Shake Shack: Recipes & Stories

LOCAL HERO

NEW YORK, NY

Our frozen custard adventure began with the dairy food scientist Barry Jones and his son, Andrew, who helped us develop our original custard base. Today, it’s made by Cumberland, a company with an American story similar to that of so many of our suppliers. In the 1930s, Charles Catalana turned a part-time job delivering milk in rural New Jersey into a regional dairy-processing powerhouse that is one of three producers across the country who process our custard base that’s shipped to Shacks nationwide. Cumberland Dairy’s milk comes from family-farming co-ops within a 90-mile radius of Bridgeton, New Jersey. And like these happy grazers, most dairy cows are Holsteins.

Dairy farmers working with the still family-owned company’s pledge not to use the growth hormone rBST on their cows, and as each milk shipment arrives at the processing facility, it’s tested for antibiotics. Cumberland then assembles Shack’s custard base with milk, cream, sugar, and cage-free eggs.

All our shakes have the same ratio of ingredients, so it’s easy to customize your flavors. And each recipe makes one 16-ounce shake. We always begin with the same amount of custard: 1½ cups. Then, we add ½ cup milk. And blend. That’s it!

For other flavored shakes, add 2 tablespoons of your favorite sauce or puree, and use ⅓ cup milk. So now you know our secrets.

Put 1½ cups Frozen Vanilla Custard, 2 tablespoons strong cold espresso (something great like Stumptown), and ⅓ cup milk in a blender. Blend on high until smooth.

Put 1½ cups Frozen Vanilla Custard and ½ cup milk in a blender. Blend on high until smooth.

Here’s the master plan; substitute your favorite premium ice cream, we won’t tell!

1. Assemble the ingredients, Vanilla Frozen Custard, Salted Caramel Sauce, apple puree, salt, and milk.

3. Pour the blended shake into a glass and repeat for as many shakes as you want!

4. Sip your creation, like this Salted Caramel Apple Shake, slowly to make it last.

Our step-by-step method for making this luscious shake is detailed on this page.

To 1½ cups custard in a blender, add 3 tablespoons apple puree (we order our fruit purees from perfectpuree.com), 2 tablespoons Salted Caramel Sauce, a pinch of salt, and ⅓ cup milk and blend.

MAKES 1½ CUPS

Salted caramel is like a Bugs Bunny cartoon; it appeals to everyone, kids and adults alike, but for different reasons: kids like its sweetness, we love its salty edge. The sauce is so good as a topping for a scoop of ice cream, great in a shake, or how about in a Concrete with vanilla custard, some chopped banana, and bits of shortbread cookies for crunch? Just saying…

1cup sugar

1cup heavy cream

2teaspoons sea salt

1. Put sugar and ⅓ cup water into a deep medium pot. Swirl the pot to moisten the sugar. Bring to a boil over medium-high heat, gently swirling the pot often to help dissolve the sugar into a clear syrup.

2. Boil the syrup until it smokes and just begins to turn a deep caramel brown, 5 to 8 minutes. The syrup will continue to brown very quickly. Be careful it doesn’t burn. When the syrup is uniformly brown, quickly and carefully add the cream, stirring until the sauce is smooth and returns to a boil, about 1 minute. Remove the pot from the heat. Stir in the salt. Caramel Sauce will keep, covered and refrigerated, for up to 1 week.

“Our goal is very specific: end childhood hunger in the United States. The funds Shake Shack raises every year in its Great American Shake Sale have turbocharged our efforts. For each dollar we spend, we get 10 meals for hungry kids.”

Put 1½ cups Frozen Vanilla Custard in a blender, add 2 tablespoons fromage blanc (or Greek yogurt), ¼ cup fresh raspberries, and ½ cup milk and blend.

Put 1½ cups Frozen Vanilla Custard in a blender, add 2 tablespoons lemon curd, ½ cup fresh blueberries, and ¼ cup milk and blend.

1. Put 1½ cups Frozen Chocolate Custard in a blender, add ½ cup milk, and ⅛ teaspoon peppermint extract.

2. For garnish you’ll need lots of whipped cream and 1 teaspoon finely chopped chocolate peppermint candies (we like Williams-Sonoma’s Chocolate Peppermint Sticks).

1½cups Frozen Vanilla Custard

⅓cup milk

2tablespoons pumpkin puree

1teaspoon ground cinnamon

½teaspoon ground ginger

⅛teaspoon ground clove

⅛teaspoon ground nutmeg

⅛teaspoon ground allspice

This shake was made for autumn days. Add all the ingredients to a blender and mix it up. Or, use a large scoop of filling from your favorite pumpkin pie.

