Homemade McDonald's McGriddle

It's the most famous fast food breakfast item in the world. Two maple griddle cakes, melted American cheese, bacon or sausage, and a fluffy folded egg. And here's the best part. It's super easy to make at home. So smack that like button because it's time to go grab an example from Ronald McDonald himself. So believe it or not, I did not have my first McGriddle until about a month ago. Smells good. Looks good. Wow. That's my favorite breakfast sandwich of the day. It was delightful. And before we make our own at home, we need to get a good example. Manny, this one's hiring too. Still not too late for you. I got you. Hi, which McGriddles do you like better? The bacon or the sausage? Ah, both are delicious. Both are delicious. Okay. What are you laughing about? Because I never try either one. Can we please do three of the sausage McGriddles and then three bacon? Okay. You still laughing? Thank you. I'll let you know how it is. Have a nice one. Thank you so much. The first thing I look for when I get fast food is whether or not it's hot. I want this sandwich to burn my hand. I want it to be piping piping hot. Here we have the sausage egg and cheese McGriddle. Right away, I'm not super impressed by the fact that the cheese doesn't look quite melted. The sandwich is warm, but I felt them hotter. But as I described earlier, we have the maple pancake buns on the outside, the melty American cheese just above it, that fluffy square folded egg above that, and finally either the sausage or the bacon. Time for a bite. This is the most famous fast food breakfast sandwich ever for a reason. But now it's time to make it at home. Now that we brought these back and we have these perfect examples to work with, it's time to make them better. We'll be making our McGriddles with both sausage and bacon. I want them both. To begin, I'll layer all my bacon out on a sheet lined with a wire rack. Even though the bacon's already smoked, I never like to leave my bacon plain. So we're going to be doctoring it up a little bit. To begin, we'll drizzle our bacon with just a little bit of maple syrup. This will caramelize as it cooks in the oven, giving us that delicious maple flavor. Now we finish off our bacon with some freshly cracked black pepper. In my opinion, you should never cook bacon without seasoning it first. Now we toss this in the oven at 400 Fahrenheit about 13 minutes. While that bacon cooks, it's time for our sausage. This may seem a bit odd, but Mandy and I bought these sausages to then turn them into a regular sausage patty. Something about the flavor of these ones is unbeatable. I also use these anytime I make some sort of pasta. And all you have to do is break open the tip and then squeeze out all that sausage from the casing. Now for our sausage, I'll be using this metal ring bowl. But if you're not interested in keeping everything precise, you can skip this step. To begin, I'll go in with just a little bit of oil. Then I'll form a nice sausage patty and press it down in the middle. I'll press this all the way out and then let it cook. Now I'll take off my mold, then flip my patty. That there is a good-looking sausage. This is what I call some crispy bacon. Now that our bacon is finished, we paint it one last time with a little bit of maple syrup, which will slowly soak into the bacon as it sits and cools. And then we let it rest. For our buns, we'll begin by cooking one cup of maple syrup until big bubbles form. Once that's been going for about 10 minutes and concentrated lots of the flavor, I'll toss in four tablespoons of butter. What we're making right now is almost a maple caramel, which is going to go into that hotcake batter for something amazing. What we've just made here is a maple caramel. And all it took was maple syrup and butter. This will be used as the base for the best McGriddle buns ever. Now to continue with our hotcakes, one and a half cups all-purpose flour, three and a half teaspoons of baking powder, one teaspoon of my famous homemade vanilla extract, one whole egg, one teaspoon salt, a tablespoon of sugar, four tablespoons butter or oil, one and a quarter cup fresh milk, and then just a touch of maple syrup for that extra flavor. Now we'll whisk this all up until smooth, then use a few spoons to take out bits of that caramel mixture and drop them into the batter. These are going to leave bits and pieces of your maple syrup throughout those hotcakes. And if you want, you can save a few pieces, then pinch them together to make nice caramels out of it. It's chewy and delicious. Now that all these maple bits are in our batter, I want you to listen. When this cooks, they'll break down and get a bit softer, but also just melt across those buns to make the perfect chewy maple flavor. For the griddle cakes, once again, I'll put down my mold in the center of my pan, add just a little bit of oil to the middle, and then in goes my batter. But make sure to let it climb a little bit up the side so that you get the proper height for your buns. After a few failed attempts to make the perfect buns, we eventually decided to bake our buns at 350 Fahrenheit in ramekins. This left us with a perfect result. The buns are beautiful and golden brown, and you can see all those spots where the maple syrup candied bits have melted. This is going to be the perfect McGriddle bun. Now last but not least, for our eggs. I'm going to teach you how to make the fluffiest eggs you've ever seen. To start, we'll separate out a few eggs into yolks and whites. Make sure to add the egg whites into the larger bowl. Then you can mix by hand if you want, but I'm going to use a hand mixer to fluff up those egg whites. Once they become lighter and fluffier, I'll slowly drop in those egg yolks and continue whipping until they're fully incorporated. That is a fluffy egg batter. This is the one true way to make perfect fluffy eggs. Now over some melted butter, I'll pour in my fluffy egg, then let it cook over low heat. Using this method, as you cook your egg, you should see how truly fluffy it is. As long as you're gentle with it, it should hold lots and lots of those air bubbles, keeping almost a light and frothy egg. Now to keep it square the way they have for the McGriddle, I'll cut off the edges, though you don't have to do this step, just until I have a nice even square. Then it's time to gently fold over our egg. That's perfect. Oh, f*** this. Once you've got that perfect square, your egg is complete, and it's time to assemble our McGriddle. To begin our assembly, we need to melt the cheese on the bottom McGriddle bun. You can do this in an oven or you can torch it like this. Then next up, our fluffy egg. Then our beautiful golden brown sausage patty. It's, like, so cute. And then our bacon, but before I put any on, I'm not kidding when I say this is the best bacon you'd ever taste. So I want to have Manny try a piece to give us his unbiased opinion. Manny, can I try it? Holy f***! Oh my god, it's so good! This is amazing! That maple syrup has melted over the top and almost hardened to make a chewy candy-like exterior on our bacon. I'll place down a few strips of the bacon, really as much or as little as you'd like, and then we finish it all with our beautiful maple bun. And that right there is our version of the McGriddle. Manny and I also figured out that if you put some soft-boiled eggs on the top, you get that nice, delicious burst of egg yolk as well. And that just makes it even better. I was excited when I learned about the real McGriddle the first time around. Now we have this. No more talking. Let's eat. This is one of those things that you're gonna want to go home and make tonight. I know, it's a breakfast food, but it's just that good.