Make your favorite Japanese dishes at home with this versatile 2-Minute Homemade Teriyaki Sauce! Plus it’s paleo and you probably have everything to make it on hand right now.
When Mike gets to choose our restaurant for date night, he inevitably goes with Lebanese or Pakistani. I was on a serious Indian food kick for a while when it was my turn to pick a place, but I had it so much even I got sick of it (which is unheard of for me), so now I’ve taken to exploring smaller, locally-owned restaurants of all kinds in our area (they are usually full of charm and character, with pretty good food to boot).
When neither of us has any particular place in mind for dinner, we usually go for Japanese, which is a favorite for us both. (Chicken for me, steak for him on the hibachi! And we’re both crazy about the rice.)
I’ve been thinking about making teriyaki at home and of course it’s easy enough to just pick up a bottle of sauce. But this sauce takes just two minutes to whip up from scratch and it basically consists of pantry staples that you probably already have on hand. And this way you get a delicious sauce that’s free of chemicals, preservatives, and ingredients that can’t be pronounced by non-scientists. Just plain old delicious teriyaki sauce.
I used honey in this recipe to make the sauce thicker and somewhat syrupy, but that being said, the flavor of this sauce is highly concentrated – both sweet and salty – so use it sparingly. You could thin it out with a bit of water (1/2 cup or so), but then I’d be tempted to add an arrowroot slurry to thicken the sauce and then it would need cooking. To keep it simple (you can’t beat a two-minute sauce that doesn’t require cooking!), I left the flavors concentrated. Use this sauce to marinate or season chicken, beef, seafood, or vegetables.
Here are a few other paleo teriyaki recipes from around the web that caught my eye:
Paleo Asian Chicken Meatballs with Teriyaki Glaze from Empowered Sustenance
Paleo Crockpot Chicken Teriyaki from PALEOHACKS
Paleo Teriyaki Chicken from The Nourishing Gourmet
Soy-Free Paleo Teriyaki Sauce from Paleo Newbie
Teriyaki Beef Stir Fry from PaleOMG
- ½ cup (120 ml) coconut aminos (see Note)
- ¼ cup (60 ml) honey
- 2 tablespoons apple cider vinegar
- 2 cloves garlic, crushed or grated on a microplane
- 2 teaspoons fresh ginger, grated on a microplane
- ½ teaspoon hot sauce or ¼ teaspoon crushed red pepper flakes (more or less to taste)
- Stir together all ingredients.
- Store refrigerated up to 2 weeks.
This Sauce is Concentrated: So you use it sparingly to marinate or season your food.
I’m Faith Gorsky, the writer, cook, and photographer behind An Edible Mosaic. My goal is to inspire you to get in the kitchen and try something new! Feel free to 
I made this vegan with agave nectar instead of honey and it turned out amazing. Tried it with low sodium tamari & was still just way too salty for me. Definitely will be sticking to using coconut aminos going forward. Thanks so much for this recipe! Some of my favorite things to use this sauce on is a teriyaki tempeh hoagie, teriyaki tofu noodle stir fry & teriyaki glazed cauliflower bites! I always make two bottles and they never last more than a week, if that!
I found this sauce about 6 weeks ago as my boyfriend and I were transitioning into a Paleo diet. We made Asian style meatballs and fell in love. My favorite is to marinate chicken thighs in this sauce, and then let it reduce down while we’re cooking them in a skillet! We make a double batch, and it will last about two weeks and cook about two meals a week for the both of us with some leftover to add to veggies. Thank you for this delicious, simple recipe!
We haven’t purposefully eaten any kind of sugar for the past 6 months. However, I had a craving for fried rice. Since we can’t have rice, I made egg fried quinoa and your teriyaki sauce was the base of my fry sauce. Needless to say it was delish.
So glad I found the recipe. Bookmarked for much future use!
This is awesome!! I love making my own condiments and this one is definitely on the agenda.
Just last night, I was making an Asian meatball recipe, and it kind of dawned on me that when I make stuff like that even though I’m making a sauce to go with them, it’s coming together from prebottled sauces. I actually was just thinking, I need to learn how to make Teriyaki sauce from scratch. LOL. So thanks!
Cool variation on teriyaki sauce! I have not gotten to try Pakistani cuisine yet, so I’m also jealous of your range of dining options. :)
This is awesome! My family loves teriyaki sauce, but the bottled stuff can be sooooo salty. This looks wonderful :)
teriyaki is our favorite, so I am super exited to try one that is actually on the healthy side, and your photos are SO beautiful