Sauces, Salsas & Dressings

A sauce and a salsa are really the same idea in different moods — one simmered slowly, the other thrown together fresh in five minutes flat. This collection of homemade sauces, salsas and dressings brings together cooked sauces, fresh salsas, coulis, and the dressings that finish a dish properly. If you are after homemade salsa recipes, they sit alongside the cooked sauces below.

Jump to: Cooked sauces · Fresh & rustic · Dressings · Preserves & condiments

Inside the Homemade Sauces, Salsas and Dressings Collection

Cooked Sauces

Cooked sauces come first in these homemade sauces, salsas and dressings: coulis, pan sauces, hot sauces, pestos and mustards, all made from scratch.

• What to Do with Coulis — A guide to using coulis well, beyond just a dot on the plate.
• Pan-Fried Pork Loin with Raspberry Coulis, Buttery Mash & Green Beans — A sharp raspberry coulis cutting through rich pork loin and buttery mash.
• Cheesy Mustard Sauce: The Lazy Chef's Upgrade for Pork Chop Night — Five minutes, one pan, a proper upgrade for a midweek chop.
• Roasted Cherry Tomato Sauce for One with Garlic Marinated Turkey Chop — Slow-roasted tomatoes, broken down into a sauce built for a single portion.
• Roasted Cherry Tomatoes and Red Onion Sauce — The same roasting technique, a different pairing.
• Sun-Dried Tomato Sauce with Olives, White Wine & Thyme — Deep, savoury, and built from the store cupboard.
• Homemade English BBQ Sauce — A proudly British take, made before the move to Spain.
• Homemade Schezwan Sauce — Fiery Indo-Chinese chilli sauce, traced back to Pearl City in Manchester's Chinatown.
• Homemade Ponzu Sauce — A Japanese citrus dipping sauce, sharp and clean.
• Quick Red Chilli Sauce — Ready in minutes, hot enough to mean it.
• Small-Batch Chilli Oil with Fresh Chillies — A gentle, fruity olive-oil chilli oil with fresh chillies, dried flakes and a spoonful of garlic confit oil, made for drizzling.
• Homemade Coriander Pesto — Fresh coriander, pine nuts, Parmesan, garlic and lemon, made whenever a good bunch turns up. It freezes beautifully.
• Homemade Sunflower Seed Pesto — A nut-free alternative with the same generous, herby spirit.
• Ramsbottom: Incredible Edible Wild Garlic Pesto — The seasonal wild garlic cousin of the coriander and sunflower seed pestos.
• Mango Salsa with Mango Ember Hot Sauce — A five-minute fresh salsa with a kick from homemade Mango Ember hot sauce, with half the mango saved for a lassi.
• Nearly Colman's — Homemade Mustard Powder — Yellow and black mustard seeds ground fresh, the starting point for prepared mustard and a good deal else.
• How to Make Home Made Beer Mustard — A malty, more robust version for those who like a bit of extra character.
• The Wolstenholme Fold Sauce — A sharp, punchy mustard and Worcestershire pan sauce with a proper Rochdale origin story.
• Balinese Spicy Paste — Homemade Marinade for Meat — Lemongrass, kaffir lime and palm sugar, originally for Babi Guling roast pork, works brilliantly with goat too.
• Roasted Red Pepper Coulis — Roasted peppers, onion and carrot, blitzed smooth with garlic and a splash of balsamic. Works over grilled meat or fish, stirred into soups, or frozen for later.
• Lemon Cream Sauce — A quick pan sauce built in the trout pan — turmeric for colour, double cream, lemon juice and flat-leaf parsley. Off the heat and poured straight over the fish. Works equally well with white fish.

Fresh & Rustic

Homemade salsa recipes and other fresh, rustic things to spoon over a plate, from sunblushed tomatoes to black bean salsa.

• Homemade Sunblushed Cherry Tomatoes — Slow-roasted until sweet and intense, ready for almost anything.
• Piperade Andalusia — A simple, rustic Basque dish for lazy weekends.
• Classic Italian Gremolata — Parsley, lemon zest, and garlic. The finishing touch that lifts a braised dish completely.
• White Bean, Preserved Lemon and Cumin Purée — Three ingredients, five minutes, blitzed smooth. A quick spring or summer lunch with endive spears or vegetables of choice.
• Black Bean Salsa — Mango, Red Onion and Lime — fresh mango, red onion, lime and parsley. Five ingredients, ten minutes, no cooking. Alongside grilled fish or chicken, or as a dip with flatbread.

Dressings

Homemade dressings for salads, vegetables and fish, from Greek ladolemono and sharp sumac to creamy remoulade.

• Ladolemono Sauce: The Greek Lemon and Olive Oil Dressing — Olive oil, lemon and dried oregano, whisked in minutes, with a creamy version made with a little Dijon mustard. First met in a fish restaurant in Piraeus.
• Homemade Sumac Dressing — Sharp and fruity, built on ground sumac, lemon juice, olive oil and garlic.
• Quick Kale Dressing for Salads, Veg & Meat — Two versions in under five minutes: Mediterranean with EVOO and lemon, Asian-inspired with peanut oil, sesame and soy.
• Nearly K-Salat — A Homemade Danish Remoulade Recipe — wholegrain mustard, capers, cornichons, red onion, spring onion and ACV, with a pinch of turmeric for the K-Salat yellow. Creamy, tangy, and considerably more useful than moisturiser.

Preserves & Condiments

A little something to keep alongside your homemade sauces, salsas and dressings: preserves and condiments that last well and finish a plate.

• Fresh Mint Jelly — Amber, not green. Homemade mint jelly with Demerara sugar, apple cider vinegar, and liquid pectin — the version you can't find in rural Andalucía.

A Note on the Nearly Series

If you're here for the homemade condiment side of things, the Nearly Series is worth a look alongside these homemade sauces, salsas and dressings — recipes that set out to recreate a specific shop-bought condiment and get close enough to make the original redundant. Nearly Coleman's Mint Sauce, Nearly Branston, Nearly Lea & Perrins, and others. Kindred spirit, different angle.

New homemade sauces, salsas and dressings are added regularly, including more homemade salsa recipes, so bookmark this page and come back when a plate needs finishing.

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