making 'copycat' foods at home

[dazzlingblue]

There's an increasing interest in attempting to figure out the recipes of certain menu items from popular chain restaurants in the US. On recipe-sharing sites, there are whole sections dedicated toward copycat recipes.

While I don't really do much of this, I certainly did look up the copycat recipes for two soups that i've always loved: Olive Garden's Zuppa Toscana, and Carrabba's sausage and lentil soup (I think I found good ones to get an idea from food.com).

Are there any copycat recipes that you've tried that you've enjoyed----maybe even more than the ones you at the restaurant?

 

[brutal37138]

This isn't necessarily a copy cat recipe but we've grabbed a few boxes for biscuits by Pepridge Farm that are suppose to taste like Red Lobsters biscuits. They do, but the box is $2.25 and makes like 5 biscuits. I keep thinking they have to have a recipe on the internet and you could definitely make these biscuits for way cheaper!

 

[OhioTom76]

I kind of laugh at some of these, since I worked at a few of the restaurants that pop up in these books and can see where some of them are way off base. I used to work at TGI Fridays, and I would say most of the "copycat" recipes I've seen online for them were wrong. The one exception would be the recipe floating around for their black bean soup, that is pretty much spot on from what I recall. But other stuff like their Spinach and Artichoke dip aren't correct. They used a homemade bechamel sauce as the base along with monterey jack and parmesan (and a few other ingredients obviously). Most of the recipes I see online say to use Mayo, and sour cream and cream cheese - all not in the actual recipe. Some of the recipes are surprisingly simple too, for example their BBQ sauce was just plain old stuff (probably Kraft, though it came in white labeled) just mixed with some apple butter.

I'm surprised we don't see more recipes being shared by actual employees of these stores. I didn't recall signing any NDA's or crap like that when I worked at these places. I did jot down some of the recipes before I left, but I've since lost the ones I had.

 

[MyPaperBleedsInk]

I really want to get some of the Chipotle recipes - their mild tomato salsa and their chicken. I've seen some online, but have yet to try making it so I settle with just going to Chipotle.
Only hacked one I tried was a KFC coleslaw recipe and it pretty much tasted the same so I was quite happy. I love restaurant coleslaw and would love to be able to make it and have it when I want.

 

[oivas]

I don't know how genuine those recipes would be and my take is that they may not even be true. I mean, how on Earth would we know what they are writing. No chef comes out and writes them, right?

Irrespective, I did try out such recipe once and I must say I would have been way off target of the one posted on the site. So, the real food item was happily safe..

 

[sandra0530]

I love the cheddar broccoli soup from Panera Bread! I tried making it one day and it actually came out pretty amazing. I also added some potatoes to it too because I love that in a creamy soup. Only thing was that I came out pretty thick. When it was cold it was almost a jelly like consistency but as soon as you heated it back up it was fine and back to just being a thick soup. I still thought it was pretty amazing in taste I just still need to tweak it a little to my liking. haha

 

[OhioTom76]

I really want to get some of the Chipotle recipes - their mild tomato salsa and their chicken. I've seen some online, but have yet to try making it so I settle with just going to Chipotle.
Only hacked one I tried was a KFC coleslaw recipe and it pretty much tasted the same so I was quite happy. I love restaurant coleslaw and would love to be able to make it and have it when I want.

There is a web site that has some pretty good copies of Chipotle's recipes:

http://chipotlefan.com/index.php?id=recipes

The recipe for their salad dressing is fantastic, and really easy to make. The rice and the corn salsa are spot on as well.

They have a more elaborate recipe for the chicken marinade, but honestly, all I do is just dump a can of chipotle's in adobo into a plastic bag along with some boneless skinless chicken thighs and let them marinate in the fridge for at least an hour or so. Then grill them over high heat.