ShackBurger Recipe: Shake Shack Burger at Home

To make a ShackBurger at home, smash a very cold 4 oz (113 g) ball of beef to 1/3 inch (about 8 mm) in a hot cast-iron skillet. Cook it 2½ minutes without touching it, flip, add a slice of American cheese and give it 1 minute more. Serve it on a butter-toasted potato bun with green leaf lettuce, plum tomato and a mayo-Dijon sauce. That method isn’t a guess: it comes from Shake Shack’s own cookbook, Shake Shack: Recipes & Stories (Clarkson Potter, 2017).

The sauce is the one place where nobody outside the company knows the exact formula. The ShackSauce served in the restaurants has never been published. The cookbook prints a sauce called “Not Quite Our ShackSauce”, and that title is Shake Shack admitting it’s an adaptation (Publishers Weekly, May 16, 2017). I use it below and label it for what it is.

What’s in a ShackBurger: official vs. copycat

A ShackBurger is an Angus beef cheeseburger with lettuce, tomato and ShackSauce on a toasted potato bun. That’s the chain’s own US menu description, which I checked on Shake Shack’s Uber Eats listing on October 27, 2026. Everything beyond that, from the beef blend to the sauce, comes either from the 2017 cookbook or from someone’s guess.

Most copycats online mix those layers together. I’d rather keep them apart.

Shake Shack’s annual report adds a little more. The chain describes “made-to-order Angus beef burgers” and proteins that are “100% all-natural”, with “no added hormones”, “humanely raised and source-verified”. It buys from 11 approved raw beef suppliers and 7 ground beef processors in the US, none of them named (Shake Shack 10-K, fiscal 2025).

All of this describes the US menu. I found nothing confirming that licensed Shacks abroad use the same bun or recipe.

ShackBurger ingredients for 2 burgers

This list makes two single ShackBurgers. It’s the cookbook recipe, written for four, cut in half, with US measures first and metric in brackets.

For the burgers

• 8 oz (227 g) ground beef, kept very cold, divided into 2 balls of 4 oz (113 g)
• 2 potato buns
• 2 tbsp (28 g) unsalted butter, melted
• 2 leaves green leaf lettuce
• 4 slices plum (Roma) tomato, 1/4 inch (about 6 mm) thick
• 2 slices American cheese
• Kosher salt and freshly ground black pepper

For the sauce (“Not Quite Our ShackSauce”, scaled down)

• 1/4 cup (55–60 g) Hellmann’s mayonnaise
• 1/2 tbsp (about 7 g) Dijon mustard
• 3/8 to 1/2 tsp Heinz ketchup
• 1/8 tsp kosher dill pickle brine
• 1 small pinch cayenne pepper

Time: the cookbook gives 30 minutes in total, 20 of prep and 10 of cooking (Tasting Table). Most of that is prep, and the pan part is over in a few minutes.

Shack Sauce recipe from the official cookbook

The Shack Sauce in the 2017 cookbook is just mayonnaise, Dijon mustard, ketchup, dill pickle brine and cayenne stirred together. For four burgers: 1/2 cup Hellmann’s mayonnaise, 1 tbsp Dijon mustard, about 3/4 to 1 tsp Heinz ketchup, 1/4 tsp kosher dill pickle brine and a pinch of cayenne (The Takeout, AJC).

The reprints disagree on the ketchup. The Takeout and the AJC print 3/4 tsp; Tasting Table prints 1 tsp. Without the printed book in hand, I give a range. In my kitchen, the top of the range won. At 3/8 tsp the Dijon dominated, and the sauce tasted more like a mustard mayo than a burger sauce.

“Not Quite Our ShackSauce” quantities: the 2017 Shake Shack cookbook amounts for 4 burgers next to the halved amounts for 2 burgers, in US measures and grams. The ketchup is given as a range because reprints of the cookbook print either 3/4 tsp or 1 tsp. (Table: Burger Breton, CC0, data from Shake Shack: Recipes & Stories (Clarkson Potter, 2017) via The Takeout, AJC and Tasting Table)

Dijon or yellow mustard in Shake Shack sauce?

The cookbook uses Dijon, not yellow mustard. Dijon is sharper and less vinegary. Plenty of copycats call for yellow mustard, but that’s their assumption, not Shake Shack’s.

Is the cookbook sauce the real ShackSauce?

No, and Shake Shack says so in the title itself. Recipes listing smoked paprika or garlic powder for the restaurant sauce circulate online. I couldn’t trace any of them to an official source, so I left them out.