Put 1½ cups Frozen Chocolate Custard and ½ cup milk in a blender. Blend on high until smooth. Serve in a tall cold glass.

BALTHAZAR COOKIE The New York bakery (next to the famous restaurant) that produces this chocolate shortbread cookie has production in New Jersey, perfect for our NJ Shacks. Marshmallow sauce says S’mores; hazelnuts add crunch.

CHOCOLATE SPRINKLES Beware! Most sprinkles are waxy concoctions. We found the purest, most chocolately sprinkles at Guittard, in San Francisco.

MARSHMALLOW SAUCE Mark grew up on sundaes at his local Friendly’s, where his fave was Reese’s Pieces peanut butter with marshmallow topping. Hence this marshmallow sauce that adds a flavorful vanilla note, plus its flat white color enhances the chocolate.

SHORTBREAD This Concrete has the vibe of a berry pie, and shortbread, with its wonderful texture and mild buttery flavor note, acts as the crust. It’s one of our favorite mix-ins as a blank canvas that holds together all the other ingredients.

BLUEBERRY LIME JAM New Jersey is berry country, and we always look for people making the best local jams to pair with the vanilla custard for our local deconstructed pie à la mode Concretes.

SALTED CARAMEL SAUCE This is our generation’s go-to topping, and kids love it, too. With its bittersweet, smoky, salty flavor, it’s perfect drizzled over both chocolate and vanilla custard, or fruit, or in a shake (recipe this page).

MALT POWDER Malt is a classic soda shop staple that adds a touch of bitterness and a crispy texture. In Kuwait we use malt for a Sandstorm Concrete that looks like sand dunes.

CHOCOLATE TOFFEE Our toffee is a magical combination of pure butter, sugar, fine French chocolate, and sea salt. Use the best you can find.

VANILLA CUSTARD Vanilla adds intense flavor to any ingredient it touches; use the best quality you can find (recipe this page).

CHOCOLATE CUSTARD Two flavors of chocolate make far more luscious custard than one. Our custard recipe (this page), combines 70% bittersweet plus unsweetened cocoa.

5. Churn the custard in an ice cream maker following manufacturer’s directions.

This is it! The master recipe for most of our Concretes and milkshakes, tweaked so you can make it at home. Frozen custard is simply freshly made ice cream with a higher butterfat and egg yolk content. Because we make ours fresh all day in small batches, our custard stays creamy and dense, its flavor heightened by the best vanilla we can find. A favorite is Nielsen-Massey pure vanilla extract from Waukegan, Illinois.

5egg yolks

½cup sugar

1½cups heavy cream

1½cups milk

Pinch of salt

1teaspoon good quality pure vanilla extract

1. Put the egg yolks and sugar into a heavy medium saucepan and whisk until smooth. Whisk in the cream and milk. Cook over medium heat, stirring frequently with a wooden spoon, until the custard reaches a temperature of 170°F on an instant-read thermometer or is thick enough to coat the back of the spoon.

2. Strain the custard into a medium bowl. Stir in the salt and vanilla. Set that bowl into a larger bowl filled with ice, then stir the custard frequently until it has cooled. Cover the custard and refrigerate it until completely chilled, about 4 hours.

3. Churn the custard in an ice cream maker following the manufacturer’s instructions. Scoop the custard into a quart container with a lid, cover, and store in the freezer for at least 2 hours, until firm. Custard can be kept up to a month in the freezer, but we prefer to eat it within 24 hours!

The obvious determining factor in this recipe is the quality of the chocolate. We seek out and use craft chocolate like Mast Brothers (this page) and Compartés (this page) wherever possible. It does make a difference. We also love the chocolate from Guittard and TCHO, both from San Francisco.

¼cup unsweetened cocoa

2ounces 70% bittersweet chocolate, cut into small pieces

5egg yolks

½cup sugar

1½cups heavy cream

1½cups milk

Pinch of salt

1. Set the cocoa and chopped bittersweet chocolate aside in a large heatproof bowl.

2. Put the egg yolks and sugar into a heavy medium saucepan and whisk until smooth. Gradually whisk in the cream and milk. Cook over medium heat, stirring frequently with a wooden spoon, until the custard reaches a temperature of 170°F on an instant-read thermometer or is thick enough to coat the back of the spoon.

