Have you heard about the quesarito at Chipotle, the patty melt at Five Guys, or the Starbucks butterbeer frappucino?
You won’t find them listed on menus, but you can go ahead and order them anyway.
“Secret menu items always start with one person daring to ask for it,” said Danielle Bolger, editor of Sonder/Sway, a lifestyle blog aimed at residents of D.C. and Montgomery County, Maryland. “A lot of times what they’re asking for is just being creative with what’s already on the menu.”
Order the Chipotle quesarito to get a burrito with a major upgrade: Two flour tortillas instead of one, with cheese sauce in between. Just be ready for a massive meal.
“There’s a Chipotle flour tortilla with every burrito, and they have the cheese, so why wouldn’t you make a quesadilla out of that and then wrap your burrito in it?” Bolger said.
The Five Guys patty melt is a grilled cheese sandwich with a burger shoved in the middle. And if you’re near a Subway sub shop but craving pizza, Bolger suggests making a pizza sub. Ask for the marinara sauce from a meatball sub, top it with veggies and cheese and get the whole thing toasted.
If you’re thirsting to drink something different, head to Starbucks — arguably the most likely place to find people ordering crazy customized creations.
“The Starbucks butterbeer frappucino is inspired by Harry Potter’s fictional drink … it’s taking different flavored syrups that Starbucks offers for other drinks and adding them to the basic vanilla cream frappucino,” Bolger said.
And Starbucks isn’t the only coffee joint for “secret” menu seekers.
“Philz Coffee actually has an underground menu that usually involves mixing their coffee blends and adding different things to the filters (and) using different milks, so you can create different flavors like an oatmeal cookie coffee or a smoky campfire coffee,” Bolger said.
Then there’s the fun of taking a photo of your “secret” food or drink and showing it off to the world.
“There’s something kind of exclusive and cool about knowing how to order what’s not obvious and out there, and then being able to share that insiders-only thing with your friends and through your social media channels,” Bolger said.
Read about more “secret menu” items on Bolger’s blog.
