Honey Teriyaki Sauce
Sticky sweet Honey Teriyaki Sauce with its slightly salty umami flavor is the perfect sauce or marinade for chicken and fish and is great in stir fry and noodle dishes. Easy to make and incredibly versatile.
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Sauces are the magic that takes ordinary dinners to the extraordinary. No more plain chicken when all you need to do is add this easy quick Teriyaki Sauce to jazz things up. Then add a side dish like green beans, Garlic Roasted Broccoli and some rice or a quinoa salad and you have a simple dinner ready in no time!
Ingredients You’ll Need
- Soy Sauce and water – If you don’t like a saltier teriyaki you can opt for low-sodium soy. Gluten-Free? Swap the soy sauce for tamari. I ran out of soy and also did half soy and half coconut aminos and it tasted great.
- Honey and brown sugar – The sweet and sticky part of the recipe. If you don’t have honey or are vegan you could swap the honey for maple syrup.
- Sesame Oil – Not essential but offers a nice flavor.
- Garlic – lots and lots!
- Ground ginger – Adds a little kick but it is totally optional if you don’t like it.
- Rice wine vinegar – A little acid to balance out the sweet.
- Cold water and cornstarch – Used to thicken the sauce.
Making Honey Teriyaki Sauce
- Peel and finely mince the garlic cloves.
- Add the soy sauce, water, brown sugar, honey, minced garlic, ginger, rice wine vinegar and sesame oil to a small pot. Bring to a bowl over medium heat stirring frequently to blend the ingredients together.
- In a small cup add the cold water and cornstarch and whisk with a fork to dissolve the cornstarch. This is called a slurry.
- Add the slurry to the boiling soy sauce mixture and stir it in. Continue to boil the liquid for about a minute or until the teriyaki sauce coats the spoon. Remove the sauce from the heat.
Making the Slurry
It is important to use cold water when making the cornstarch slurry to thicken the sauce for a few reasons:
- When cornstarch is added to warm water it tends to clump making it nearly impossible to dissolve into the water. This will result in little white clumps throughout the sauce.
- Having the cornstarch dissolve in the water means that the cornstarch particles are suspended evenly throughout the water so that when they expand they thicken.
- In order for cornstarch to begin to create a gelatin it needs to reach a temperature of 180°F. Adding it to the already hot liquid after the cornstarch has been dissolved helps these particles swell quickly and gel in the hot liquid evenly and make a smooth thick sauce.
Ways To Use Teriyaki Sauce
- Baste chicken, fish, shrimp or beef with the sauce and bake or grill.
- Add your meat or fish of choice to a resealable bowl or bag and add the sauce. Let marinade overnight then bake, grill for a simple dinner. You can also freeze the sauce in the marinade to make a quick freezer meal.
- Toss noodles and veggies in the sauce to make a stir fry.
- Use it as a dip for chicken nuggets.
Storage
Store this teriyaki sauce recipe in a tightly sealed container in the fridge for up to 2 weeks.
Be sure to avoid cross-contamination by pouring the sauce you need into a bowl to baste from or into the bowl with meat to be marinated. Throw any leftover sauce that has come in contact with the basting brush or meat.
I find this recipe makes enough for only one large stir fry with noodles. If using it to marinade meat or baste the meat while cooking I can usually get two uses out of this recipe. So in this case split the teriyaki sauce in half to avoid contamination.
More Sauces & Seasonings To Try
Honey Teriyaki Sauce
Ingredients
- 1 cup water
- ⅓ cup soy sauce
- ⅓ cup brown sugar
- 2 tbsp honey
- 1 tbsp rice wine vinegar
- 2 tsp sesame oil
- 2 cloves garlic, minced
- ½ tsp ground ginger
- ¼ cup cold water
- 2 tbsp cornstarch
Instructions
- Add one cup of water, honey, brown sugar, soy sauce, sesame oil, rice wine vinegar and the minced garlic and ground ginger to a small pot. Whisk to ensure all of the ingredients are combined and the honey and brown sugar are dissolved into the liquid.
- Bring the ingredients to a boil over medium-high heat stirring occasionally.
- In a small cup add the cold water and the cornstarch. Use a fork to whisk the cornstarch into the water until it is completely dissolved to make a slurry.
- Add the cornstarch slurry to the pot of boiling liquid and whisk to combine. Let simmer for about 60 to 90 seconds to thicken. Stir the teriyaki sauce and if the sauce coats the back of the spoon in an opaque layer it is done. The sauce should not slide off the spoon it should stick to it.
- Remove sauce from the heat use in noodle dishes, as a dip, to baste on meat or fish or let cool and use as a marinade.
Nutrition
Notes
The information shown is an estimate provided by an online nutrition calculator. It should not be considered a substitute for a professional nutritionist’s advice.
