams of fat each.

Nutrition Facts
Serving size–1/2 muffin
Total servings–16
Calories per serving–142 (Original–220)
Fat per serving–4g (Original–11g)

Source: Top Secret Recipes Lite by Todd Wilbur.

In Cayce, South Carolina, Otis Spunkmeyer muffins were manufactured with state-of-the-art robotic equipment that would make R2-D2 jealous. The amazing machines do everything from packaging 130 muffins per minute to sealing up the cartons for a quick shipment to stores across the country.

This Top Secret Recipes reduced-fat clone version uses unsweetened applesauce to keep the muffins moist and to help replace fat.

Nutrition Facts
Serving size–1/2 muffin
Total servings–16
Calories per serving–16 (Original–240)
Fat per serving–5.5g (Original–13g)

Source: Low-Fat Top Secret Recipes by Todd Wilbur.

If you've had the Kookaburra Wings from Outback, then you've tasted the chain's thick and creamy bleu cheese dressing served on the side. Use this hack when you need a dipping sauce for your next batch of wings, or pour it on a salad.

Source: Top Secret Restaurant Recipes 2 by Todd Wilbur.

Menu Description: "An Outback Ab-Original from Russell's Marina Bay."

If you go to an Outback Steakhouse expecting exotic Aussie prairie food that someone like Crocodile Dundee would have enjoyed, you're gonna be a bit disappointed, mate. Except for a little Australia-themed paraphernalia on the walls, like boomerangs and pictures of kangaroos, the restaurant chain is about as "down under" as McDonald's is Scottish. The three founders, Tim Gannon, Chris Sullivan, and Bob Basham, are all U.S. boys. And the menu, which is about 60 percent beef, contains mainly American fare with cute Australian names like The Melbourne, Jackeroo Chops, and Chicken on the Barbie.

The founders say they chose the Aussie themes because "Most Australians are fun-loving and gregarious people and very casual people. We thought that's exactly the kind of friendliness and atmosphere we want to have in our restaurants."

In only six years, Outback Steakhouse has become the number one steakhouse chain—in part because of the Bloomin' Onion: a large, deep-fried onion sliced to look like a flower in bloom that was created by one of the restaurant's founders. What makes the appetizer so appealing besides its flowery appearance is the onion's crispy spiced coating, along with with the delicious dipping sauce, cleverly presented in the center of the onion.

The restaurant uses a special device to make the slicing process easier, but you can make the incisions with a sharp knife. It just takes a steady hand and a bit of care. This is how they did it in the early days of the chain.

Source: Top Secret Restaurant Recipes by Todd Wilbur.

Roll a scoop of creamy vanilla ice cream in homemade candied pecans. Surround the ice cream with warm cinnamon apples and drizzle caramel over the top. Sprinkle fresh cinnamon-butter croutons on the dessert and you've got an irresistible clone that will make your diet cry "uncle!" For the croutons, the restaurant uses leftover Honey Wheat Bushman Bread (the clone is here). If you don't have plans to make the bread from scratch, you can use any sweet bread from the store, such as Hawaiian Sweet Bread or Pillsbury Honey White Bread.

Source: Top Secret Restaurant Recipes 2 by Todd Wilbur.

The beginning of the graham cracker goes back to the early 1800s when Sylvester Graham thought his new invention was the secret to a lifetime of perfect health, even sexual prowess—certainly extraordinary claims for a cracker. But this came from the man thought to be quite a wacko in his time, since he had earlier claimed that eating ketchup could ruin your brain. So, while his crispy whole wheat creation was not the cure for every known ailment, the sweet crackers still became quite a fad, first in New England around the 1830s and then spreading across the country. Today, graham crackers remain popular as a low-fat, snack-time munchable, and, most notably, as the main ingredient in smores.

You don't need to use graham flour for this recipe, since that stuff is similar to the whole wheat flour you find in your local supermarket. Just pick your favorite variety among these three clones of Nabisco's most popular crackers, and be sure to roll out the dough paper thin.

Nutrition Facts
Serving size–2 crackers
Total servings–22
Calories per serving–120
Fat per serving–3g

Source: Low-Fat Top Secret Recipes by Todd Wilbur.

Outback makes their sauces and salad dressings from scratch every day following master formulas in a corporate cookbook. Now you've got a secret recipe of your own that will duplicate the taste of their hugely popular house honey mustard recipe. You'll need just three basic ingredients and only about two minutes of free time to make it.

Source: Top Secret Restaurant Recipes 2 by Todd Wilbur.

Mix it together, heat it up, cool it down, and store it in the fridge until salad time.

