per month

($23.88 annually)*
Save $12 vs. monthly

Includes eight (8) 79¢ recipes of your choice each month!

Just like the pro chefs use. A secret blend of herbs and spices that will make your homemade steaks taste like they came from a famous steakhouse chain. All-natural. Contains no MSG or preservatives. Great for anyone who likes a truly amazing steak.

Top Secret Steak Rub is created by Food Hacker Todd Wilbur who has spent the last 30 years reverse-engineering popular menu items at the most-loved restaurant chains across America. By identifying the herbs, spices and other ingredients that make great restaurant food taste so good, Todd created this custom Top Secret Steak Rub to help you make restaurant-style steaks at home. All it takes is just a few shakes. Then cook the steaks your favorite way. Our Top Secret Steak Rub is also great on hamburger patties, vegetables, French fries, and popcorn!

Buy up to 5 bottles to ship for one low price!

7-ounce bottle. Money back guarantee. Kosher certified. Gluten-free.

You may also like our Top Secret Chicken Rub, and Top Secret Fish Rub.

per month*

Includes eight (8) 79¢ recipes of your choice each month!

If you like McDonald's Big Mac Sauce, you'll love Todd Wilbur's McDonald's-inspired special burger sauce.

Created by food hacker Todd Wilbur, host of Top Secret Recipe and best-selling author of 12 Top Secret Recipes cookbooks, this sauce is inspired by the special Big Mac sauce McDonald's uses on their world-famous hamburgers.

Use our Top Secret Burger Sauce on your own burgers, sandwiches and wraps.

Buy up to 4 bottles to ship for one low price! 

10-ounce bottle.

You might also like our Top Secret Burger Spread (like In-N-Out) and our Top Secret Chicken Sandwich Sauce (like Chick-fil-A).

Ingredients: Soybean oil, cucumbers, sugar, water, white distilled vinegar, eggs, salt, mustard seed, corn syrup, onions, natural flavors, spices, Xanthan gum, garlic, turmeric, lemon juice, pimento, soy protein, preservatives, paprika, citric acid, annatto, Autolyzed yeast, sunflower oil.

Nutritional facts: Serving size 1 tbsp. Servings per container 20. Amount per serving: Calories 70, Total Fat 7g, Saturated Fat 1g, Trans Fat 0g, Cholesterol 5mg, Sodium 125mg, Total Carbohydrate 2g, Dietary fiber 0g, Sugars 1g, Protein 0g.

Save money with this combo pack. You get all three of Todd Wilbur's "Top Secret Steak Rub," "Top Secret Chicken Rub," and "Top Secret Fish Rub" for more than $10 off the retail price!

A secret blend of herbs and spices that will make your homemade steaks, chicken, and fish taste like they came from a famous restaurant! All-natural. Contains no MSG or preservatives. Great for anyone who likes to make a truly tasty meal in no time!

These rubs were created by identifying the herbs, spices and other ingredients that make restaurant food taste so great. "Food Hacker," Todd Wilbur, who has been reverse-engineering popular menu items for the past 30 years, studied dishes at the most loved chains across the country to develop his own proprietary rubs with the best tasting combination of ingredients. 

Your combo pack gives you THREE 6-ounce bottles. 1 Chicken Rub, 1 Steak Rub, 1 Fish Rub. (No substitutions please).

Money-back guarantee. Kosher certified. Gluten-free.

You may also like Todd Wilbur's "Hell Flakes".

This unique blend of five ripe ground chili peppers of varying intensity wakes up practically any dish, adding awesome flavor and perfect—but not overwhelming—heat. The peppers included in the blend range from sweet (bell) to hot (habanero). The sweet hits your tongue first, then the hot creeps in.

Hell Flakes does NOT contain salt, vinegar, MSG or other ingredients found in liquid hot sauces—you get just pure chili flavor!

Hell Flakes is made from 100% natural chili peppers, which are a thermogenic, anti-inflammatory food. Capsaicin in the peppers helps to supercharge your metabolism so that you burn calories even after you've finished eating, and the peppers have an anti-inflammatory effect on your body to help give you relief from aches and pains.

Hell Flakes takes crushed red pepper flakes to the next level with smaller flakes and better flavor. Hell Flakes comes in a long-lasting flip-top shaker bottle to distribute the micro-flakes perfectly over your food. 

Our award-winning Hell Flakes were developed by food hacker Todd Wilbur, host of Top Secret Recipe on CMT-TV, and author of 12 Top Secret Recipes cookbooks.Buy up to 3 bottles to ship for one low price!

1.9-ounce shaker bottle. Money-back guarantee. Kosher certified. Gluten-free.

You may also like Top Secret Steak Rub and Top Secret Chicken Rub.

Just like the pro chefs use. If you like restaurant-style rotisserie chicken, you'll go crazy over our Top Secret Chicken Rub. It's a secret blend of spices that will make your homemade chicken taste like it came from a famous rotisserie chicken chain. All natural. Contains no MSG or preservatives. Great for anyone who loves chicken.

Top Secret Chicken Rub is created by Food Hacker Todd Wilbur who has spent the last 30 years reverse-engineering popular menu items at the most-loved restaurant chains across America. By identifying the herbs, spices and other ingredients that make great restaurant food taste so good, Todd created this custom Top Secret Chicken Rub to help you make amazing rotisserie-style chicken at home. All it takes is just a few shakes. Then cook the chicken your favorite way.

Buy up to 5 bottles to ship for one low price!

5.8-ounce bottle. Money back guarantee. Kosher certified. Gluten-free.

You may also like our Top Secret Steak Rub and our Top Secret Fish Rub.

If you like Chick-fil-A's sandwich sauce, you'll love this.

Created by food hacker Todd Wilbur, host of Top Secret Recipe and best-selling author of 12 Top Secret Recipes cookbooks, this copycat Chick-fil-A sauce is inspired by the sweet and smoky secret chicken sandwich sauce that is the top pick at the restaurant. 

Use it on chicken, ham and turkey sandwiches, or as a delicious dipping sauce for chicken fingers and nuggets.

Buy up to 4 bottles to ship for one low price!

11-ounce bottle. Money-back guarantee.

You might also like our Top Secret Burger Special Sauce (like McDonald's Big Mac Sauce) and our Top Secret Chicken Tender Sauce (like Zaxby's and that other famous chicken finger sauce).

Ingredients: Soybean oil, sugar, water, vinegars, eggs, tomato paste, mustard seed, salt, corn syrup, lemon juice, natural smoke flavor, preservatives, garlic, Xanthan gum, onions, red chili peppers, citric acid, turmeric, paprika, annatto, spices.

Nutritional Facts: Serving Size 1 tbsp. Servings per Container 21. Amount per Serving: Calories 90, Total Fat 8 g, Cholesterol 10mg, Sodium 75mg, Total Carbohydrate 3g, Dietary Fiber 0g, Sugars 3g, Protein 0g.

If you like In-N-Out's burger spread, you'll love Top Secret Recipes Secret Burger Spread.

Created by food hacker Todd Wilbur, host of Top Secret Recipe and best-selling author of 12 Top Secret Recipes cookbooks, this sauce is inspired by the secret spread In-N-Out uses on their world-famous hamburgers.

Use our Top Secret Burger Spread on your own burgers, sandwiches, and wraps.

Buy up to 4 bottles to ship for one low price! 

11-ounce bottle. Money-back guarantee.