3. Pour the warm custard into the large bowl with the 2 chocolates and let it sit for a minute to melt the chocolate. Add salt and stir well, smoothly incorporating all the chocolate.

4. Strain the custard into a medium bowl. Set that bowl into a larger bowl filled with ice, then stir the custard frequently until it has cooled. Cover the custard and refrigerate it until completely chilled, about 4 hours.

5. Churn the custard in an ice cream maker following the manufacturer’s instructions. Scoop the ice cream into a quart container with a lid, cover, and store in the freezer. Custard can be kept up to a month in the freezer, but we prefer to eat it within 24 hours!

Make this Concrete with whatever pie’s the apple of your eye. It’s one of our favorites, maybe because it hearkens back to the classic American pie and burger combo. A well-constructed pie adds yummy texture and jammy consistency to the frozen custard.

1. Spoon the frozen vanilla custard into a medium bowl. Add the pie. Cover with wrap and transfer the bowl to the freezer for at least 15 minutes and as long as 2 hours.

2. When ready to serve, gently mash ingredients together with a wooden spoon until just combined. Spoon the Concretes into 2 dessert dishes, top with whipped cream, if using, and serve.

To make a Pecan Pie Oh My, just substitute a nice slice of good pecan pie for the berry pie and enjoy!

LOCAL HERO

BROOKLYN, NY

Emily Elsen and her sister, Melissa, have a storybook American tale. The girls grew up in the South Dakota town of Hecla (population 230), where their family owned a homestyle restaurant and their grandmother, Liz, just happened to be a famous pie baker. After art school in New York and London (Emily), and a degree in finance (Melissa), the girls moved into an old house in Brooklyn. “Whenever we thought about a business to start, it always came back to pies,” Emily remembers. “Every time I made a pie, people would flip out. They said I had a gift!”

The sisters had a simple goal: Make the best pies. In 2009, they found a funky shop space in Gowanus, Brooklyn, renovated it with friends, and sold out as soon as they opened. “We were in over our heads right away.” Soon afterward, they met the folks from Shake Shack, and began supplying pies for Pie Oh My Concretes.

LOCAL HERO

ATLANTA, GA

Award-winning chef Linton Hopkins and his wife, Gina, a sommelier, are household names on the Atlanta fine dining restaurant scene, where they run among others, the renowned Restaurant Eugene and Holman & Finch Public House, for which their H & F Bread Co. is named. Started to feed their restaurant company, H & F has gained renown in its own right, turning out artisanal breads and pastries such as these pecan pies that Shake Shack mixes into Pecan Pie Oh My Concretes in Atlanta, here proudly shown by Fallon Parks in the cozy, sweet-smelling shop tucked into the front of the bakery.

This Concrete has been our #1 seller since it was first served at Madison Square Park in 2004. Only the mix-ins have evolved. As we enter new communities, we reach out to the best local purveyors. In London, it’s chocolate hazelnut brownies from Fergus Henderson’s St. JOHN Bakery and paul.a.young’s craft chocolate chunks. In Tokyo, the brownies are from Dominique Ansel’s bakery. In LA, we mix Suzanne Goin’s salted caramel chocolate brownie from her Larder Baking Co. with Compartés dark chocolate chunks. Make your own with your favorite small batch brownies and chocolate.

3 to 4 scoops Frozen Chocolate Custard

2tablespoons Fudge Sauce

½cup brownie cut into small pieces

3tablespoons Mast Brothers or other craft chocolate, broken into chunks

2tablespoons chocolate sprinkles

1. Spoon the frozen chocolate custard into a medium bowl. Add the fudge sauce, brownies, and chocolate. Cover with wrap and transfer the bowl to the freezer for at least 15 minutes and as long as 2 hours.

2. When ready to serve, gently mash ingredients together with a wooden spoon until just combined. Spoon the Concretes into 2 dessert dishes, top with the sprinkles, and serve.

⅓cup heavy cream

⅔cup milk

¼cup sugar

2tablespoons unsalted butter

1cup bittersweet chocolate, finely chopped

Put cream, milk, sugar, and butter into a large saucepan and bring just to a boil over medium heat. Add the chocolate and cook, stirring often, until chocolate melts. Remove pan from heat. Let fudge sauce cool, stirring occasionally. Fudge sauce will keep, covered and refrigerated, for up to 1 week.

LOCAL HERO

NEW YORK AND TOKYO

As Dominique tells it, he arrived in New York from Paris in 2006 with two suitcases to be executive pastry chef for Daniel Boulud at Daniel. By 2011, he’d opened his own shop in SoHo, where, in 2013, he launched the Cronut, that marriage of croissant and donut that rocketed to worldwide fame.