Source: Top Secret Restaurant Recipes 2 by Todd Wilbur.

Restaurateurs Chris Sullivan, Robert Basham, and Timothy Gannon knew they wanted an Australian theme for their new steakhouse and hunkered down to come up with a name. Robert's wife Beth pulled out her lipstick and started writing names on a mirror. "Outback" jumped out as the best name among the choices. While looking for Windex a little later, the group wondered why they didn't bother to look for a pen and a piece of paper.

This creamy onion soup has become a favorite item on the Outback menu. With this formula, you'll get all the flavor of the original with only one-third the fat.

Nutrition Facts
Serving size–1 cup
Total servings–8
Calories per serving–144 (Original–230)
Fat per serving–5.8g (Original–17g)

Source: Low-Fat Top Secret Recipes by Todd Wilbur.

One of the most popular and hard-to-pronounce items on the Olive Garden menu is found in the soup column. It's more like chili than a soup, really, with all those beans and veggies and ground beef in there. The reduced-fat grams in this clone are especially important when we consider that this dish makes an excellent meal by itself, and you may want to eat more than the 1 1/2-cup serving size measured for the nutrition stats.

We'll keep the added fat to a minimum by sauteing the veggies in what little fat is not drained off from browning the lean ground beef. The soup will fill your mouth with flavor so it won't matter that we aren't adding additional fat. You'll have a hard time distinguishing between this version and the original. Try it.

This recipe makes about eight 1 1/3-cup servings. If you can't eat it within a few days, it freezes well.

Nutrition Facts
Serving size–1 1/2 cups
Total servings–8
Calories per serving–312 (Original–416)
Fat per serving–4g (Original–17.5g)

Source: Top Secret Recipes Lite by Todd Wilbur.

After baking the big 'ol muffins, Otis Spunkmeyer freezes them so that they stay fresh on the way to the stores. Vendors thaw out the tasty baked goodies before displaying them on their shelves. Even after the muffins reach room temperature, they still have a very impressive shelf life of twenty-one days.

You can also freeze the muffins you make with this reduced-fat clone recipe. Just wait until they cool, then wrap the muffins in plastic wrap, and toss them in the freezer. And remember, the shelf life of your version without preservatives will be much less than that of the real McCoy, so dive into those muffins post haste.

Nutrition Facts
Serving size–1/2 muffin
Total servings–16
Calories per serving–165 (Original–210)
Fat per serving–4 g (Original–11g)

Founder Ken Rawlings opened his first baked cookie store in San Francisco in 1977, and over the next five years the chain had grown to 22 stores throughout California. In 1990, after much success, Rawlings' Otis Spunkmeyer Company started selling ready-to-bake cookie dough in grocery stores. That same year the company acquired a Modesto, California, muffin manufacturer, and Otis Spunkmeyer Muffins were born. Since then, the company has seen a 1,200 percent increase in muffins sales, and today this is America's best-selling brand of muffins.

The banana-nut variety is my favorite, normally with 24 grams of fat per muffin. Real banana is a perfect substitute for much of the fat. Even with a small amount of oil in there, and the walnuts on top, these tasty Texas-size Otis Spunkmeyer banana nut muffins weigh in with less than half the fat of the original.

Nutrition Facts
Serving size–1/2 muffin
Total servings–16
Calories per serving–147 (Original–240)
Fat per serving–5g (Original–12g)

Source: Top Secret Recipes Lite by Todd Wilbur.

Menu Description: "Oven-baked smoked mozzarella, provolone, parmesan and romano cheese. Served with Tuscan bread."

Olive Garden's take on the Italian melted cheese dip includes smoked mozzarella combined with grated Parmesan, Romano, and provolone cheese, and lots of thyme. When making your clone, be sure to slice the waxy rind off the smoked mozzarella before you grate it. That part does not taste good. After slowly melting the mozzarella, Parmesan, and Romano in a small saucepan with half-and-half, pour the creamy mixture into a shallow dish, top it with a slice of provolone, and pop it under the broiler until light brown. Serve your hot fonduta with baguette slices, bagel chips, or crackers.

Source: Top Secret Restaurant Recipes 3 by Todd Wilbur.
 

This is a classic Italian dish, but with cheese and cream and butter in the traditional version, you can get a whopping seventy grams of fat in a single plateful. For this conversion, well replace those fatty ingredients with substitutes such as evaporated skim milk, fat-free milk, Butter Buds, and a great cheese-like substance made from straining yogurt with a coffee filter.