You might also like our Top Secret Burger Special Sauce (like McDonald's Big Mac Sauce) and our Top Secret Chicken Sandwich Sauce (like Chick-fil-A).

Ingredients. Vegetable oils, cucumbers, water, tomatoes, white distilled vinegar, eggs, high fructose corn syrup, corn syrup, salt, onions, sugar, mustard seed, Natural flavors, spices, Xanthan gum, turmeric, preservatives, lemon juice, garlic, citric acid, paprika, annatto.

Nutrition Facts: Serving Size 1 tbsp. Servings per container 26. Amount per serving: Calories 70, Total Fat 7g, Cholesterol 5mg, Sodium 135mg, Total Carbohydrate 1g, Dietary Fiber 0g, Total Sugars 1g, Protein 0g.

I got lucky on the day I picked up a box of chow mein from this huge Chinese chain because they had just run out. This meant that I could watch from the sidelines as they whipped up a fresh batch in a giant wok over a high flame in the completely visible kitchen, and I was able to take plenty of mental notes. The whole dish took just a few minutes for the enthusiastic chef to prepare, and before I knew it I was out the door with a huge box of hot chow mein ready for hacking. 

Just like the real Panda Express Chow Mein, the beauty in this re-creation is its simplicity. There are only seven ingredients, and the prep work is low-impact. I used dry chow mein noodles (also called Chinese stir fry noodles) which are easy to find and cheap, and dark soy sauce to get that great caramel color. And if you don’t have a wok for this, a large skillet with sloped sides for tossing will work just fine.

This recipe was our #1 most popular in 2021. Check out the other four most unlocked recipes for the year: Qdoba 3-Cheese Queso (#2), Panda Express Fried Rice (#3), Outback Baked Potato Soup (#4), Chipotle Carne Asada (#5).

You might also like my #1 recipe of 2020, Rao's Homemade Marinara Sauce.

If you like Zaxby's Chicken Finger Sauce, and that other really popular chicken tender sauce, you'll love this!

Created by food hacker Todd Wilbur, host of Top Secret Recipe and best-selling author of 12 Top Secret Recipes cookbooks, this sauce is inspired by the delicious secret chicken finger dipping sauce from Zaxby's, and that other famous chicken tender chain who copied them. 

Use it on chicken fingers, fried shrimp and breaded chicken breast sandwiches.

Buy up to 4 bottles to ship for one low price!

10-ounce bottle. Money-back guarantee.

You might also like our Top Secret Burger Special Sauce (like McDonald's Big Mac Sauce) and our Top Secret Chicken Sandwich Sauce (like Chick-fil-A)

Ingredients: Soybean oil, white distilled vinegar, water, tomato concentrate, eggs, high fructose corn syrup, salt, corn syrup, spices, lemon juice, mustard seed, garlic, molasses, onions, paprika, sugar, citric acid, celery seed, Xanthan gum, preservatives, anchovy extract, autolyzed yeast, natural flavors, tamarind extract, caramel color, sunflower oil

Nutrition Facts: Serving Size 1 tbsp. Servings per Container 20. Amount per Serving: Calories 70, Total Fat 7g, Cholesterol 5mg, Sodium 180mg, Total Carbohydrate 1g, Dietary Fiber 0g, Sugars 1g, Protein 0g.

Just like the pro chefs use. A secret blend that will make your homemade fish taste like it came from a famous seafood chain. All-natural. Contains no MSG or preservatives. Great for anyone who loves fish. 

Top Secret Fish Rub is created by Food Hacker Todd Wilbur who has spent the last 30 years reverse-engineering popular menu items at the most-loved restaurant chains across America. By identifying the herbs, spices and other ingredients that make great restaurant food taste so good, Todd created this custom Top Secret Fish Rub to help you make restaurant-style fish at home. And this fish spice blend is especially amazing on salmon. All it takes is just a few shakes. Then cook the fish your favorite way.

Buy up to 5 bottles to ship for one low price!

5.3-ounce bottle. Money back guarantee. Kosher certified. Gluten-free.

You may also like Top Secret Steak Rub and Top Secret Chicken Rub. 

When dippable tempura-battered chicken chunks made their debut at select McDonald’s restaurants in 1981, America couldn’t get enough…literally. Supply chain issues prevented the burger chain from meeting high demand in all markets for many months, and it wasn’t until two years after the McNuggets were first introduced that they were finally available at every McDonald’s in the country.

The famous finger food was invented by McDonald’s first executive chef, Rene Arend, who discovered that reconstituted chicken blended with flavor enhancers, enrobed with tempura batter, and deep-fried until golden brown, made a simple, portable snack. The chicken was formed into four “B” shapes designed for dipping—the bell, the bow-tie, the ball, and the boot—and served along with child-friendly dipping sauces such as ranch and barbecue, so the breakout finger food product became a huge winner with kids.

To make a home version that looks and tastes like McNuggets I dissected a real one and discovered that the chicken in the middle is coated twice: once with dry, seasoned breading, and then once more with wet batter before frying. The chicken in McNuggets is puréed not ground, and the best way to prepare it is with a food processor. “Ground” chicken in grocery stores is often puréed, then pushed through a die to look more appealing in the package, similar to how ground beef is presented. For my Chicken McNugget recipe below, it's best to use a home food processor, but if you don’t have one, ground chicken from your butcher will work.

If I had to identify a secret ingredient in this hack it would be Knorr chicken bouillon powder. It contains many of the same ingredients found in real Chicken McNuggets, so once you get that crucial flavoring component, you’re well on your way to an amazing knockoff of an iconic American food.

This recipe was our #5 most popular in 2022. Check out the other four most unlocked recipes for the year: Rao's Traditional Meatballs (#1), Chipotle Pollo Asado (#2), Wendy's Seasoned Potatoes (#3), Cheesecake Factory Spicy Cashew Chicken (#4).

A recipe for Portuguese sweet bread inspired the soft rolls that became a big hit at Robert Tiara's Bakery & Restaurant in Honolulu, Hawaii in the 1950s. It wasn’t long before Robert changed the name of his thriving business to King’s Hawaiian, and in 1977 the company opened its first bakery on the mainland, in Torrance, California, to make the now-famous island sweet rolls sold in stores across the U.S.

King’s Hawaiian Rolls are similar to Texas Roadhouse Rolls in that they are both pillowy, sweet white rolls, so it made sense to dig out my Texas Roadhouse Rolls clone recipe and use it as a starting point. These new rolls had to be slightly softer and sweeter, so I made some adjustments and added a little egg for color. And by baking the dough in a high-rimmed baking pan with 24 dough balls placed snugly together, I ended up with beautiful rolls that rose nicely to the occasion, forming a tear-apart loaf just like the original King's Hawaiian Rolls, but with clean ingredients, and without the dough conditioners found in the packaged rolls.

Use my King's Hawaiian Sweet Rolls recipe for sandwiches, sliders, or simply warmed up and slathered with soft European butter.

This recipe was our #3 most popular in 2020. Check out the other four most unlocked recipes for the year: Rao's Homemade Marinara Sauce (#1), Olive Garden Lasagna Classico (#2), Pei Wei Better Orange Chicken (#4), Chipotle Mexican Grill Carnitas (#5).