How to make a ShackBurger step by step

The ShackBurger is a smash burger: a cold ball of beef pressed thin on hot cast iron so it builds a deep brown crust in under four minutes. Read every step before you start. Once the beef hits the pan, there’s no time to look anything up.

1. Mix the sauce

Stir the mayonnaise, Dijon mustard, ketchup, pickle brine and cayenne together in a small bowl. Refrigerate it while you prep the rest.

2. Portion and chill the beef

Divide the beef into two 4 oz (113 g) portions and shape each into a puck about 1 inch thick. Keep them in the fridge until the last moment. On my first test I left one puck on the counter while the buns toasted, and it tore at the edges when I smashed it. The one straight from the fridge held together.

3. Toast the buns in butter

Heat a cast-iron skillet over medium-low heat. Brush the cut sides of the buns with melted butter and toast them cut side down for 2 to 3 minutes, until golden.

4. Dress the top buns

Spread about 1 tbsp of sauce on each top bun, then add a lettuce leaf and two tomato slices. In the Shake Shack build, sauce and vegetables sit above the patty, not under it.

A single ShackBurger at Shake Shack in New Haven, Connecticut: one Angus beef patty, American cheese, green leaf lettuce and thick tomato slices in a potato bun wrapped in paper, next to crinkle-cut fries. It shows the official build: lettuce and tomato sit on the patty, under the top bun. (Photo: m01229, CC BY 2.0, https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:Shake\_Shack\_burger\_and\_fries\_(14129412503).jpg)

5. Preheat the skillet

Turn the heat up to medium and let the skillet heat for 2 to 3 minutes. Meanwhile, season both sides of each puck with kosher salt and pepper.

6. Smash the patties

Put the pucks in the skillet and press each one down hard with a sturdy metal spatula until it is about 1/3 inch (8 mm) thick. Smash once, right away. Then leave it alone.

7. Sear for 2½ minutes

Cook the patties for 2½ minutes without moving them, until the edges turn brown and lacy. That crust is the ShackBurger. Without it you’re just making a nice cheeseburger.

8. Flip, add cheese and finish

Scrape under each patty with the spatula, flip it, lay a slice of American cheese on top and cook 1 minute more. The cookbook calls this result medium.

ShackBurger cooking times in a cast-iron skillet, from the Shake Shack cookbook: toast the buns 2 to 3 minutes, preheat the pan 2 to 3 minutes (shown as 2½), sear the smashed patty 2½ minutes, then flip, add cheese and cook 1 minute. That’s about 3½ minutes in the pan per patty. (Chart: Burger Breton, CC0, data from Shake Shack: Recipes & Stories (2017) via Tasting Table)

9. Assemble and serve

Set each patty on a bottom bun, close with the dressed top bun and eat right away. To check doneness with a thermometer, my colleague Clara’s burger patty internal temperature guide gives the numbers for every level.

How to smash burgers in a cast-iron skillet

A cast-iron skillet does the job of a flat-top griddle, provided it’s fully preheated and you press hard. The cookbook method is written for cast iron, so you don’t need extra gear.

• Use a rigid metal spatula, not a flexible fish spatula. Pressing a second spatula or a heavy pan on top gets you to 1/3 inch.
• Smash once, in the first seconds. Pressing later squeezes out juice and breaks the crust.
• Cook no more than two patties at a time in a 10-inch skillet, or the pan cools down.
• Scrape, don’t lift, when you flip. The best part of the crust sticks to the iron, and you want it on the burger.

It’s the same technique I use in my Five Guys cheeseburger copycat, and Alice applies it to a bacon burger in her Sonic All-American Bacon Smasher copycat.

Which beef to use for a Shake Shack burger

Shake Shack uses Angus beef but has never published its blend or fat ratio. Anything more precise is a copycat assumption.

Todd Wilbur of Top Secret Recipes rebuilds it from four cuts: chuck, brisket, skirt steak and short rib, formed into 1/4 lb patties (Top Secret Recipes). It’s a reasonable guess, nothing more. If your butcher grinds to order, ask for that blend. If not, good ground chuck, ideally labeled Angus, gets you most of the way there. Cold handling matters more than the blend.

Single or double ShackBurger?

The cookbook recipe makes a single, with one 1/4 lb (113 g) patty. For a double, cook two 4 oz pucks the same way and stack them with a slice of cheese on each.

