How To Make McDonald's Breakfast Sauce, According To A Former Chef

The world of dupe recipes is so rich and expansive you can essentially find close-enough versions of all your fast food favorites. Corporate recipe sharing is especially handy when fan favorites like McDonald's breakfast sauce, for example, are discontinued or only offered regionally. For those unfamiliar, McDonald's has a "creamy breakfast sauce," as it's referred to on its website. The hollandaise-like dressing is typically served with any of the chain's bagel breakfast sandwich offerings. While it's unclear whether or not McDonald's actually discontinued this popular menu item (according to Reddit, some people in Eastern states say they can still get the sauce with a breakfast bagel), it's certainly not easy to find everywhere.

This is why former McDonald's corporate chef Mike Haracz took to TikTok to share what exactly is in the famous breakfast sauce. According to Haracz, the dressing consists of a mayonnaise base with lemon juice, plus herbs like dill and some spices — we're guessing salt and pepper. The other banner ingredients Haracz says you need (cheddar cheese powder, buttermilk powder, liquid smoke, and autolyzed yeast extract) make this an extremely difficult recipe to replicate. Luckily, there are enough substitutions that will get you most of the way there.

Although the fate of McDonald's breakfast sauce is still a mystery, the corporate website does still have it listed along with its allergen information. And a quick scan of the list helps piece together the ingredient puzzle. All the components Mike Haracz mentioned in his TikTok are front and center along with things like xanthan gum, potassium sorbate, and other unpronounceable additives that you probably don't need to worry about when trying to replicate the flavor of this tangy sauce.

For a decent copycat sauce, we recommend starting with ½ cup of mayonnaise and 1 tablespoon of lemon juice to replicate the base. If you want to really go all out, try making your mayo from scratch. Then you can add in 1 tablespoon of steak sauce — but if you can get your hands on liquid smoke, use a ¼ teaspoon of this instead. A little goes a long way when it comes to this ingredient, so start with a little and layer in more if you're craving more of that savory flavor. We prefer fresh herbs in our dip, so if you can add some dill, go for it. If not, ¼ teaspoon of dried dill will probably be a better match for the original recipe. Finally, add a little salt and pepper and your very own version of McDonald's breakfast sauce is complete. The zippy tang of the mayo, lemon, and mustard is a great balance to fattier dishes. This sauce pairs excellently with tasty breakfast sandwiches, tacos, and burritos, but you can also use it as dip for your french fries or drizzle it over your asparagus — the possibilities are endless.