Sherwood Johnson survived a case of malaria while serving in World War II, which left him with some residual nerve damage and a new nickname: Shakey. Despite his affliction, Shakey Johnson was still able to bang out toe-tapping Dixieland jazz on the piano night after night in the pizza parlor he opened in Sacramento in 1954, where live jazz accompanied the thin crust pizza and cold pitchers of beer.

Shakey’s became the first franchised pizza restaurant in the U.S., and by 1974 the chain had 500 stores across the U.S. The #1 dish is clearly the made-to-order pizza, but the chain’s trademarked crispy battered potato slices are a close runner-up and a perfect tasty subject to hack.

Recipes that claim complete pancake mix is the secret breading ingredient in Mojo Potatoes fail to observe that pancake mix contains sugar, and there is no noticeable sweetness in the breading of the Mojos. I also decided that dry breading wouldn't work since in my tests the paprika failed to bloom and give the coating a perfect hue like it does when the mixture is wet.

I eventually settled on a simple wet batter made with seasoned salt, flour, and little cornstarch for crunch to best match the flavor, crispiness, and red/orange tint of the real thing from America’s first pizza chain. Use this original technique, and these handy step photos, to make extra crispy potatoes the Shakey's way.

There's your appetizer, now what's for dinner? Find clones for some of your favorite famous entrées here.

Braised and shredded pork shoulder is a staple of Mexican cuisine that Chipotle prepares with a simple blend of flavors, and a surprising ingredient you may not have expected: juniper berries. Once you track those down (they’re easy to find online), the berries are combined with thyme and bay leaves in a braising liquid that will transform your own pork roast into an easily shreddable thing of beauty in under 3 hours. Then you can use your Chipotle carnitas clone on tacos, in burritos, or in a bowl over rice and beans just like they do in the restaurant.

When picking your pork roast, try to find one without too much fat. If your roast has a thick cap of fat on it, trim off the excess. You want some fat in your braising liquid, but if the cap of fat is too thick, it may not fully render down and you’ll get chunks of fat in the shred.

It’s often assumed that the pork butt is from the rear end of the pig, even though cuts from the back region already have a name: ham. The pork butt, also known as a Boston butt, is cut from the other end, the upper shoulder of the pig. It’s called a “butt” because in pre-Revolutionary War New England the roasts were stored and transported in barrels called “butts”, and the confusing name stuck.

This recipe was our #5 most popular in 2020. Check out the other four most unlocked recipes for the year: Rao's Homemade Marinara Sauce (#1), Olive Garden Lasagna Classico (#2), King's Hawaiian Original Hawaiian Sweet Rolls (#3), Pei Wei Better Orange Chicken (#4).

This 220-unit downscaled version of P.F. Chang’s China Bistro targets the lunch crowd with a smaller menu that features bento boxes, bowls, and small plates. Obviously, a clone is needed for this one, stat.

The name “Wei Better Orange Chicken” is a competitive callout to Panda Express's signature orange chicken, which is made with pre-breaded and frozen chicken. Pei Wei claims its orange chicken is prepared each day from scratch with chicken that is never frozen, so we’ll craft our clone the same way. But rather than assemble the dish in a wok over a high-flame fast stove like they do at the restaurant, we’ll prepare the sauce and chicken separately, then toss them with fresh orange wedges just before serving.

By the way, Pei Wei Better Orange Chicken goes very well with white or brown rice, so don’t forget to make some.

This recipe was our #4 most popular in 2020. Check out the other four most unlocked recipes for the year: Rao's Homemade Marinara Sauce (#1), Olive Garden Lasagna Classico (#2), King's Hawaiian Original Hawaiian Sweet Rolls (#3), Chipotle Mexican Grill Carnitas (#5).

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 KFC Extra Crispy Fried Chicken 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).

A requirement of any visit to Chicago is eating at least one slice of deep dish pizza in the city that perfected it. Deep dish pizza quickly became a Chicago staple after Ike Sewell and Ric Riccardo opened the first Pizzeria Uno in 1943 and served a hearty new style of pizza constructed in a high-rimmed cake pan. The yeast crust was tender and flakey, like a pastry, and the cheese was layered under the sauce so that it wouldn’t burn in a hot oven for the long cooking time.

While researching a home hack of this now-iconic recipe, I discovered an unexpected technique that I hadn’t seen in other deep dish recipes. Employees told me the pizza crusts are partially cooked each morning to cut down on the wait time for customers. Before the restaurant opens each day, cooks press the dough into a pan and then sprinkle it with a little shredded cheese. The shells are then partially baked and set aside. Later, when an order comes in, the pizza is built into one of the par-baked crusts and finished off. This way customers get their food faster, and the tables turn over quicker.

Copying that delicious, flakey crust was the task that took me the longest. After two weeks of baking, I finally settled on a formula that was a mash-up of yeast dough and pie crust and made a perfectly tender deep dish crust, with great flavor that exactly mimicked the original. If you like Uno, you'll love this! 

Regarding the cheese: be sure your cheese is at room temperature, not cold, or it may not melt all the way through. Also, it’s best if you buy cheese by the block and shred it yourself. Pre-shredded cheese is dusted with cornstarch so that the shreds don’t stick together in the bag, and it won’t melt as smoothly as cheese you shred by hand.

My Pizzeria Uno Chicago Deep Dish Pizza recipe will make enough sauce for two pizzas. I just thought you should know that in case you get the urge to make another deep dish after this one disappears.

This recipe was our #4 most popular in 2019. Check out the other four most unlocked recipes of the year: Texas Roadhouse Rolls (#1) KFC Extra Crispy Fried Chicken (#2), Olive Garden Braised Beef Bolognese (#3), Bush's Country Style Baked Beans (#5).

Reviewers of Wendy’s tasty seasoned potatoes point out that the skin-on slices stay crispy even when cool. That tells us the breading is most likely made with a non-wheat flour blend, an assumption confirmed by the website ingredients list for the potatoes where nary a gram of wheat flour is included. Yep, these seasoned potatoes are gluten-free.

Wendy’s uses a blend of food starches plus rice flour for the breading on their version, but my tests confirmed that cornstarch is all you’ll need for a great clone of Wendy's seasoned potatoes. The secret process starts by coating the potato slices with the dry breading mix, which contains salt. The salt in the blend will draw water out of the potatoes, magically transforming the dry breading into a wet batter in about 20 minutes.

When all the breading is wet, the potatoes go into the oil for partial frying. After resting a bit, they get dropped in again until golden brown and crispy. And, thanks to the cornstarch, these potatoes will stay crispy, even when they’re completely cool. Pretty cool right? Give my Wendy's seasoned potatoes recipe a try.

This recipe was our #3 most popular in 2022. Check out the other four most unlocked recipes for the year: Rao's Traditional Meatballs (#1), Chipotle Pollo Asado (#2), Cheesecake Factory Spicy Cashew Chicken (#4), McDonald's Chicken McNuggets (#5).

This chain’s not-spicy original chicken sandwich which debuted in 1964 was the first chicken sandwich introduced to America by a fast food chain, and it put Chick-fil-A on the map. By diversifying the menu with new products such as this kicked-up version of the famous sandwich, the chain grew over the years to become the #1 chicken restaurant in the nation, and this sandwich is now one of the most popular picks on the menu board.

The secrets for a good clone of the Chick-fil-A Spicy Deluxe Chicken Sandwich lie in the brine and the breading. I recently obtained some insider intel confirming the long-standing rumor that pickle juice is the brine. I hadn’t called for it in my prior Chick-fil-A clones because the listed ingredients for the sandwich didn’t include it. I’m not sure why that is, but my latest test versions with the pickle juice were noticeably better, so now it’s in there. You should also know that MSG is an important ingredient in both the brine and breading, so don’t leave that out if you want the best clone.