To easily prepare this useful ingredient, well use a technique that I picked up from watching Graham Kerr, the once-galloping gourmet. Graham loves to use this yogurt cheese in many of his low-fat dishes that require a creamy white sauce, traditionally made with fatty foodstuffs. This fat-free substitute is made by straining the whey from the yogurt with a coffee filter. Place a filter into a large strainer or metal steamer basket in a covered saucepan overnight in the refrigerator. As the hours tick by, the whey slowly drips from the yogurt, leaving a thick, creamy substance in the filter. The liquid in the bottom of the pan is chucked out, and you measure the yogurt cheese left in the coffee filter for the recipe.

Using this technique, we can shave something like forty-nine grams of fat off the traditional recipe for fettuccine alfredo presented at the country's largest Italian restaurant chain. This recipe makes two huge dinner-size entrees like they serve at the restaurant, though you might prefer to divide this into four more modest servings.

Nutrition Facts
Serving size–4 cups
Total servings–2 
Calories per serving–1035 (Original–1236)
Fat per serving–18g (Original–67g)

Source: Low Fat Top Secret Recipes by Todd Wilbur.

In 1867, infant mortality rates in Vevey, Switzerland, had been climbing and Henri Nestle was working hard on a concoction of concentrated milk, sugar, and cereal for babies who were refusing their mother's milk. Eventually he discovered a formula that helped infants stay strong and healthy. He called his new product Farine Lactee and merged with two American brothers, Charles and George Page, who came to Switzerland to capitalize on Swiss canned milk technology. Their new company was called Nestle and Anglo-Swiss Condensed Milk Company, and quickly expanded into fifteen other countries. Seven years later, Nestle sold the company to three local businessmen for one million francs.

The new company kept the Nestle name and started selling chocolate in 1904. In 1929, the company acquired Cailler, the first company to mass-produce chocolate bars, and Swiss General, the company credited with inventing milk chocolate. This company was the core of the chocolate business as we know it today. The Nestle Crunch bar was introduced in 1928 and is now the company's top-selling candy bar.

Source: More Top Secret Recipes by Todd Wilbur.

Beneath the chocolate of Nestle's popular candy bar is a chewy, peanut-covered center that resembles Hershey's PayDay. To clone this one we'll only have to make a couple adjustments to the PayDay clone recipe, then add the milk chocolate coating. Even though the wrapper of this candy bar calls the center "nougat," it's more of a white or blonde fudge that you can make in a saucepan on your stovetop with a candy thermometer.

Source: Even More Top Secret Recipes by Todd Wilbur.

Nestle is the world's largest packaged food manufacturer, coffee roaster, and chocolate maker. It is the largest single company in Switzerland today, but Nestle derives only 2 percent of its revenue from its home country.

The company is quite diverse. Nestle's product lines include beverages and drinks, chocolate and candy, dairy products, and frozen foods. The company also operates more than thirty Stouffer Hotels and owns 25 percent of the French cosmetics giant L'Oreal. In the United States, where the company is called Nestle USA, it ranks third behind Mars, Inc., and Hershey in chocolate sales.

This candy bar was introduced in 1966 as the $100,000 Bar, then its name was changed to 100 Grand Bar in 1985.

Source: More Top Secret Recipes by Todd Wilbur.

For five thousand years tea was served hot. But when a heat wave hit the World’s Fair in St. Louis in 1904, tea plantation owner Richard Blechynden couldn’t give the steamy stuff away. So he poured it over ice, creating the first iced tea, and the drink became the hit of the fair. Today Nestlé’s drink division, which markets Nestea, produces somewhere in the area of 50 percent of the world’s processed tea. That’s huge business when you consider that tea is second only to water in worldwide beverage consumption.

Source: Top Secret Recipes: Sodas, Smoothies, Spirits & Shakes by Todd Wilbur.

To dispel the urban legend of the $250 recipe in the infamous chain letter, Neiman Marcus created an actual recipe for chocolate chip cookies and displayed it on the Neiman Marcus Web site. Since I get so many request for that formula, I'm posting the real Neiman Marcus recipe here. 

One of the favorite SnackWell's creations are the very low-fat snack bars that come in several varieties, including apple raisin, banana, golden cake, and this one, which tastes like a brownie. But, while a single full-fat brownie might contain around 6 to 10 grams of fat, this snack bar weighs in with just a fraction of that—only 2 grams of fat per serving.

The secret to keeping the fat to a minimum in this recipe is the use of egg whites, corn syrup, and chocolate syrup. These fat-free ingredients help to replace much of the fat that would be found in the traditional recipe, while keeping the finished product moist and chewy, and filled with flavor.

Nutrition Facts
Serving Size–1 bar
Servings–21
Calories per serving–144
Fat per serving–2g

Source: Top Secret Recipes Lite by Todd Wilbur.

