In-N-Out secret menu hoax: Fans go ape online for ‘Monkey Style’ burger that doesn’t exist

Last summer “Gangnam Style” became a viral sensation.

This summer that sensation might have been a “Monkey Style” burger — if only it existed.

An Internet hoax targeting devotees of In-N-Out Burger fooled more than a few customers and even mainstream news outlets this week, despite the restaurant’s insistence that there is no such thing as “Monkey Style” — a burger jammed with grilled onions and french fries.

The hoax, which first appeared on Foodbeast, got mentioned on some blogs, on a newspaper website and even garnered a tweet and photograph from an ESPN and ABC News reporter who declared that the fictional burger appears on In-N-Out’s “secret menu.”

“In-N-Out new secret menu order: Monkey Style (animal style fries in a burger pic.twitter.com/Kqbok4WL6i (H/T @jordynhall4, @foodbeast),” reporter Darren Rovell wrote.

But, there’s no such thing.

So how does one cook up a media frenzy?

It began at 8:51 a.m. on Friday. Foodbeast’s Elie Ayrouth wrote