Use this special trick to get three perfect sandwich-size cutlets out of each chicken breast, and then give the chicken a nice 4-hour brine. Your patience will be rewarded with one of the best chicken sandwich hacks to come out of a home kitchen. 

Now, check out my version of Chick-fil-A Mac and Cheese!

A popular staple of any Chinese chain is fried rice, so it better be good, and the version served at Panda Express most certainly is. Here's my easy Panda Express Fried Rice recipe for when you need a stress-free, low-cost side for your entrées. But I do suggest that you cook the white rice several hours or even a day or two before you plan to make the finished dish. I found that the cooked rice called for in this recipe works best when it's cold. 

As for a shortcut, bagged frozen peas and carrots will save you from the hassle of petite-dicing carrots since the carrots in those bags are the perfect size to produce an identical clone. And they're already cooked. 

This recipe was our #3 most popular in 2021. Check out the other four most unlocked recipes for the year: Panda Express Chow Mein (#1), Qdoba 3-Cheese Queso (#2), Outback Baked Potato Soup (#4), Chipotle Carne Asada (#5).

There are many acceptable ways to formulate good queso, but to make this specific queso the ingredients must be correct, and most copycat recipes seem to get it wrong. A few recipes get one of the peppers and two of the cheeses right, but pretty much every recipe out there is a bit of a mess that I will now save you from.

Quesos can be made with a variety of cheeses that include queso fresco, asadero, and Muenster, but this particular queso includes a cheese you probably didn’t expect: Swiss. That cheese is slow to melt, so we’ll shred it first, along with the Jack. And you won't need to gum up the queso with flour or cornstarch by making a roux because the white American cheese in the mix contains sodium citrate or sodium phosphate—additives that help the cheese melt smoothly and stay that way. 

Authors of recipes that call for tomatoes in this dish haven’t looked closely. Those are red bell peppers and they are roasted, peeled, and seeded along with the poblano and jalapeños before they are diced and added to the cheese sauce. The sauce cooks on low heat, never bubbling, so that it stays smooth and creamy.

When done, your queso might seem thin in the pan, but it will thicken as it cools to a perfect consistency for dipping tortilla chips, or as a topping for tacos and burrito bowls.

My Qdoba 3-cheese queso recipe was our #2 most popular in 2021. Check out the other four most unlocked recipes for the year: Panda Express Chow Mein (#1), Panda Express Fried Rice (#3), Outback Baked Potato Soup (#4), Chipotle Carne Asada (#5).

For decades, Carl’s Jr. has effectively cornered the market on fried zucchini at major fast food chains by serving a great crispy breaded version that’s flavorful all the way through. Now you can make zucchini that tastes just as good, as long as you know the secret step that other fried zucchini recipes miss. It makes all the difference.

The secret is a brine. I found that this fried zucchini tastes best when it takes a salted water bath before breading. In 60 minutes, the salt in the brine is absorbed by the zucchini, spreading good flavor all the way through. After the brine, the zucchini is rinsed, coated twice with flour and once with seasoned breadcrumbs, and fried to a beautiful golden brown.

I’m giving you a couple choices here. You can make the recipe all the way through and serve it immediately, or if you want to serve it later, you can par-fry the zucchini and freeze it for several days. After that, when an occasion arises, a couple minutes is all it takes to finish off the dish and serve it. My Carl's Jr. Fried Zucchini recipe makes enough for a small gathering, but you can easily cut it in half for a more intimate hang.

Click here for more amazing Carl's Jr. copycat recipes. 

Menu Description: "Quickly-cooked steak with scallions and garlic."

Beef lovers go crazy over this one at P.F. Chang's. Flank steak is cut into bite-sized chunks against the grain, then it's lightly dusted with potato starch, flash-fried in oil, and doused with an amazing sweet soy garlic sauce. The beef comes out tender as can be, and the simple sauce sings to your taste buds. 

I designed my P.F. Chang's Mongolian Beef recipe using a wok, but if you don't have one, a sauté pan will suffice. You may need to add more oil to the pan to cover the beef in the flash-frying step. 

P. F. Chang's secret sauce is what makes this dish so good, and it's versatile. If you don't dig beef, you can substitute with chicken. Or you can brush it on grilled salmon.

I've cloned some of the best dishes from P.F. Chang's. Click here to see if I coped your favorite.

Source: Top Secret Restaurant Recipes 2 by Todd Wilbur.

Exclusive signed copy. Buy the #1 National Bestseller from America's Clone Recipe King, signed by the author, and we'll include a free bottle of our Hell Flakes, a 5-pepper microflake blend to kick up all your grub!

For more than thirty years, Todd Wilbur has been obsessed with recreating America's most iconic brand-name foods at home. In his first cookbook with color photos, the New York Times bestselling author brings you 125 new clone recipes: 75 first-time hacks and 50 overhauled all-time favorites. These recipes are not found individually on the website with the exception of just a few.

Each recipe comes with easy-to-follow step-by-step photos so that even novice cooks can perfectly recreate their favorite famous foods with everyday ingredients. And your homemade versions cost just a fraction of what the restaurants charge! The result of years of careful research, trial-and-error, and a little creative reverse-engineering.

