One of Olive Garden’s most popular offerings is the breadsticks, which the restaurant boasts about “baking straight from the oven.” But when an Olive Garden employee demonstrated how the chain makes the fan-favorite side, some viewers quickly lost their appetite.
Olive Garden breadstick tutorial
In her TikTok, Olive Garden worker @readheadgurl takes a container of disposable gloves and slides them on her hands. “Come and make Olive Garden breadsticks with me,” she writes in the text overlay.
Then, she shows over 333,000 viewers how it’s done. First, she tears open a plastic wrapper with eight pre-made, frozen breadsticks inside and dumps them out. The breadsticks appear stuck together by the fours. Next, the content creator picks up what appears to be parchment paper to lay on a baking sheet pan.
She then lays them on the sheet, still stuck together.
She then cracks open a tub of what appears to be liquid garlic butter and dumps the contents into a metal dish. The worker pops the breadsticks in the oven for a little bit before topping them with butter.
However, @readheadgurl makes a slight error. “Accidentally burned them,” she states in the text overlay, showing the dark-tanned bread with crispy edges.
Boredom is what inspired the content creator to post this demo. “S[u]per bored that I made a video about breadsticks,” she also shared.
The Daily Dot reached out to @readheadgurl via TikTok comment and direct message as well as Olive Garden via press email.
Viewers weigh in
Some felt uneasy watching the TikToker’s video, while others were repelled.
“This feels illegal to watch,” one viewer stated.
“I don’t want it anymore,” a second remarked.
“Yeah I’m [good. I] haven’t been to Olive Garden in over 15 years. I’ll keep it that way,” a third commented.
Hot dog buns disguised as breadsticks controversy
Another noted, “Why did Olive Garden change their breadstick supplier, they’re literally hot dog buns.”
The conspiracy that Olive Garden uses hot dog buns for its breadsticks has been around for a while and is often fueled by TikTok videos. In January, Olive Garden customer Rachel noticed something odd about her basket of bread. “Are Olive Garden breadsticks just warmed up hot dog buns????” she asked her followers. Another viral TikTok posted a month later, in February, speculated the same.
Even an alleged worker chimed in, claiming the restaurant uses hot dog buns when “their local supplier is out of stock.” And they assured the customer that “it’s temporary.”
What’s the verdict?
The bread Olive Garden uses is not a hot dog bun. However, the restaurant switched its breadstick supplier in 2023 because the FDA added sesame as an allergen. “Following the FDA’s declaration of sesame as a major allergen, our suppliers have added a minimal amount of sesame flour… to our breadsticks,” Olive Garden told Business Insider. “We have updated our allergen guide accordingly and are sharing this information with our guests.”
Although the breadsticks are pre-baked before being shipped to different locations and heated in the oven, the chain claims that the recipe hasn’t changed.
@readheadgurl Súper bored that I made a video about breadsticks #olivegarden ♬ original sound – Ms.Kly – Ms.Kly ^᪲᪲᪲⋆
Internet culture is chaotic—but we’ll break it down for you in one daily email. Sign up for the Daily Dot’s web_crawlr newsletter here. You’ll get the best (and worst) of the internet straight into your inbox.