Mark, who admires Dominique’s “creativity, warmth, and uncanny ability to push culinary boundaries,” asked him to make a Cronut Concrete for charity. Dominique’s Concrete had a base of the Shack’s butter caramel frozen custard with cinnamon sugar Cronut holes. When Tokyo Shacks opened, Dominique had a bakery there, too: Tokyo Shack Attack Concretes feature his milk chocolate popcorn brownie.

LOCAL HERO

LONDON, UK

How the chef made famous by his book The Whole Beast, Nose to Tail Eating, can make what Mark calls the “Best. Brownie. Ever.” is one of life’s sweet mysteries. But Fergus, whose London restaurant, St. JOHN, is a tribute to elemental yet elegant food, just knows what good is. St. JOHN Bakery makes intensely flavorful goodies. That chocolate hazelnut brownie and their brown sugar biscuit star in Concretes at the London Shacks, and at Cardiff, Wales, too. That’s Henderson, below front, hard at work at their French vineyard, backed by his St. JOHN partner, Trevor Gulliver, and winemaker/partner, Benjamin Darnault.

LOCAL HERO

BROOKLYN, NY

“We’re a chocolate company,” says Rick Mast, , with his brother, Michael, in their Brooklyn shop/factory. “With so much hate and divisiveness in the world, you can’t go wrong coming down on the side of love.” Since 2007, the brothers’ dream was to “start a family food business with chocolate as the focus that blends into architecture, design, art, and music.” They obsess over the proper blending of cacao beans from small farm cooperatives while at the same time focusing on such expansion as moving into a vast space in the newly reimagined neighborhood of Downtown Los Angeles.

“We had a lot of respect for Danny and Mark and bonded over our love of good food,” says Michael. “Our relationship is super-collaborative.” The Mast Brothers Shake Shack Buttermilk Chocolate bar in its signature wrapper is sold at Shacks and used as an ingredient in Concretes.

Staple Pigeon is a hotter than hot menswear company that elevates streetwear to cult status. Working with Jeff Staple, Mark’s challenge was to create a Concrete that looked like a pigeon (Staple’s mascot) and tasted like a dream. To Mark, pigeon gray equaled black sesame donuts from Doughnut Plant; to mirror a pigeons’ pink feet, Mark conjured up raspberry preserves.

1. Spoon the frozen custard into a medium bowl. Add the donuts and raspberry preserves. Cover with wrap and transfer the bowl to the freezer for at least 15 minutes and as long as 2 hours.

2. When ready to serve, gently mash ingredients together with a wooden spoon until just combined. Spoon the Concretes into 2 dessert dishes and serve immediately.

LOCAL HERO

NEW YORK, NY

The tiny pink rivet on the pocket of his black Staple Pigeon shorts is the clue to fashion designer/manufacturer Jeff Staple’s aesthetic. It’s what put raspberry preserves in the Staple Concrete launched at Madison Square Park that, along with a Staple-designed T-shirt and glasses, sold out in about 30 seconds. Google staplepigeon.com for an idea of how pigeons—and contemporary culture—work their magic. Staple says of his relationship with Shake Shack: “We bonded over our mutual respect and our links to New York City culture.”

Donuts and Concretes are perfect mates and the Rainbow’s a big favorite for kids’ birthday parties. We created a special version, the Rainbow Connection, for the opening of our West Hollywood Shack, combining Nicole Rucker’s spice crumb donut from Cofax with Jessica Koslow’s Seascape Strawberry & Rose Geranium jam from Sqirl. In Philadelphia, we use Federal Donuts’ French toast donut, and in Chicago, it’s a salted caramel old-fashioned donut from Glazed and Infused.

3 to 4 scoops Frozen Vanilla Custard

1spiced crumb donut or other cake donut, broken into ½-inch pieces

¼cup strawberry preserves

2tablespoons rainbow sprinkles

1. Spoon the frozen vanilla custard into a medium bowl. Add the donuts and strawberry preserves. Cover with wrap and transfer the bowl to the freezer for at least 15 minutes and as long as 2 hours.

2. When ready to serve, gently mash ingredients together with a wooden spoon until just combined. Spoon the Concretes into 2 dessert dishes, top with rainbow sprinkles, and serve immediately.