Contents
Applebee's Mozzarella Sticks
Applebee's Oriental Chicken Salad
Applebee's Mexican Rice
Applebee's Fiesta Lime Chicken
Applebee's Maple Butter Blondie
Arby's Curly Fries
Auntie Anne's Pretzels
Ben & Jerry's Chocolate Chip Cookie Dough Ice Cream
Boston Market Meatloaf
Buba Gumps Seafood Hush Pups
Bubba Gump's Shrimp New Orleans
Burger King Stuffed Steakhouse Burger
Cafe Rio Creamy Tomatillo Dressing
Cafe Rio Sweet Pork Barbacoa
Cafe Rio Tres Leches Cake
Capital Grille Creamed Corn with Smoked Bacon
Capital Grille Lobster Mac 'N' Cheese
Capital Grille Classic Creme Brulee
Carrabba's Cozze in Bianco (Steamed Mussels)
Carrabba's Pollo Rosa Maria
Cheesecake Factory Fried Macaroni and Cheese
Cheesecake Factory Stuffed Mushrooms
Cheesecake Factory Mashed Red Potatoes
Cheesecake Factory Chicken Madeira
Cheesecake Factory Louisiana Chicken Pasta
Cheesecake Factory Fresh Strawberry Cheesecake
Cheesecake Factory Vanilla Bean Cheesecake
Chick-fil-A Chicken Sandwich
Chili's California Grilled Chicken Flatbread
Chili's Chipotle Chicken Flatbread
Chili Grilled Baby Back Ribs
Chili's® Molten Chocolate Cake
Chipotle Mexican Grill Black Beans
Chipotle Mexican Grill Cilantro Lime Brown Rice
Chipotle Mexican Grill Adobo-Marinated Grilled Chicken & Steak
Girl Scout Cookies Trefoils/Shortbread Cookies
Hostess CupCakes
Hostess Twinkie
Houston's Chicago-Style Spinach Dip
IHOP New York Cheesecake Pancakes
IHOP Original Buttermilk Pancakes
IKEA Swedish Meatballs
Jack-in-the-Box Beef Taco
KFC Cole Slaw
KFC Grilled Chicken
KFC Original Recipe Fried Chicken
Legal Sea Foods New England Clam Chowder
Legal Sea Foods Legal's Signature Crab Cakes
Lofthouse Frosted Cookies
Long John Silver's Tartar Sauce
Long John Silver's Battered Fish
Marie Callender's Famous Golden Cornbread
Marie Callender's Banana Cream Pie
Mauna Loa Kona Coffee Glazed Macadamias
McDonald's McCafe Blueberry Pomegranate Smoothie
McDonald's Sweet Chili Chicken McWrap
McDonald's Big Mac
McDonald's McRib Sandwich
McDonald's Apple Pie (Baked & Fried)
The Melting Pot Cheddar Cheese Fondue
The Melting Pot Traditional Swiss Cheese Fondue
Mrs. Fields Chocolate Chip Cookies
Nordstrom Roma Tomato Basil Soup
Nuts 4 Nuts Honey Roasted Nuts
Olive Garden Garden Fresh Salad & Salad Dressing
Orange Julius Original Orange Julius
The Original Pancake House Apple Pancake
The Original Pancake House Dutch Baby
The Original Pancake House Sourdough Pancakes
Outback Steakhouse Honey Wheat Bushman Bread
Outback Steakhouse Bloomin' Onion
Outback Steakhouse Kookaburra Wings
Panera Bread Broccoli Cheddar Soup
Panera Bread Asian Sesame Chicken Salad
Panera Bread Fuji Apple Chicken Salad
Panera Bread Spinach & Bacon Baked Egg Soufflé
Pepperidge Farm Milano Cookies
P.F. Chang's Chicken Lettuce Wraps
P.F. Chang's Oolong Chilean Sea Bass
Pinkberry Original Frozen Yogurt
Pinkberry Pomegranate Frozen Yogurt
Raising Cane's Cane's Sauce
Raising Cane's Chicken Fingers
Red Lobster Cheddar Bay Biscuits
Red Lobster Pumpkin Pie in a Jar
Roy's Braised Short Ribs of Beef
Roy's Misoyaki "Butterfish"
Roy's Melting Hot Chocolate Soufflé
Rubio's Mild Salsa
Rubio's Red Tomatillo Salsa
Rubio's Grilled Gourmet Taco with Shrimp
Rubio's Original Fish Taco
Ruth's Chris Steak House Barbecued Shrimp
Ruth's Chris Steak House Ruth's Chop Salad
Ruth's Chris Steak House Sweet Potato Casserole
Ruth's Chris Steak House Chris Filet
Sabra Classic Hummus
St. Elmo Steak House Shrimp Cocktail
Starbucks Birthday Cake Cake Pops
Starbucks Holiday Gingerbread
Steak 'n Shake Classic Milk Shakes
Steak 'n Shake Genuine Chili
Steak 'n Shake The Original Double 'n Cheese Steakburger
Taco Bell CrunchWrap Supreme
Taco Bell Mexican Pizza
TGI Friday's Loaded Potato Skins
TGI Friday's Jack Daniel's Sauce
TGI Friday's Dragonfire Salmon
Tony Roma's Baby Back Ribs
Tony Roma's Original Barbecue Sauce
Tony Roma's Carolina Honeys Barbecue Sauce
Waffle House Waffles
Wendy's Chili
Wendy's Pretzel Bacon Cheeseburger

Craving more of Todd's recipes? There are 12 cookbooks in all! 

IHOP upped its French toast game in 2022 with the introduction of a new recipe that suggests your French toast is only as good as the bread you start with, and IHOP’s new Thick ‘N Fluffy French Toast starts with thick specialty artisan bread, rather than the more commonly used Texas toast white bread.

For my IHOP Thick 'N Fluffy French Toast recipe, you can use any thick-sliced bread from your bakery, but there are two national brands that work well: Nature’s Own Perfectly Crafted Thick-Sliced White Bread and Sara Lee Artisano. Either of those will do, but of the two, Nature’s Own is shaped more like IHOP’s version.

Adding vanilla and a little cinnamon to the easy batter will set these waffles apart from most others, and in no time, you’ll have 6 beautiful slices of French toast for a total of 3 servings. Dust them with a little powdered sugar, add some butter and maple syrup on the side, and it’s like you just opened a mini IHOP in your house.

Click here for more amazing IHOP breakfast hacks.

This iconic Chinese chicken salad, born at Wolfgang Puck’s Chinois restaurant in Santa Monica, California, can also be found on menus at other Puck dining rooms, including Wolfgang Puck Bar & Grill and Wolfgang Puck Player’s Locker, both in Las Vegas.

It's a decades-old secret recipe that is often imitated but never duplicated since no knockoff I've found includes all the ingredients necessary to create the signature taste. In my underground lab, I sat down with my “to-go” salad (dressing on the side, of course) and meticulously deconstructed it by separating all the ingredients into small bowls. After working for about 45 minutes with the tweezers, I had separate piles of napa cabbage, various greens including frisée, radicchio, shredded carrot, and another shredded root vegetable that I have yet to see anyone include in their so-called “hack”: daikon radish.

In my Wolfgang Puck Chinois Chicken Salad recipe below I’ll show you how to make the perfect blend of greens (including another secret ingredient that recipes miss), and the ultimate way to clone the famous dressing. I’ve also got easy hacks for perfect candied sesame cashews and crunchy wontons to sprinkle on top, plus I’m including a handful of step photos to ensure that your salad comes out perfect.

In late 2021, Popeyes debuted a new macaroni and cheese recipe made with cheddar, cream, and butter, and browned nicely on top like it was just pulled out of Mom’s home oven. After analyzing the real thing from Popeyes in my kitchen lab and experimenting with multiple batches, I was eventually able to reproduce the dish so the same great mac & cheese taste can now come out of your OWN home oven. And the best part: it's super easy to make. You'll like that.

I created my Popeyes Mac & Cheese recipe using the same ingredients used by the chain: cheddar cheese, whole milk, heavy cream, unsalted butter—all wholesome foods without any weird stuff. We'll make a quick roux for the cheese sauce using a little flour, and I’m also adding easy-melting American cheese into the mix for its keen ability to keep the sauce from becoming grainy, as cheddar-based sauces tend to do.

Combine the sauce with the pasta, brown the top under a broiler, and you just home-styled your way to a delicious mac & cheese masterpiece.

Get more cool Popeyes hacked recipes here.

Tweaking a classic recipe with a few special prep tricks leaked to me by a server was the key to developing this spot-on hack for the famous meatballs from the iconic 125-year-old Italian dining room. With just two locations in the U.S. (Los Angeles and New York), sinking your fork into a fresh meatball at the restaurant requires quite a trip for most people, but my Rao's Traditional Meatballs recipe, refined through multiple batches, will make you a meatball master in your own kitchen, producing ten 5½-ounce meatballs that look and taste like the real thing.

Fortunately, I could squeeze in a reservation at the Las Vegas Rao’s location a few weeks before it closed its doors forever at Caesar’s Palace in late November 2021. While there, I made sure to ask my server for any information about the recipe, and was informed about the secret two-step process described in this hack to create giant meatballs that are cooked through, but so moist that they practically crumble when cut with a fork.