Double ShackBurger at Shake Shack in Las Vegas: two smashed beef patties with melted American cheese, lettuce, tomato and ShackSauce on a toasted potato bun. At home, stack two 4 oz (113 g) patties with one slice of cheese on each. (Photo: T.Tseng, CC BY 2.0, https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:Double\_shack\_burger.jpg)

Potato bun swaps when you can’t find Martin’s

The ShackBurger bun is a potato roll, and in the US it’s made by Martin’s Famous Potato Rolls. Shake Shack has worked with Martin’s since its first opening in 2004. Martin’s sells the roll as the “Shake Shack bun”: it made the bun 4 inches wide in 2013, then 5 inches from 2016 (Chowhound, Martin’s foodservice).

No Martin’s at your store? Any soft potato roll of about the same size will do, or bake your own with our homemade burger buns recipe. Pick a soft, slightly sweet bun that toasts well in butter. I’d rather use a supermarket potato roll than a fancy brioche: a crusty or seeded bun changes this burger more than any sauce tweak.

American cheese and other swaps

Use plain American cheese slices. The cookbook calls for them, and nothing else melts that smoothly in a one-minute finish. I tried a sharp cheddar once. It tasted good, but it was still half-solid when the minute was up, and the burger no longer tasted like a ShackBurger.

Why this recipe tastes like the original

This copycat gets close because it copies what Shake Shack has documented itself, not rumors about secret ingredients.

• The crust. Smashing to 1/3 inch and leaving the patty alone for 2½ minutes gives the crisp brown edge that defines the burger.
• The bun. A butter-toasted potato roll is soft, a little sweet and sized for a 1/4 lb patty.
• The build. Sauce, lettuce and tomato go on the top bun, so the patty sits directly on the bottom bun and the crust stays crisp.
• The sauce. The cookbook version is Shake Shack’s own adaptation. It isn’t the restaurant formula, but it beats any guessed formula.

Where the ShackBurger comes from

The ShackBurger was born at Shake Shack’s first location in Madison Square Park, New York, which features in our guide to the best burgers in New York. The chain had 659 Shacks at the end of 2025, 373 company-operated and 286 licensed (10-K, fiscal 2025). The full timeline is on our Shake Shack brand page. In London, our best burgers in London guide is a good place to start if you’d like to compare a homemade smash burger with what the city’s grills serve.

The original Shake Shack kiosk in Madison Square Park, New York, at night in August 2023, with its outdoor tables under string lights. The ShackBurger was born here when the permanent stand opened in 2004. (Photo: Eden, Janine and Jim, CC BY 2.0, https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:Shake\_Shack\_Night\_(53103585496).jpg)

Map of the first Shake Shack, inside Madison Square Park near East 23rd Street and Madison Avenue in Manhattan, New York: the birthplace of the ShackBurger. (Map: OpenStreetMap contributors, ODbL)

Shake Shack had 659 locations on December 31, 2025: 373 company-operated and 286 licensed, according to its fiscal 2025 10-K annual report. (Chart: Burger Breton, CC0, data from Shake Shack Form 10-K fiscal 2025 (SEC))

ShackBurger recipe FAQ

What’s in a ShackBurger?

According to Shake Shack’s US menu, it’s an Angus beef cheeseburger with lettuce, tomato and ShackSauce on a toasted potato bun. The 2017 cookbook specifies American cheese, green leaf lettuce and plum tomato.

How much does a ShackBurger patty weigh?

The official cookbook uses a 1/4 lb (113 g) patty, shaped 1 inch thick and smashed to 1/3 inch in the pan.

Is the cookbook ShackSauce the real recipe?

No. Shake Shack titled it “Not Quite Our ShackSauce”, an adaptation published for home cooks. The restaurant formula has never been released.

How long do you cook a ShackBurger?

According to the cookbook, sear it for 2½ minutes after smashing, then flip, add cheese and cook 1 minute more. That’s about 3½ minutes per patty over medium heat.

Can I make a ShackBurger without a griddle?

Yes. The official method uses a cast-iron skillet. Preheat it over medium heat for 2 to 3 minutes and smash with a sturdy metal spatula.

Did Shake Shack ever sell a ShackBurger kit?

Yes. In 2020 Shake Shack sold DIY ShackBurger kits for eight burgers, with potato buns, patties and ShackSauce (FOX 11 Los Angeles).

For more chain burgers rebuilt at home, see the Whopper ingredients and copycat recipe and the rest of our burger recipes.