Top Secret Restaurant Recipes 3: The Secret Formulas for Duplicating Your Favorite Restaurant Dishes at Home (Top Secret Recipes) [Paperback]

Todd Wilbur (Author)

Book Description

Release date: September 28, 2010 | Series: Top Secret Recipes

A brand new restaurant recipe treasury from the wizard of culinary carbon copies.

For more than twenty years, Todd Wilbur has been translating his obsession with recreating restaurant favorites at home into a blockbuster bestselling cookbook series. Using everyday ingredients, each of Wilbur's recipes provides step-by-step instructions that even the novice cook can follow-and the delicious results cost just a fraction of what the restaurants charge.

With over 100 sensational new recipes, Top Secret Restaurant Recipes 3 unlocks the secrets to:

?Outback Steakhouse Outback Rack

?Chili's Quesadilla Explosion Salad

?Olive Garden Breadsticks

?TGI Friday's Fried Mac & Cheese

?Chili's Firecracker Tilapia

?On the Border Mexican Mojito

?Cracker Barrel Double Chocolate Fudge Coca-Cola Cake

And much, much more...

Editorial Reviews

About the Author

Todd Wilbur is the top-selling QVC cookbook author who’s been cloning recipes since the 1980’s. He’s the author of nine top secret recipes books. He’s toured extensively for his books, appeared on The Oprah Winfrey Show, Today, and Live with Regis and Kathie Lee, among others. He lives in Las Vegas with his family.

Excerpt. © Reprinted by permission. All rights reserved.

Product Details

• Paperback: 448 pages
• Publisher: Plume; Original edition (September 28, 2010)
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 0452296455
• ISBN-13: 978-0452296459
• Product Dimensions: 6 x 0.9 x 9 inches
• Shipping Weight: 1.3 pounds (View shipping rates and policies)
• Average Customer Review: 4.4 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (38 customer reviews)
• Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #34,976 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)

More About the Author

Food hacker and host of CMT's "Top Secret Recipe," Todd Wilbur is the author of a series of unique cookbooks which reveal simple secret recipes for creating home versions of America's most popular brand-name foods. With over 5 million Top Secret Recipes books in print, Todd designs each recipe through careful research, trial-and-error, creative reverse-engineering, and obsession. Readers will not only be fascinated with the back stories and impressed with the accuracy of the formulas, but will also find that they can save money when recreating these signature dishes at home and will enjoy the ability to now customize their favorite foods to suit specific diets and health concerns.

Todd has appeared on numerous talk shows in the 24 years he has been cloning famous foods, including The Oprah Winfrey Show, Dr. Oz, Today Show, Live! with Regis & Kathie Lee, Good Morning America, Fox News, Rachael Ray, Maury, and The Food Network. Season 1 of "Top Secret Recipe" debuted on CMT in October, 2011. When not taste-testing recipes on himself, his wife, his friends, and TV talk show hosts, Todd is busy teaching his 3-year-old daughter how to identify herbs in a sauce at their home in Las Vegas, NV.

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

29 of 31 people found the following review helpful

5.0 out of 5 stars Good book! Read the table of contents before you purchase! September 29, 2010

By Denise

Format:Paperback|Amazon Verified Purchase

I'm a big fan of Todd Wilbur and love all of his books, including this one. I have tried the BJ's restuartant white cheddar mashed potatoes, and their avocado egg rolls. Both of the recipes came out really good. I have also tried the T.G.I. Friday's tuscan spinach dip and the crispy green bean fries. Once again those recipes were just as good as the restaurants....if not better!
My only suggestion is to visit [...] and view the table of contents before you purchase this book. A lot of recipes in here maybe a repeat if you own other books. If you purchased his recent book off of QVC then you'll see that a lot of the recipes in that book are in here. His website is: [...]. Besides that the book is a gem and for only $10 it will pay for itself with in two meals.

20 of 21 people found the following review helpful

4.0 out of 5 stars Beware of Banana Cream Cheesecake recipe January 20, 2011

By CrabbyPatti

Format:Paperback

Just a note since I'm sitting here, I might as well try to help....

I love his books, and I have them all. In fact, I lent two of them out to a friend a few weeks ago and I'm actually worried about them.....can't wait to get them back so I can once again have my entire series of Top Secret Recipe books back together again. :-D

So, I made the Cheeecake Factory's Banana Cream Cheesecake recipe for my husand's birthday. I spent a lot of time and fair amount of moolah on the ingredients, only to find out that there's a major error in the recipe instructions.