Nabisco unveiled a line of reduced-fat products in 1992 with the introduction of SnackWell's Devil's Food cookie cakes. The product was an instant hit with demand quickly outstripping supply, leaving store shelves empty. The company poked fun at the situation with a series of humorous TV spots, featuring the dweebish "Cookie Man" hounded by pushy shoppers trying to get their hands on his cookies. The successful product launch was followed with the introduction of dozens of new SnackWell's products through the years, including Apple Raisin Snack Bars. Our clone uses a secret combination of unsweetened applesauce along with molasses and apple juice to keep the cake moist and tasty.

Nutrition Facts
Serving size–1 bar
Total servings–21
Calories per serving–120
Fat per serving–1.7g

Source: Low-Fat Top Secret Recipes by Todd Wilbur.

Nabisco took great effort to produce reduced-fat versions of the most popular products created by the food giant. This product loyalty-retaining move is just good business. According to one Nabisco spokesperson, "We want to bring back the people who have enjoyed our products, but went away for health and diet reasons." And that's exactly what we see happening, as customers are now grabbing the boxes with "Less Fat" printed on them. This box says, "Reduced fat: 40% less fat than original Cheese Nips."

The secret ingredient for this clone of the popular little square crackers is the fat-free cheese sprinkles by Molly McButter. One 2-ounce shaker of the stuff will do it, and you won't use it all. Just keep in mind that cheese powder is pretty salty, so you may want to go very easy on salting the tops of the crackers 

Nutrition Facts 
Serving size–31 crackers 
Total servings–about 10 
Fat per serving–3.5g 
Calories per serving–105

Source: Top Secret Recipes Lite by Todd Wilbur.

At one time Nabisco actually conducted a study to determined that 50 percent of Oreo consumers twist the cookie apart before eating it. I guess this is important information, since it concerns the world's top-selling cookie. Historians at Nabisco aren't sure who came up with the idea for this sandwich cookie back in 1912, but they do know that it was introduced along with two other cookie creations that have long since died. The name may have come from the Greek word for mountain, oreo, which would once have made sense because the first test version was hill-shaped. When the Oreo was first sold to the public, it was much larger than today's cookie, but it kept shrinking over the years until Nabisco realized it had become too small and had to enlarge it again to today's current 1 3/4-inch diameter. 

In 1975, Nabisco figured we couldn't have too much of a good thing, so the company gave us Double Stuf Oreos, with twice the filling. But why stop there? Now you're free to pile as much "stuf" on your cookies as you like.

Source: More Top Secret Recipes by Todd Wilbur. 

Watch this video demo: How to Clone an Oreo Cookie (plus how to make a really BIG Oreo!).

Menu Description: "Delicate white cake and lemon cream filling with a vanilla crumb topping."

To make this clone easy I've designed the recipe with white cake mix. I picked Betty Crocker brand, but any white cake mix you find will do. Just know that each brand (Duncan Hines, Pillsbury, etc.) requires slightly different measurements of additional ingredients (oil, eggs). Follow the directions on the box for mixing the batter, then pour it into a greased 10-inch springform pan and bake until done. The filling recipe is a no-brainer and the crumb topping is quick. When your cake is assembled, stick it in the fridge for a few hours, and soon you'll be ready to serve 12 slices of the hacked signature Olive Garden dessert.

Source: Top Secret Restaurant Recipes 2 by Todd Wilbur.

Menu Description: "Fresh vegetables, beans and pasta in a light tomato broth—a vegetarian classic."

This classic Italian soup is jam-packed with beans, zucchini, onion, tomatoes, carrots, pasta, and spices; but O.G.'s secret formula doesn't include chicken broth. Canned vegetable broth found in the soup aisle of most markets works as a base here in this secret formula that bursts with flavor as a purely vegetarian dish.

Source: Top Secret Restaurant Recipes 2 by Todd Wilbur.

Cranberries, white chocolate chips, walnuts, and rolled oats get together in this recreation of a cookie that's not only great for the holidays but will also turn the regular days into something special. As with any proper Mrs. Fields cookie clone, these cookies will, at first, seem underdone when they come out of the oven. But when the cookies cool down you will have a couple dozen of the sweet treats with slightly crispy edges and soft, gooey centers.

Source: Top Secret Recipes Unlocked by Todd Wilbur.

Menu Description: "Grilled beef medallions drizzled with balsamic glaze, served over fettuccine tossed with spinach and gorgonzola-alfredo sauce."

