Durkee’s Famous Sauce Copycat #1 on the left, original in the center, #2 on the right.*
The dry-brined turkey breast we smoked on Memorial Day required some Durkee’s Famous Sauce to make sandwiches, and our jar was near empty. Amazon does not currently stock the product and their third parties are offering punitive markups. If we lived in TX we could just stroll to the supermarket and buy a fresh jar but, north of the Mason Dixon line, Durkee’s Famous Sauce seems impossible to acquire. Time to execute a long delayed experiment and attempt a copycat.
Our jar of Durkee’s Famous Sauce is down to the last spoonful.
Here are the ingredients on the Durkee’s label which have stayed fairly consistent through changes in ownership: soybean oil, water, distilled vinegar, sugar, mustard, salt, whole egg solids, food starch-modified, xanthum gum, spice extractives. Not that helpful. Xanthum gum is a thickener you probably don’t have in your cupboard (though we do, from our molecular gastronomy experiments) so we’ll need to find another way to turn liquids into a spreadable emulsion.
We have been tracking copycat recipes online as Durkee’s availability has ebbed and flowed over the years and saved two recipes for experimentation. We will tip our hand and tell you the following recipe was not the winner but it’s pretty good if you feel like making something up right now:
Ingredients:
1 egg yolk
¼ c white vinegar
½ c plus 2 T mayonnaise
¼ c plus 1 T Dijon mustard
2 t granulated sugar
4 t dry mustard
1 t Kosher salt
½ t Worcestershire sauce
Method: whisk egg yolk and vinegar in a double boiler until temperature on an instant-read thermometer reaches 160 degrees. (For us, this happened after a couple minutes when the egg and vinegar were smoothly incorporated.) Add all other ingredients and whisk to combine while still warm. Cool before using as a spread or salad dressing.
Critique: the finished dressing (#1 in our feature photo) has a mayo-like consistency which is fine but Durkee’s is thicker. This dressing is tarter than Durkee’s so consider dialing back the vinegar. “Dijon mustard” is variable and the brand we used (Maille) maybe was more assertive than the recipe wanted. And we had misgivings about the use of Worcestershire which does not fit the flavor profile of Durkee’s in our opinion.
The other recipe? It’s almost a dead ringer and we will share it in an upcoming post. It’s very close to actual Durkee’s Famous Sauce and is a variation of (but not same as) on the recipe we linked to way back in 2010. Check back in a few days!
P.S. If you haven’t recently visited our 2010 post on Durkee’s, scroll down to the comments and read all the way to the end. There’s a possible recipe for “3 P Salad” to check out!
*In our photo, the Durkee’s original has a yellowish cast that we didn’t try to duplicate as it makes no difference in the flavor. The yellow probably comes from the egg solids or maybe one of those spice extractives.