Rao’s has shared a meatball recipe in the past, but don’t be fooled. That recipe produces decent meatballs, but they are not the same as what’s served in the restaurant. If you want to make meatballs that taste like the classic original, use my Rao's meatballs recipe below.

And when they're done, top the meatballs with your favorite marinara or use my hack here to re-create Rao’s famous sauce.

This recipe was our #1 most popular in 2022. Check out the other four most unlocked recipes for the year: Chipotle Pollo Asado (#2), Wendy's Seasoned Potatoes (#3), Cheesecake Factory Spicy Cashew Chicken (#4), McDonald's Chicken McNuggets (#5).

You might also like my #1 recipe of 2021, Panda Express Chow Mein.

It's rumored that the secret ingredient in the signature crust of a Gino’s East Deep Dish Pizza is cornmeal, but that suspicion is incorrect. The dough’s yellow color makes it looks like cornbread, and it has a softer quality than most doughs, but these qualities come from other not-so-secret ingredients that have nothing to do with corn.

When three friends—Sam Levine, Fred Bartoli, and George Loverde—opened their pizza joint just off the Miracle Mile in Chicago, Illinois in 1966, they hired talented pizza chef Alice Mae Redmond, who came up with a special dough recipe that included a "secret" conditioner. Today, Gino's ships boxes of frozen pizzas across the country and is required by law to list all the ingredients on the package. So, of course, I ordered a few of those pizzas and discovered that the "secret" dough additive is cream of tartar, and the dough's yellow tint comes from beta-carotene, a natural source of yellow. On those boxes, I also discovered zero cornmeal. 

For a great deep dish crust at home, you'll need to start your dough 1 to 2 days in advance. A slow, chilled rise will improve the quality and taste of your finished crust to more closely match the characteristics of the real thing. I include cream of tartar here, just like in the original dough, and simple yellow food coloring to add the proper tint.

My Gino's East Deep Dish Pizza recipe makes a plain cheese pizza, but if you want toppings (sausage, pepperoni, bacon, onions, mushrooms, peppers, etc.), arrange them on top of the cheese before applying the sauce.

This 600-unit Mexican fast food chain celebrates the holidays each year with delicious little $2 corn husk-wrapped pork tamales made from a traditional recipe for authentic south-of-the-border taste. The only problem is when the holidays go away, so do these tasty tamales. And that's why we bust out this Top Secret Recipe.

Making authentic tamales is not difficult, but it does take time. The pork requires a braise for several hours to get it fork-tender, and the wrapped tamales will take around 2 hours to steam until they're done.

My Del Taco tamale recipe is inspired by traditional tamale recipes that include a braising sauce for the pork made from rehydrated guajillo peppers. To coax out more flavor, I chose to first toast the peppers before adding them to the liquid. And rather than using lard in the masa dough, I found a combination of vegetable shortening and butter to be a more flavorful alternative.

Steam all 24 of tamales until they are fully cooked, and store those you can’t eat in your freezer for several weeks. Steam the frozen tamales for 20 to 30 minutes, and they’ll taste as good as fresh.

How about a cold margarita to wash down those tamales? Find your favorite famous drink recipes here.

Much of Wingstop’s success can be pinned on its great selection of unique wing flavors such as Korean, Louisiana Rub, Garlic Parmesan, and Hawaiian. But it’s the traditional buffalo-style hot wings that are one of the top two picks at the 1,124-unit chicken wing chain (the other one is Lemon Pepper).

The chain’s buffalo-style sauce is darker red than most buffalo wing sauces, which are typically made by combining Frank’s RedHot sauce with melted butter. Frank’s is more orange than red, so I set out to find an alternative Louisiana-style hot sauce that looked the part.

My market had several other Louisiana hot sauces, but the one whose color best matched Wingstop was called “The Original Louisiana Brand Hot Sauce.” This particular vinegar-and-pepper hot sauce has been around for over 90 years, and it has the right color and flavor to make a great knockoff of the wing sauce. You’ll just need to add a few more ingredients, including butter, and it’s ready for saucing your wings.

If you can’t find The Original Louisiana Hot Sauce, you can use another Louisiana-style sauce, such as Crystal, Bulliard’s, or even Frank’s, and although your wings won’t look quite the same as Wingstop’s, they’ll still taste similar.

Try my Wingstop Original Hot Wings recipe below, and find more of my copycat appetizer recipes here.

The Southern-themed chain famous for its gift shops filled with made-in-America products and delicious homestyle food is also known to have a particularly good meatloaf. This dish ranks high in popularity, right up there with the Chicken ‘n Dumplins and the Hash Brown Casserole, so a good Cracker Barrel Meatloaf recipe is long overdue.

Making meatloaf is easy. What’s hard is making it taste like the meatloaf at Cracker Barrel which is tender and juicy, and flavored with onion, green pepper, and tomato. I sought to turn out a moist and tender loaf of meat, and one that’s not dry and tough, but my first attempts were much too dense. I wasn’t happy about that, but my dog was thrilled.

After playing around with the eggs-to-breadcrumbs-to-milk ratios and being careful to use gentle hands when combining everything and pressing it into the loaf pan, the final batch was a winner and I get to pass it along to you.    

It's best to use a meatloaf pan here which has an insert that lets the fat drip to the bottom, away from the meat. A regular loaf pan will still work, but you’ll want to pour off the fat in the pan before slicing. 

Satisfy your Cracker Barrel cravings with more of my copycat recipes here.

Traditional Italian doughnuts are often made with soft choux dough dropped by a spoon into the oil, resulting in light and crispy puff pastries. Others—like what Olive Garden serves—are made with tighter dough for a finished product that is more substantial, like beignets. That's the pastry you'll be making here, and it's pretty darn easy, once you know the secret dough formula.

In Italy, Zeppoles (Olive Garden changed the spelling a bit) are often filled with fruit or jelly and always come dusted with granulated or powdered sugar. In this case, Olive Garden's Zeppolis are unfilled with dipping sauce on the side, and they're tossed in extra-fine granulated sugar (baker’s sugar).

At the restaurant, you get a plate of warm Zeppolis with your choice of raspberry sauce or chocolate sauce. But why choose? My Olive Garden Zeppolis recipe here makes 2 dozen pillowy pastries, which you can serve with both raspberry and chocolate dipping sauces, or with any sweet sauce you like. 

Crafting an Olive Garden’s signature Lasagna Classico recipe became the perfect opportunity to create a beautiful multi-layered lasagna hack recipe that uses up the whole box of lasagna noodles and fills the baking pan all the way to the top. This Top Secret Recipe makes a lasagna that tips the scale at nearly 10 pounds and will feed hungry mouths for days, with every delicious layer copied directly from the carefully dissected Olive Garden original.

I found a few credible bits of intel in a video of an Olive Garden chef demonstrating what he claims is the real formula on a midday news show, but the recipe was abbreviated for TV and the chef left out some crucial information. One ingredient he conspicuously left out of the recipe is the secret layer of Cheddar cheese located near the middle of the stack. I wasn’t expecting to find Cheddar in lasagna, but when I carefully separated the layers from several servings of the original dish, there was the golden melted cheesy goodness in every slice.

This clone recipe will make enough for 8 big portions, but if you make slightly smaller slices this is easily enough food to fill twelve lasagna-loving bellies. If you like lasagna, you're going to love this version.