LOCAL HERO

PHILADELPHIA, PA

They admit to knowing nothing about making donuts when the five friends gathered in Philadelphia in 2011. But they did know about cooking and serving food. Michael Solomonov and his business partner, Steven Cook had opened the already-famous modern Israeli restaurant, Zahav, in 2008. Bobby Logue, next to Steve, ran a hip coffee shop, Bodhi Coffee, in South Philly, often with Tom Henneman, next to Mike, now Fed Nuts’ general manager. Felicia D’Ambrosio is a social media maven.

Bobby found “a greasy, pizza parlor down on Second Street.” The five became partners, expanding their Federal Donuts shops that serve both hot fresh and fancy glazed donuts, in flavors like grapefruit and pomegranate-Nutella. And since there is all that hot oil, they make fried chicken too, dusted with exotic spices.

Philly Shacks serve Fed Nuts mix-ins such as the French toast fancy donut in our Declaration of Donuts Concrete.

A float is the simplest thing, but it’s exciting because the flavors keep changing. First there’s the impact of the bubbly soda, then, as the custard melts into the drink, every sip and every bite is different and fun. Here are just two examples. But how about swapping out the soda for Brooklyn Brewery’s Chocolate Stout? Add grape soda and it’s a Purple Cow. The combinations are endless.

Pour 12 ounces cold Fanta orange soda into a tall wide chilled 24-ounce glass. Gently add 2 scoops Frozen Vanilla Custard.

Pour 12 ounces cold Abita or other fine root beer into a tall wide chilled 24-ounce glass. Gently add 2 scoops Frozen Vanilla Custard.

LOCAL HERO

COVINGTON, LA

Clearly, Danny’s memory of the old-fashioned draft root beer (with its secret recipe!) served at his teen hangout, Fitz’s in St. Louis, led the search for it to this craft brewery on the North Shore of Lake Pontchartrain, across from New Orleans.

Abita makes bright root beer that’s served on tap at most Shacks. It has that authentic draft root beer smell and flavor of fresh herbs, vanilla, yucca, and Louisiana cane sugar, involving no corn syrup or other artificial ingredients. The magic, it’s said, comes from the healing powers of the spring water they use from an artisanal well in Abita Springs.

When we opened in Madison Square Park, so many of our customers showed up after taking their pets to the Park’s dog run that we thought it would only be good hospitality to offer something to those hungry, thirsty dogs, too. Hence the Pooch-ini. We make ours with Bocce’s all-natural ShackBurger Dog Biscuits.

Put 2 tablespoons smooth peanut butter in a dog dish. Add 1 or 2 scoops Frozen Vanilla Custard. Break some dog biscuits (this page) in pieces and scatter over the custard.

“We love dogs! This goes back to being born in a park where you could come have a burger and let your pet loose at the dog run. Our Shacks love to host pet adoption organizations like Badass Brooklyn Animal Rescue, Bobbi and the Strays, and PAWS. No sensible dog would sniff at our dog biscuits and dog-friendly dessert, the Pooch-ini.”

This is one version of the healthy dog biscuits made by Andrea Tovar at Bocce’s Bakery. For more treats, check out boccesbakery.com.

1. Preheat the oven to 350°F. Put the bananas and peanut butter in a food processor and purée until creamy, about 1 minute. Add the oat flour and process until the dough comes together in a ball, about 1 minute.

2. On a lightly oat-floured surface, roll out the dough to about ¼ inch thick. Cut into shapes using any cookie cutter. Dip the cookie cutter in the oat flour with each cut. Work from the center of the rolled-out dough out to the edges, cutting shapes close to prevent extra rerolling. Place cookies 1 inch apart on ungreased cookie sheets. Bake until golden, about 25 minutes.

LOCAL HERO

NEW YORK, NY

Named appropriately for baker/owner Andrea Tovar’s dog, Bocce’s began when Andrea discovered that most dog treats were filled with chemicals. An organic baker, Andrea, with her sister, Natalia, began baking healthy biscuits out of a tiny New York apartment.

Andrea says she’d always loved Shake Shack and was surprised when she took Bocce to Madison Square Park for his Pooch-ini that its dog treats were pretty ordinary. A random email resulted in a meeting with Mark Rosati, where “he eagerly tasted every dog biscuit I made.” Together they developed biscuits with “human-grade” ingredients, wheat-free, packed with fruits and vegetables. (ShackBurger Biscuits use Pat LaFrieda’s beef!) Shacks began selling Andrea’s Bag O’ Bones. When the first London Shack opened in 2013, Andrea found a London baker to partner with, to source and bake locally.