This menu item builds on Olive Garden's great alfredo sauce recipe with the addition of gorgonzola cheese. The tangy cheese sauce works well with the sweet-and-sour balsamic reduction drizzled over the beef medallions. Find three 6-ounce sirloin steaks or whatever cut you prefer and slice each of them into four 1 1/2-ounce fillets. Get pounding with a kitchen mallet and make those steaks about 1/2-inch thick and they will grill up to same size as the medallions on the original dish. Between the pounding and the meat tenderizer in the beef seasoning, you will turn even the cheapest cut of beef into a tender morsel. Build your dish as described below and you will have re-created the taste and presentation of the original rich, tasty, fulfilling dish.

Source: Top Secret Restaurant Recipes 3 by Todd Wilbur.

You can only get this delicious stuff in the restaurant and they won't give you much extra to take home. The good news is you can make it from scratch in minutes (you will need to find anchovy paste—an important ingredient). This dressing keeps for a couple weeks in the fridge in a covered container.

Source: Top Secret Restaurant Recipes by Todd Wilbur.

It's been an Iowa tradition since 1926, and today this sandwich has a huge cult following. It's similar to a traditional hamburger, but the ground beef is not formed into a patty. Instead, the lightly seasoned meat lies uncompressed on a white bun, dressed with mustard, minced onion, and dill pickles. Since the meat is loose, the sandwich is always served with a spoon for scooping up the ground beef that will inevitably fall out.

When this clone recipe for Maid-Rite was originally posted on our Web site several years ago, it elicited more e-mail than any recipe in the site's history. Numerous Midwesterners were keyboard-ready to insist that the clone was far from accurate without the inclusion of a few bizarre ingredients, the most common of which was Coca-Cola. One letter states: "You evidently have not ever had a Maid-Rite. The secret to the Maid-Rite is coke syrup. Without it you cannot come close to the taste." Another e-mail reads: "Having lived in the Midwest all of my life and knowing not only the owners of a Maid-Rite restaurant but also many people who worked there, I can tell you that one of the things you left out of your recipe is Coca-Cola. Not a lot, just enough to keep the meat moist."

On the flip side, I received comments such as this one from an Iowa fan who lived near Don Taylor's original Maid-Rite franchise: "The secret to the best Maid-Rite is the whole beef. Don had a butcher shop in his basement where he cut and ground all his beef. Some people still swear they added seasoning, but that is just not true. Not even pepper."

Back in my lab, no matter how hard I examined the meat in the original product—which was shipped to me in dry ice directly from Don Taylor's original store in Marshalltown, Iowa—I could not detect Coca-Cola. there's no sweetness to the meat at all, although the buns themselves seem to include some sugar. When the buns are chewed with the meat, the sandwich does taste mildly sweet. I finally decided that Coca-Cola syrup is not part of the recipe. If it is added to the meat in the Maid-Rite stores, it's an insignificant amount that does not have any noticeable effect on the flavor.

Also, the texture is important, so adding plenty of liquid to the simmering meat is crucial. This clone recipe requires 1 cup of water in addition to 1/4 cup of beef broth. By simmering the ground beef in this liquid for a couple hours the meat will tenderize and become infused with a little flavor, just like the real thing.

When the liquid is gone, form the ground beef into a 1/2 cup measuring scoop, dump it onto the bottom of a plain hamburger bun, then add your choice of mustard, onions, and pickles. Adding ketchup is up to you, although it's not an ingredient found in Maid-Rite stores. Many say that back in the early days "hobos" would swipe the ketchup and mix it with water to make tomato soup. Free ketchup was nixed from the restaurants way back then, and the custom has been in place ever since.

Source: Top Secret Recipes Unlocked by Todd Wilbur.

When the first Big Mac was served by a McDonald's franchisee in 1968, it was a time when all food in America was prepared with little attention to the amount of fat. Some low-calorie products had been developed, but they were not hugely popular, and most Americans ate and prepared food using whatever ingredients made it taste the best. Around 27 years later, McDonald's responded to the public's rapidly changing, health-conscious eating habits with the McLean Deluxe, a burger with a significantly reduced amount of fat. But the McLean Deluxe was not a commercial success; it never even came close to selling as fast as the other McDonald's burgers. Soon, the McLean Deluxe was history. And today, as reduced-fat products in supermarkets are selling faster than ever, McDonald's has not replaced the McLean Deluxe on its menu. The Big Mac is still king, with its 31 grams of fat. Here's a clone to make a version of the Big Mac at home with less than half the fat of the original.

Nutrition Facts
Serving size–1 burger
Total servings–2
Calories per serving–500 (Original–560)
Fat per serving–13g (Original–31g)

Source: Top Secret Restaurant Recipes Lite by Todd Wilbur.