This recipe was our #2 most popular in 2020. Check out the other four most unlocked recipes for the year: Rao's Homemade Marinara Sauce (#1), King's Hawaiian Original Hawaiian Sweet Rolls (#3), Pei Wei Better Orange Chicken (#4), Chipotle Mexican Grill Carnitas (#5).

Getting a table at the 123-year-old original Rao’s restaurant in New York City is next to impossible. The tables are “owned” by regulars who schedule their meals months in advance, so every table is full every night, and that’s the way it’s been for the last 38 years. The only way an outsider would get to taste the restaurant’s fresh marinara sauce is to be invited by a regular.

If that isn’t in the stars for you, you could buy a bottle of the sauce at your local market (if they even have it). It won't be fresh, and it's likely to be the most expensive sauce in the store, but it still has that great Rao's taste. An even better solution is to copy the Rao's Marinara sauce for yourself using this new and very easy recipe.

The current co-owner of Rao’s, Frank Pellegrino Jr., told Bon Appetit in 2015 that the famous marinara sauce was created by his grandmother many years ago, and the sauce you buy in stores is the same recipe served in his restaurants. The ingredients are common, but correctly choosing the main ingredient—tomatoes—is important. Try to find San Marzano-style whole canned tomatoes, preferably from Italy. They are a little more expensive than typical canned tomatoes, but they will give you some great sauce.

After 30 minutes of cooking, you’ll end up with about the same amount of sauce as in a large jar of the real thing. Your version will likely be just a little bit brighter and better than the bottled stuff, thanks to the fresh ingredients. But now you can eat it anytime you want, with no reservations, at a table you own.

This recipe was our #1 most popular in 2020. Check out the other four most unlocked recipes for the year: Olive Garden Lasagna Classico (#2), King's Hawaiian Original Hawaiian Sweet Rolls (#3), Pei Wei Better Orange Chicken (#4), Chipotle Mexican Grill Carnitas (#5).

You might also like my #1 recipe of 2019, Texas Roadhouse Rolls.

Menu Description: “Creamy marsala wine sauce with mushrooms over grilled chicken breasts, stuffed with Italian cheeses and sundried tomatoes. Served with garlic mashed potatoes.”

My Olive Garden Stuffed Chicken Marsala recipe includes a marsala sauce that even marsala sauce haters will like. My wife is one of those haters, but when she tried this sauce, her eyes lit up, and she begged for more. That’s great, now I won’t have to eat alone.

Not only is Olive Garden's delicious marsala sauce hacked here (and it’s easy to make), you’ll also get the copycat recipe for the chain's awesome Italian cheese stuffing that goes between the two pan-cooked chicken fillets. Build it, sauce it, serve it. The presentation is awesome, and the flavor will soothe your soul.

Try this dish paired with my recent clone of Olive Garden’s Garlic Mashed Potatoes for the complete Olive Garden Stuffed Chicken Marsala experience.

Menu Description: “Two lightly fried parmesan-breaded chicken breasts are smothered with Olive Garden’s homemade marinara sauce and melted Italian cheeses. We serve our Chicken Parmigiana with a side of spaghetti for dinner.”

Chicken parmigiana is a forever favorite, and it’s not a difficult dish to whip up at home. But for it to taste like the Olive Garden signature entree, we’ll need to take some very specific steps.

Olive Garden’s chicken is salty and moist all the way through, so we must first start by brining the chicken. Give yourself an extra hour for this important marinating step. The marinara sauce used on the chicken is an Olive Garden specialty and no bottled sauce compares, so we’ll make our own from scratch using canned crushed tomatoes and the formula below.

While the sauce cooks, filling your house with its intoxicating aroma, the chicken is breaded and browned. When the marinara is done, top the chicken with the sauce and mozzarella and stick it under your hot broiler until bubbling.

Hopefully, everyone at your house is hungry, because the Olive Garden dinner portion is two chicken fillets, and my Olive Garden Chicken Parmigiana recipe will yield a total of four 2-piece servings. Add a small serving of spaghetti on the side, topped with more of the delicious sauce, and you'll have a perfect match to the restaurant plate.

Can't get enough Olive Garden? Click here for more of your favorite copycat recipes. 

It was only a matter of time before the spicy fried chicken made famous in Nashville, Tennessee at shops like Prince's Hot Chicken Shack and Hattie B's would find its way into the mainstream. A dish this good is never contained forever, and KFC became the first fast food chain to give the recipe national exposure. A test run of the new spicy chicken in Pittsburgh was the most successful product test in KFC's recent history.

The original dish from Nashville is made with crispy fried chicken that's doused with a top-secret spicy chili sauce and served on sliced white bread with dill pickles on top. KFC's version is served with just pickles, no bread (a biscuit on the side instead), and is made by soaking the chain's Extra Crispy Fried Chicken with the oily chili sauce from a squirt bottle. Since there isn't any water in the sauce, just oil, the chicken stays crispy, regardless of how much sauce is applied.

To make a home version of KFC Nashville Hot Chicken, you first need to prepare the chicken, either using my KFC Extra Crispy Chicken recipe included below, or by baking or frying some of the pre-breaded chicken pieces you can find frozen in just about every grocery store. While the chicken is brining, make the sauce and pour it into a squirt bottle or spouted measuring cup. Apply it to your chicken when it's done (shake it or stir it first!), then top it with dill pickle slices.  

The Cheesecake Factory’s latest decadent dessert goes extreme with America’s favorite cookie. You’ll find Oreos in the middle of the cheesecake, in the cookie mousse layer, pressed onto the edge, sprinkled on the whipped cream, and even up on top where an Oreo wafer crowns each slice. In fact, I’ve designed my copycat Cheesecake Factory Oreo cheesecake recipe to use every Oreo in a standard size-package—all 36 of them!

This beautiful cheesecake starts with a chocolate cake layer, topped with a layer of chocolate buttercream icing, followed by a no-bake cheesecake layer, Oreo cookie mousse, and more chocolate icing. It’s a chocolate lover’s—and Oreo lover’s—dream, and not surprisingly, one of Cheesecake Factory’s best sellers.

When creating your own version of this dessert masterpiece at home, be sure to use a 10-inch springform pan. This is a big cheesecake, so you'll get 12 large slices out of it. The restaurant charges around 56 bucks for a whole cheesecake this big, but thankfully, a homemade version will cost you much less than that.

In the Bush’s Beans commercials, Duke, the family golden retriever, wants to sell the secret family recipe, but the Bush family always stops him. The dog is based on the Bush family’s real-life golden retriever, and the campaign, which began in 1995, made Bush’s the big dog of the canned baked beans market practically overnight. Their confidential baked beans formula is considered one of the top 10 biggest recipe secrets in the U.S.

Bush Brothers & Company had been canning a variety of fruits and vegetables for over 60 years when, in 1969, the company created canned baked beans using a cherished recipe from a family matriarch. Sales jumped from 10 thousand cases in the first year to over 100 thousand cases in 1970. And just one year later sales hit a million cases. Today Bush’s makes over 80 percent of the canned baked beans sold in the U.S., and the secret family recipe remains a top food secret, despite Duke’s attempts. A replica of the original recipe book—without the original recipe in it (drat!)—is on display at the company's visitor center in Chestnut Hill, Tennessee.

I chose to hack the “Country Style” version of Bush’s Beans because I don’t think the Original flavor has enough, uh, flavor. Country Style is similar to Original, but richer, with more brown sugar. My recipe for Bush's Country Style baked beans starts by soaking dry small white beans in a brine overnight. The salt in the water helps to soften the skins, but don’t soak them for more than 14 hours or the skins may begin to fall off. You can skip this step if you've got a fancy Instant Pot using my directions below. 