The error in the Banana Cream Cheesecake recipe is in Step 6, where you are making the "Bavarian Cream." They don't tell you what to do with the heavy cream, so the major component of this cake, the Bavarian Cream -- doesn't become a bavarian cream at all -- it's a liquidy mess. I didn't have enough of the ingredients required to remake the bavarian cream, so my cake was basically a flop. When I contacted TSR via their website, to alert them that there was an error, they offered me one free downloaded recipe, which equals .79 cents. Kind of disappointed in that, but oh well, at least they wrote back?

To be fair, I've made quite a few other recipes from the book, all successfully. (The Cheesecake Factory Meatloaf is AWESOME and now holds top spot in my family's Meatloaf Hall of Fame.

Yes, you can get almost all of these recipes online now if you search. But a true cookbook lover buys cookbooks to read them like novels and have all the recipes combined together on a bookshelf. This is a great book, just like all the others in the series.

16 of 18 people found the following review helpful

5.0 out of 5 stars I have a food allergy and LOVE Todd Wilbur! Great book! September 30, 2010

By Jolene C. Chave

Format:Paperback

Great book! I have quite a few of Todd's books and they all have items in there that I make quite frequently! As for reviewers saying that these recipes are high in fat- well then learn how to cook! Most people who are watching their weight use recipes as a guide. Opt for a lower fat cheese, or bake an item instead of frying. This isn't rocket science! Also on another note- Todd faking food allergies to get ingredients... Apparently it is true, I did Google it, and I don't think that was too smart of him to do or publicly announce on Oprah, BUT with these clones of restaurant recipes he has in his books, those of us with real food allergies (I have Celiacs) I can still enjoy these recipes but substitute ingredients I can have. Soooooooo really, however Todd does it, I am glad he does, because I rarely get to enjoy restaurant food at a restaurant because of my allergy- now I can in my own home and, most importantly, rest assure the food is prepared in a allergy safe environment and gluten (or whatever you allergy may be) free! So think about that! Thank you Todd! Keep the recipes coming!

6 of 6 people found the following review helpful

5.0 out of 5 stars Yummy! October 15, 2010

By S. Sharp

Format:Paperback|Amazon Verified Purchase

I bought this book for the Margaritaville Jerk Salmon recipe. I made it today and it was so good! And 1/3 of the cost of going to restaurant! Thank you Todd Wilbur for making these excellent books!

10 of 12 people found the following review helpful

5.0 out of 5 stars Todd's best book September 28, 2010

By Bender Rodriguez

Format:Paperback|Amazon Verified Purchase

If you've enjoyed Todd Wilbur's other books then getting this is a no-brainer.

I've tried 9 recipes so far:
Olive Garden Breadsticks (this one is really close, other clone recipes online are so off it's sad)
Olive Garden Dipping sauces for Breadsticks
Buca Di Beppo Garlic Bread
Chili's Honey-Chipotle Chicken Crispers
Denny's Cherry Limeade
Famous Dave's Wilbur Beans
Fleming's Prime Steakhouse Chipotle Cheddar Mac & Cheese (best mac and cheese ever!)
On the Border Guacamole Live
Serendipty 3 Frrrozen Hot Chocolate

Update
Made some more:
Carrabba's Spicy Sausage Lentil Soup (really good)
PF Chang's Asian Pear Mojito
PF Chang's Vegetarian Lettuce Wraps
PF Chang's Spicy Green Beans
Red Robin Campfire Sauce

These are either really close or better so I feel like this is a pretty fair assessment considering I can't possibly try every recipe anytime soon. If you like the original restaurant dish, chances are you'll like his clone since they're usually pretty spot on. I'll update this if I try more recipes and they're not good clones, but given his track record I'm sure they'll be accurate.

There are about 150 recipes in the book. The complete list is available on his website so no surprises here.

5 of 6 people found the following review helpful

4.0 out of 5 stars Good Stuff! August 16, 2011

By L. Price

Format:Paperback|Amazon Verified Purchase

Great little book - I bought it specifically for the Warm Butter Cake recipe from Mastros. Yep...it pretty much rocked my world, and now I can rock my own world by making it at home...kinda like....er, nevermind!