My first versions tasted great but lacked the deep brown color of the real Bush’s beans, which include caramel coloring—an ingredient that can be hard to find on its own. I eventually discovered that the “browning” sauce, Kitchen Bouquet, will add the dark caramel color needed to our home version of the beans so that they’ll look just like the real thing.

This recipe was our #5 most popular in 2019. Check out the other four most unlocked recipes of the year: Texas Roadhouse Rolls (#1) KFC Extra Crispy Fried Chicken (#2), Olive Garden Braised Beef Bolognese (#3), Pizzeria Uno Chicago Deep Dish Pizza (#4).

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 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.

Menu Description: "Here they are in all their lip-smacking, award-winning glory: Buffalo, New York-style chicken wings spun in your favorite signature sauce."

Since Buffalo, New York was too far away, Jim Disbrow and Scott Lowery satisfied their overwhelming craving in 1981 by opening a spicy chicken wing restaurant close to home in Kent, Ohio. With signature sauces and a festive atmosphere, the chain has now evolved from a college campus sports bar with wings to a family restaurant with over 300 units. While frying chicken wings is no real secret—simply drop them in hot shortening for about 10 minutes—the delicious spicy sauces make the wings special. There are 12 varieties of sauce available to coat your crispy chicken parts at the chain, and I'm presenting clones for the more traditional flavors. These sauces are very thick, almost like dressing or dip, so we'll use an emulsifying technique that will ensure a creamy final product where the oil won't separate from the other ingredients. Here is the chicken wing cooking and coating technique, followed by clones for the most popular sauces: Spicy Garlic, Medium and Hot. The sauce recipes might look the same at first, but each has slight variations make your sauce hotter or milder by adjusting the level of cayenne pepper. You can find Frank's pepper sauce by the other hot sauces in your market. If you can't find that brand, you can also use Crystal Louisiana hot sauce.

Source: Top Secret Restaurant Recipes 2 by Todd Wilbur.

Nicknamed "Sliders" and "Gut Bombers," these famous tiny burgers were one of the earliest fast-food creations. It all started in 1921 when E.W. Ingram borrowed $700 to open a hamburger stand in Wichita, Kansas. Ingram chose the name White Castle because "white" signified purity and cleanliness, while "castle" represented strength. permanence, and stability. White Castle lived up to its name, maintaining that permanence and stability by growing steadily over the years to a total of 380 restaurants.

Ingram's inspiration was the development of steam-grilling, a unique process that helped the burgers retain moisture. The secret is grilling the meat over a small pile of onions that give off steam as they cook. Five holes in each mini-burger help to ensure that the meat is completely cooked without having to flip the patties. Today customers can buy these burgers "by the sack" at the outlets, or pick them up in the freezer section of most grocery stores, but hey, making them at home is fun!

Now, how about some fries and a milkshake to complete the meal?

Source: More Top Secret Recipes 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. 

Try my Olive Garden Zuppa Toscana copycat recipe below along with your own bottomless Olive Garden House Salad and Breadsticks. Find more of my Olive Garden clone recipes here.

Source: Top Secret Restaurant Recipes by Todd Wilbur.

There's no chocolate in it. Or coffee. Or Coca-Cola. The ingredient rumors for the Skyline Chili secret recipe are plentiful on the Internet, but anyone can purchase cans of Skyline chili from the company and find the ingredients listed right on the label: beef, water, tomato paste, dried torula yeast, salt, spices, cornstarch, and natural flavors. You can trust that if chocolate were included in the secret recipe, the label would reflect it—important information for people with a chocolate allergy. 

Use my Skyline Chili recipe to re-create that unique flavor with a special blend of easy-to-find spices plus beef broth and a few other not-so-unusual ingredients. Let the chili simmer for an hour or so, then serve it up on its own or in one of the traditional Cincinnati-style serving suggestions (the "ways" they call 'em) with the chili poured over spaghetti noodles, topped with grated Cheddar cheese and other good stuff:

     3-Way: Pour chili over cooked spaghetti noodles and top with grated Cheddar cheese.
     4-Way: Add a couple teaspoons of grated onion before adding the cheese.
     5-Way: Add cooked red beans over the onions before adding the cheese.

Check out more of my recipes for other popular soups and chilis here.

Source: Top Secret Recipes Unlocked by Todd Wilbur.

Menu Description: "We use only the 'best of the breast' chicken tenderloin in our recipe. Our dumplins are made from scratch, then hand-rolled and cut into strips before simmering to perfection in chicken stock."

By 1977 there were 13 Cracker Barrel stores located in Georgia and Tennessee, with all of them based on founder Dan Evins' original concept of a restaurant and store built around gasoline pumps. But with the oil embargo and energy crisis of the mid-seventies, Cracker Barrel started building stores that did not offer gas. Eventually, all of the original 13 stores were converted so you can no longer "filler-up" while you fill yourself up.

An old-time favorite at Cracker Barrel is the Chicken & Dumplins found on the lunch and dinner menu. The nice thing about this home version of the popular classic dish is that it creates its own tasty gravy. As the "dumplins" dissolve, the flour thickens the stock into a creamy sauce.

Try my Cracker Barrel Chicken & Dumplins recipe below, and find more Cracker Barrel copycat recipes here.

Source: Top Secret Restaurant Recipes by Todd Wilbur.

The first Auntie Anne's pretzel store opened in 1988 in the heart of pretzel country—a Pennsylvanian Amish farmers' market. Over 500 stores later, Auntie Anne's is one of the most requested secret clone recipes around, especially on the internet. 

Many of the copycat Auntie Anne's soft pretzel recipes passed around the Web require bread flour, and some use honey as a sweetener. But by studying the Auntie Anne's home pretzel-making kit in my secret underground laboratory, I've created a better Auntie Anne's copycat recipe with a superior way to re-create the delicious mall treats at home. For the best quality dough, you just need all-purpose flour. And powdered sugar works great to perfectly sweeten the dough. Now you just have to decide if you want to make the more traditional salted pretzels, or the sweet cinnamon sugar-coated kind. Decisions, decisions.

Find more of my copycat recipes for famous muffins, bagels, and rolls here. 

Source: Even More Top Secret Recipes by Todd Wilbur.

Try my improved version in Top Secret Recipes Step-by-Step.

Domino’s oven-baked starter, which debuted in early 2023, reveals a great way to transform a boring bag of potato tots into a dish with pizzazz. The pizza chain’s new Loaded Tots are built with a delicious pile of crispy potato tots, topped with cheese, a secret sauce, and other good stuff that I probably should have been stacking on potato tots years ago.

For my Domino’s Loaded Tots recipe, I picked the two bestsellers of the three versions offered at Domino’s for you to clone: Philly Cheesesteak and Cheddar Bacon. The Philly Cheesesteak version includes onion, green pepper, steak, and Alfredo sauce, and the Bacon Cheddar is topped with crispy crumbled bacon and garlic Parmesan sauce. Which one will you be making?  

Once you decide, simply arrange a couple of dozen cooked tots on a baking sheet and smother them with the mozzarella/cheddar cheese blend, a few toppings, and the secret sauce hack, then bake for just 8 minutes until it’s melty and magnificent.

Find more of my Domino's copycat recipes here.